D.e.m.o.c.r.a.c.y (((((((((dicttor))))))))))

In general people seem not to question the spreading of democracy, its one of the few beliefs we in the west seem perfectly happy to impose on people and i was wondering why?

Imo democracy is inherently flawed due to its reliance on the quality and knowledge of the voters <_< . Did you know that over 50% of people are below average intelligence :blink: I&#39;ve actually never voted, I missed my chance at the last general election because my flatmate misplaced my postal vote, I don&#39;t know who i would have voted for, but chances are i would have known and understood incredibly little about the policies and effects thereof of whichever party i voted for, and i suspect that in that situation i would not have been alone. The average voter knows little and understands less. Throw in the intricacies & vagaries of inter and intra party dynamics and that the general public only seem to think of self-interest short term benefit and i think that sums up most of my main reasons for disliking democracy.

Its not that i totally dislike the idea of democracy, perhaps with some modifications it could be better. I read somewhere that america used to have a literacy test for voters, but that it was scrapped, i think the idea of some form of voter testing is a sound one, perhaps not of literacy, but maybe of knowledge and understanding of policies? This would no doubt increase voter apathy, but the average quality of each vote may rise.


If anyone has any thoughts on why democracy is actually a good way of making decisions...

to quote the bard

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Originally posted by i have add

huh C u gyus just stay quite just like in the past to afraid to find out the truth
cause then u think WTF have i been doing im still gona DIE every 1 dies but new
ppl come to shape the world for better or for worse
Plzz post ur comments especially any thoeries u ppl Might have

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(Sorry if anything doesn&#39;t make sense, I&#39;m half asleep)

It is a good way of thinking because it empowers the interested individual with the ability to control (or believe that he can) his future.

Laws to exclude people from voting would be perceived as a scam by "those in control" to shun those who are asking for change and help.

For instance, blacks were allowed to vote after being freed, but then some States said, "Oh wait, you have to own land in order to vote". Just a way the system can screen those who it does not want to participate.

And no, most blacks could not read either, it was illegal to teach this to a slave.

The concept that people are given a sense of empowerment, a sense of some control over their destiny, is a fine and noble one. Although people may not be versed in politics, people often know what they want from a new government and vote to secure their interests.

My parents, for instance, are more concerned about medication costs and health care issues than anything else and this will control their vote.

I still am in favor of the benevolent dictator myself, but that is another story.

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Originally posted by ilw@27 December 2003 - 19:15
Did you know that over 50% of people are below average intelligence

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How can this be?
Wouldn&#39;t this fact lower the "average" in "average intelligence"?

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Originally posted by clocker+28 December 2003 - 03:05--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (clocker @ 28 December 2003 - 03:05)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-ilw@27 December 2003 - 19:15
Did you know that over 50% of people are below average intelligence

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How can this be?
Wouldn&#39;t this fact lower the "average" in "average intelligence"? [/b][/quote]
the boy makes a good point

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Originally posted by the.gringo+28 December 2003 - 04:14--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (the.gringo &#064; 28 December 2003 - 04:14)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>

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Originally posted by clocker@28 December 2003 - 03:05
<!--QuoteBegin-ilw

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@27 December 2003 - 19:15
Did you know that over 50% of people are below average intelligence

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How can this be?
Wouldn&#39;t this fact lower the "average" in "average intelligence"?

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the boy makes a good point[/b][/quote]
http://mecha.barry.edu/public/gallery/pix/6bscout1.jpg

I smell "merit badge" for a certain "boy".

Thanks hobbes, but my badge sash is already full.

A true democracy is where everybody participates, thou this can also be referred as mob rule.

In Australia once you register on the electoral roll it&#39;s compulsory to vote, not showing up to vote at an election will get you fined, if you refuse to pay you’ll get imprisoned usually for a short term 7 - 30 days, this seems to put a halt to groups getting undue amounts of say over policy unlike the US were this seems rife, but it doesn’t completely stop it.

In the last election John Howard used a racist streak in Australians to win the last election by treating Refugees as a threat, proving that racism was alive and well in the electorate, a compassionate doco about refugees even had people making ignorant statements like "there’s not enough room for them" and so on, Although in reality John Howard has allowed many more people to migrate to Australia as long as they have money that is. :angry: :angry:

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Originally posted by hobbes+28 December 2003 - 03:21--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (hobbes @ 28 December 2003 - 03:21)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>

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Originally posted by the.gringo@28 December 2003 - 04:14

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Originally posted by clocker@28 December 2003 - 03:05
<!--QuoteBegin-ilw

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@27 December 2003 - 19:15
Did you know that over 50% of people are below average intelligence

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How can this be?
Wouldn&#39;t this fact lower the "average" in "average intelligence"?

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the boy makes a good point

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http://mecha.barry.edu/public/gallery/pix/6bscout1.jpg

I smell "merit badge" for a certain "boy". [/b][/quote]
lmao


is that ur kid hobbes?

His kid?
That is hobbes himself.

There is talk about allowing only high school educated citizens to vote in the u.s.

but this is silly.

does this mean that the hooker who dropped out of high school, can&#39;t choose the candidate who she thinks will allow her to have abortions.

whether you agree or not, she is still a c itizen of the united states and deserves her vote.

If you go after intelligence, what next, weight?

then 65% of americans wouldn&#39;t be able to vote.

But The U.S. needs to wake up and realize that having the right to vote is an amazing achievment, its sad that what, 11% of the voting population actually votes?

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Originally posted by kAb@28 December 2003 - 07:46
But The U.S. needs to wake up and realize that having the right to vote is an amazing achievment, its sad that what, 11% of the voting population actually votes?

