I'm going to reply to a lot of this thread, partly as a commentary to the things said, partly as a direct response. This may take a while ... but bear with me here. This'll probably take the crown "longest legitimate post on gotwoot, ever" [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-happy.gif[/img]
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Originally posted by: milfhunter
If this country was a democracy, then we'd all be caucasian orthodox methodists and at the mercy of southerners with below average IQs. Read some books.
EDIT: If the United States of America was a democracy, then we'd all be at the mercy of illiterate southerners with severely below average IQs.
What's ok with this? Well, the central point makes sense, but Ben Franklin said it much better: "Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote."
What's wrong with this?
(1) How would we all be caucasian? Would this imply that the honkeys rose up en masse to expel the people who made them breakfast every day, and farmed their fields? Not so much -- the prevalent opinion of white people in the last 150 or so years is pretty much the prevalent opinion of everyone else as well: civil rights are good, diversity isn't the devil, and if I can get someone else to clean my house for a nominal fee, why not? You're suggesting that nearly every white person is the "white devil" parading around in a KKK outfit and lynching everyone who isn't white. This is quite not the case.
(2) We're a representative democracy, not a pure democracy. Representative democracies force their representatives to bear in mind the principles on which the country was founded, and think about the repercussions of their decisions in ways that direct democracies don't require. This is an attempt to harness the less transient essence of the people, rather than the more transient opinion of the people. Again, this is what good old Bennie was saying back in 1753.
(3) By definition of "average", in a normal distribution (as intelligence follows), no more than half of the people in the country should be there. If they are, then either the metric is mis-tuned and needs to be adjusted, or the testing is flawed, or the distribution is abnormal and needs to be rethought. In the case of IQ, intelligence very closely follows a normal distribution, thus there's no possibility of tyrrany exclusively by people on one side of it or the other. Indeed, you'd need confluence of opinions between both sides of the mean line in order to rule -- which is what we have, thanks in no small part to the presence of a century of marketing research yielding a very ... let's call it Machiavellian understanding of popular opinion.
(4) Orthodox Methodists. Let's stop for a minute to appreciate the stunning beauty of this incredible oxymoron. Let it sink in. Yes, you've just managed to create a link between Methodism (a practice that claims to have come into existence less than 200 years ago, and has its roots in the reformation started by Martin Luther in the 1500's) and the practice of Orthodoxy (meaning traditionalist practices in religion). Orthodoxy can NOT be applied to methodists, I'm sorry.
(5). Illiteracy isn't just for southerners anymore. In fact, 3/4 of college students lack functional literacy. When was the last time you got off your ass and read a work of great classic fiction, or an essay on something with more depth than the latest news?
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Originally posted by Masamuneehs
When I was speaking of 'democratic values', i could see how people might reject that statement. My idea of what values our government stands for are not the same as anyone elses. A value, among other things, is worth in importance to the possessor of that value. It can also be a principle, standard, or quality that one considers desirable. I don't believe 'democratic values' under those definitions are STRICTLY declared in any law or document. Otherwise it would be against the law for me to disagree with you
What's right?
(1) well, we've got ground rules for what "values" are, and a general hand-wavey approach to what you mean by "democratic values".
What's wrong?
(1) You're not talking about democratic values. You mean to say "liberty" and "those who value liberty". Democracy is tyranny, as Ben said (quoted above).
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Originally posted by el_boss
Isn't this how it is now? I mean the fact that it's the state elections that count and not the total votes of the entire population. I agree that America isn't really a democracy. Since there is basically only two parties to vote for and the "losing" side doesn't get represented.
No, no, that's the very ESSENCE of democracy. We've managed to avoid it for a long time, because popular opinion has been overwhelmingly popular opinion, in most cases (while it could be argued that in fact Bush's 2000 election was anti-democratic because he lost the popular vote, but the electoral college is set up as an attempt to balance representation based on population with the voice of the minority). But I digress ... the US was never meant to be a democracy, it was meant to be a federalist republic. We've lost the meaning of both that federalism and that idea of a republic of late, though -- federalism because our national government has gained too much power and exerts too much influence over what should ultimately remain state affairs, and the republic because of the raw perversion of what "republican" has come to mean.
