• Buttons@programming.dev
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    65
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    True democracy would be filling at least one branch of government with randomly selected citizens. Career politicians are psychopaths and don’t represent us.

    • ChiwaWithMujicanoHat@mujico.org
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      20
      ·
      1 year ago

      It’s funny and sad at the same time that career politicians are allowed to exist because they tend to be the ones voting for their own restrictions and benefits.

      Term restrictions? Fuck that

      Increase our own salary even though we haven’t passed any new laws actually helping society? Let’s goo

      • jecxjo@midwest.social
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        edit-2
        1 year ago

        More like reasonable term limits.

        Two terms for each position seems reasonable so you can be asked to continue or asked to leave. This allows you to run on a policy, implement it and then fix it or things that need to be tweaked and then get out.

        • ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          1 year ago

          Also means you have less time to cash in so you’re forced to sell policy to the highest bidder and never enact changes that you actually want

          • jecxjo@midwest.social
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            2
            ·
            1 year ago

            Think that issue gets resolved quickly as no one really has the power in tenure anymore. If everyone only has a few years a cycle or two of stalemates will eventually lead to both sides having to work together or try and win the entire house.

        • wieson@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          This leads to another problem. Everyone will make policy to suck up to industry in order to secure a job after their term limits.

          It’s already a problem of politicians swapping in and out of politics and into industry. Today they “represent the people against car manufacturers”, tomorrow they are a car industry lobbyist.

  • papel@lemmyf.uk
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    60
    ·
    1 year ago

    Democracy is incompatible with power concentration. Excessive wealth easily translates into power, thus, it breaks the balance of any democracy.

    There’s also a saying that “Democracy cannot exist while people are hungry”, because a common complaint is that “poor people vote with their stomachs”.

    • Cabunach@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      1
      arrow-down
      6
      ·
      1 year ago

      I don’t see what makes these things incapable of being present at the same time as democracy.

      Seems like these statements are based on feelings, not actual reasoning.

      • FaeDrifter@midwest.social
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        Let me use an example. Let’s say you’re my partner, and it’s movie night. I give you a choice between two movies: Star Wars, and Harry Potter. However, if you choose Harry Potter for movie night, I will actually break both your hands with a sledgehammer.

        I say I’m giving you a choice, but do you actually have a fair choice?

        • Cabunach@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          1
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          I don’t see how that’s an adequate example.

          It seems like you’re making a bad attempt at a caricature instead of actually explaining.

          • desconectado@lemm.ee
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            5
            ·
            edit-2
            1 year ago

            People choose policies that might be beneficial in the short term, but very harmful on the long way. For example, restricting immigration might have a favourable short term impact on wages, but in the long term it will stagnate the economy and pensions schemes, and make people even more poor.

            So… People who are hungry will vote for whatever brings food to their table today, so they don’t really have a choice, because those policies or politicians are not actually on their side, they are just benefiting from the misery of others.

  • jkmooney@kbin.social
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    49
    ·
    1 year ago

    “Plutocracy” is the term for “Financial Oligarchy” BTW. Worth knowing the term if you live in the U.S. since that’s kinda what we have here these days :/

    • Dogyote@slrpnk.net
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      1 year ago

      Huh, I guess I’m a neo-Brandeisian:

      The New Brandeis movement opposes the school of thought in modern antitrust law that antitrust should center on customer welfare (as generally advocated by the Chicago school of economics). Instead, the New Brandeis movement advocates a broader antimonopoly approach that is concerned with the structure of the economy and market conditions necessary to promote vigorous competition.

      Capitalists hate capitalism. They don’t want to compete with other firms, they want a monopoly. So it’s like you’re saying to the monopolists, fine, you want to do capitalism? Well then we’re going to jam so much capitalism down your throat you’ll shit free market competition.

    • juliebean@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      i guess, but only as much as any other oligarchy. you can have democracy where the only people who can vote are people with doctorates in stem fields, or who’re land owning white men, or who have their patents of nobility, or who have at least a million USD in their bank account. but really it’s not particularly in keeping with the ideal that people are usually talking about when they say ‘democracy’.

  • Touching_Grass@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    5
    arrow-down
    10
    ·
    edit-2
    1 year ago

    The left are champs at rallying around memes that makes no sense to anyone but themselves. Like anti memes.

    • trailing9@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      1 year ago

      They are not entirely wrong. Oligarchy influences media and thus voters and thus changes the will of the population. You should be aware of that.

      • Touching_Grass@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        3
        ·
        1 year ago

        But isn’t it amazing the right was able to convey all that with “fake news” the left always makes it sound like the right are a bunch of morons never realizing it was all well crafted.

        • rumckle@aussie.zone
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          4
          ·
          1 year ago

          Because most right wing memes are created by professionals. Left wing memes are genuine grass root creations.

          The best grass root memes the right can come with is “let’s go Brandon”, which while catchy is about as meaningful as farting into a microphone.

          • Touching_Grass@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            1 year ago

            Right. You say it like its a slight against the right. They by far much better funded, equipped and actually doing what works every single day and the left are so far behind the times in the new social media world. The ground already given up will never be recovered.

    • hare_ware@pawb.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      1 year ago

      It’s not even that this one doesn’t make sense, it’s just not funny or a meme, even if it’s agreeable.

      • Touching_Grass@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        5
        ·
        1 year ago

        That’s kind of what I mean. If the political parties were actual partys. The right would be a backyard with a keg, axe throwing and live band with fireworks and strippers. The left would be a book reading in a damp living room where the the host served canned mini sausages and everybody wore wool sweaters.