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Originally posted by: milfhunter
I don't think so either. I'd go further by stating the obvious that a pure Republic never existed in USA.
In fact, the US is an exercise in hybridity. We're a democratic republic, practising socialistic capitalism (ie: capitalism with a welfare system), and US public opinion has historically been socially liberal and fiscally conservative. And none of this is in conflict, per se. The conflicts between the "left" and the "right" are largely artificial, created as tools to manipulate public opinion for one side's interests or another.
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Originally posted by: God#2
Dam, You beat me to it. Oh well. Anyway, democracy is never good nowadays because everybody is just so dumb. And Republics dont work either, I mean look at our country! (U.S.A)
What? People now are as smart as they've ever been. Smarter, even. Less self-reliant, lazier, and more easily manipulated. But still smarter, in a certain sense. And the US is either both or neither democratic and/nor republican.
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Originally posted by el_boss
I think everyone knows that there are more parties than reblicans and democrats in america. But the fact remains that these two parties get like 99% of the votes or something like that.
This is a direct result of cognitive laziness. You find a party you like. You check their box. Simple.
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Originally posted by mage
Aborting all the black babies in the country would lower crime rates. Bill Bennet said so.
There's always someone to demonize. Kill all the blacks off, and next thing you know, it'll be those damned hispanics. Kill them off, and it'll be the asians. Kill them off, it'll be the irish. Kill them, italians. Then germans. Then ... whatever.
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Originally posted by Ero-fan
And that any system where you elect representatives is a republic, since a true democracy (where everyone votes on every issue) is just about impossible in today's world.
Actually, with the advent of ubiquitous connecting technology, a direct democracy is more of a realistic possibility than it's ever been (and the results of it are predictable. See also: TRL). But what we have isn't necessarily a "republic" per se, it's a hybrid between a republic and a representative democracy. A republic doesn't necessarily have to follow the whims of popular opinion, so long as it recognizes that power ultimately comes from the people.
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Anyway, it doesn't matter too much if the supreme court decides to overturn roe vs. wade. If they do, and you read the law, then each individual state sets their own abortion laws. Even though that seems stupid, it could happen.
In the case of state law, that's true. Theres no constitutional basis for a sane federal government to be concerning itself with reproductive issues, except to explicitly guarantee or deny them to the people as a whole. What's a but more worrisome is if congress decides that abortion should be illegal, and aims for a constitutional amendment to the effect. Not that that'd ever get ratified (one can hope).
Of course, even in the case of a national ban on abortion, there's an abortion-friendly neighbor to our north. Are they going to give every woman a pregnancy test at the border before letting her enter Canada? I doubt it.
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Originally posted by KoKo37erm, if any kinds of people aborted that much, there would probably be lower crime rates because lower amounts of people.
Let's think of this for a second. The population is growing. Abortion is legal. Crime rates are dropping. While it follows that if the population were being aborted at a rate that would actually impact net population growth, there would be less crime, it would only reduce the actual number of crimes, not the per-capita crime rate necessarily.
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Originally posted by God#2
Guess why black are in poverty and have to resort to crime, um i dont know, how about WHITE PPLZ?????
If you'd care to make a cogent argument in this direction, I'd suggest reading the book "Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria" by Beverly Daniel Tatum. It puts forth a quite excellent operant definition of racism (as systematic advantage, as opposed to prejudice). Ultimately, however, blame for the prevalence of any race overrepresented in poverty can't be heaped exclusively on one group -- many black people have "made it" without the help of whites, and a big chunk of what dooms so many blacks to the same poverty-ridden lives their parents led is in fact indigenous to black adolescent culture (for instance, the rejection of education as a "white" value).
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Originally posted by mage
There is no such thing as racism. They are in poverty and have to steal to survive because they are inferior.
You should also read that book I recommended to God#2 above.
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Originally posted by The Heretic Azazel
Why are these blacks impoverished? i don't know, how about... getting off their lazy asses and forgoing welfare for a real job.
With no marketable skills and a self-defeating value system? I think & not so much. Recommendation number three for the book above.
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Originally posted by ChaosKiddo
the topic has nothing to do with blacks or whites or jobs!
Directly, no. Tangentially, yes. But ...
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Originally posted by masamuneehsi think it goes without saying that basing any argument for/against abortion on racist or cultural grounds is a pretty poor argument.
Right on.
Getting back on topic, ImitationSanen says some interesting things:
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Originally posted by ImitationSanenThe truth is, in the United States you are what you make yourself. If you choose to be a moron by joining a gang or doing drugs you do so on your own merit as a human being. On the same token, if you bust your ass in school, dont smoke crack, and go to work everyday you will be successful. All this independant of your race.
Yet another recommendation for Tatum's book. But to summarize the important part ... as someone living in a racist (and sexist, and ageist, and about a dozen other -ists) society, you get advantages for the things you conform to the socially accepted image of "good" in. A light skinned black woman has an easier time finding a nice apartment than a dark-skinned one, an attractive, able-bodied person has more luck finding a good job than an ugly, sickly one. Even if such factors have no logical bearing on the person's capacity to perform the job.
It's not a question of whether success is possible. It's a question of to what degree success is possible.
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If they are supposedly for the equal treatment of everyone, why do they further programs which make a point of throwing our cultural differences in each others faces?
and
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I can honestly tell you, when I look at a person, I dont see their race, their sex, or religion. I see their merits, what you do is who you are, race is irrelevant.
In fact, this ties back to something I said about the top of this post, which is that popular opinion is socially liberal and fiscally conservative: Democrats dont see how to be fiscally conservative, Republicans dont see how to be socially liberal (and Bush doesnt see how to be either). Beyond that, Id say that those programs are essential. Being colorblind in a racist (in Tatums definition) society means in fact exploiting the fact that youre in the advantaged class. If you werent, you couldnt afford the luxury of pretending that everyone is on a level playing field.
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I think we should once and for all just celebrate the unity of one people under one flag instead of constantly trying to throw our differences in each others faces. On the same token our race, gender or religion should never be used as an excuse as to why we fail, its an insult to everyone of that race or religion that did the right thing to succeed.
I partially agree. We need to celebrate our unity as a people, as Americans, as Humans. At the same time, we must fight to preserve the cultural distinctness that makes us all different. Americas great strength isnt uniformity, its heterogeneity. The fact that I am different than you, and you are different than my Latino neighbors or my Black friends or my Middle-eastern coworkers is a wonderful thing. If we were all the same, we wouldnt have this rich cultural diversity to explore. As I said before, America is an exercise in hybridity. And, in fact, even this community is an exercise in the same: everyone here is here because of our explorations of the entertainment of a different culture. Would anime be appealing if it were all Love Hina?
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I am a white male raised with southern values, no one should be generalized by what color they are or where they are from.
sweet vindication. You are, in fact, the majority. You can afford colorblindness. Ask your Black friends (you _do_ have a couple, right?) about it sometime, about what they think of the race situation in this country. I agree that prejudice needs to be done away with, but pretending that it isnt there isnt going to make it happen. Then, neither is prying at it like Farrakhan and his ilk, or in fact anyone pushing hate on either side. Understanding and awareness are the keys.
But what did that have to do with the topic? Oh, this:
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As far as abortion, other than in cases of incest and danger to the mother, I believe it is a license to have unprotected sex, since kids believe there is little or no permanent damage done (I can just get an abortion). That was fine until 1979 when the AIDs virus came into play. Sex is a dangerous thing anymore. I can't say how i feel either way, accept messing with the natural order of things never seems to work right for us.
Indeed. That's the danger of abortion, and the big objectionable side: that people will use abortion as a contraceptive. I think that's a terrible thing. Regardless of HIV or other STDs, people need to learn personal responsibility. But how can you mandate that in a political climate like this, where the most corrupt, horrible people manage to both get and retain political office, mocking the very term "personal responsibility"?
In fact, in as marketing-laden a world as we live in, there are researchers questioning the impact of such things on our very capacity for free will and rational thought. Is personal responsibility a contradiction in an age where "God is in the TV"?
Such questions lie at the core of the abortion debate. Can we modulate our own behavior in the face of what amounts to brainwashing, equating every product with sexuality and ordering us to seek both? If not, then all hope for restricting the use of abortion as a birth control agent is just misguided.