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This low number can either be good or bad.

Good: Things are going well, the new administration probably won&#39;t screw things up too much, whomever wins. The apathy stems from lack of need for significant change. Once severe problems arise you will see a lot more interest in politics by the average citizen. Outside of college students, politics is a subject of very little interest here in the States. In some countries, politics are discussed with every meal.

Bad: The system is corrupt, my vote doesn&#39;t really count.

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Originally posted by ilw@27 December 2003 - 20:15
I read somewhere that america used to have a literacy test for voters, but that it was scrapped,

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* With good reason it was meant to keep blacks, who usually weren&#39;t taught to read at the time , from voting.

* If you place restriction on who is to vote there is always the question of who is to determine what the restricitons are and the
possibility of some classes gaining too much power over the others.

* I don&#39;t know the exact numbers but i think about 98 percent of people are within 10 -20 iq points away from average in either
direction(anyone know the exact numbers)

* We have known for a long time that IQ test are not good measures of who will make intelligent decisions in life, they rely too heavily on verbal intelligence, a persons skill at taking tests, and on knowledge. And are best at doing what that were originally meant to do - predict who will have problems in school.

* If 50% of people are below average that is half the population that needs to be represented.


I think the best thing that could be done is to offer the more information that can be easily accessible. I Also thinks it would be better if we had more power over individual decisions, not groups of them. I don&#39;t think we should be stuck trying to choose one person who we know little about, to make all of the best choices.

Edit: bad typing, spacing

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Originally posted by clocker+27 December 2003 - 21:05--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (clocker @ 27 December 2003 - 21:05)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-ilw@27 December 2003 - 19:15
Did you know that over 50% of people are below average intelligence

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How can this be?
Wouldn&#39;t this fact lower the "average" in "average intelligence"? [/b][/quote]
Yeah It&#39;s an average. :lol: Iq is measured on a bell curve.

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Originally posted by hobbes+28 December 2003 - 10:18--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (hobbes @ 28 December 2003 - 10:18)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-kAb@28 December 2003 - 07:46
But The U.S. needs to wake up and realize that having the right to vote is an amazing achievment, its sad that what, 11% of the voting population actually votes?

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This low number can either be good or bad.

Good: Things are going well, the new administration probably won&#39;t screw things up too much, whomever wins. The apathy stems from lack of need for significant change. Once severe problems arise you will see a lot more interest in politics by the average citizen. Outside of college students, politics is a subject of very little interest here in the States. In some countries, politics are discussed with every meal.

Bad: The system is corrupt, my vote doesn&#39;t really count. [/b][/quote]
Like i said I think it is a lack of adequate information, on the other hand if things were worse i would probably put a lot more effortin in to obtainig infromation, so maybe it is a little of both.

Two points:

1) Your point has been covered, read the thread before posting in this forum (first post).
2) Since you obviously made little effort to make your post intelligible, why should anybody waste time reading it?

I agree with your position, but damn that is a really sloppy load you dropped. One would think that if you really gave a shit about what you were saying, you would have made an effort to express yourself more articulately.

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Since you obviously made little effort to make your post intelligible

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Maybe it was kinda sloppy

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Your point has been covered, read the thread before posting in this forum

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i was just giving my opinion before i read the posts. I do think it adds a little though.

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Originally posted by Chame1eon@29 December 2003 - 00:15

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Since you obviously made little effort to make your post intelligible

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Maybe it was kinda sloppy

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Your point has been covered, read the thread before posting in this forum

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i was just giving my opinion before i read the posts. I do think it adds a little though.

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"NO VOTING FOR YOU&#33;&#33;&#33;&#33;", said the Soup Nazi

In England, over 30% don&#39;t bother to vote because they are either, apathetic, or think everything is ok, which is good or bad, depends which way you look at it. i think people should be made to vote like Australia.
If we had a referendum on going into Europe, everybody would vote because it&#39;s such a topical subject.

keep in mind that the american and british democratic systems aren&#39;t democracies in the strict sense, anyway. they&#39;re representative democracies, with quite a few quirks here & there that exclude them from being "pure" democracies (i.e. the electoral college, the house of lords, etc).

If you want to get picky, the United States of America is a federal republic, and England is a constitutional monarchy (with an unwritten constitution) combined with a representative democracy.

:ninja:

errm the 50% comment was supposed to be tongue in cheek, though i suppose it could have been median average :rolleyes:

While i agree testing is very open to abuse, I think its valid. Basically my argument for it is that I can&#39;t see why we don&#39;t let children vote. If the reason is that we consider them unable to make a valid and informed choice then i think that argument applies to a much greater percentage of the population, myself probably included.

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If we had a referendum on going into Europe, everybody would vote because it&#39;s such a topical subject.

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I was thinking about bringing referendums up, for instance the vote on the Euro which the UK government have long been side stepping. I really don&#39;t understand how the public is supposed to decide on a subject as complex as joining a single economic policy. I feel the public will end up basing the vote primarily on short term financial gain and a bizarre assortment of patriotic/nationalistic pride and prejudice. I suppose democracy does give people power over their own destiny, but are they capable of handling the responsibility.

I don&#39;t care about voter apathy/turnouts, as long as those who do vote know wtf they are actually voting for. I would never have a system of forcing everyone to vote, as this would not make the decision reached any more intelligent or reasoned (imo the reverse would be true).

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If 50% of people are below average that is half the population that needs to be represented.

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Surely you don&#39;t really mean this? If you do then i sincerely hope you are never involved in electoral reform :ph34r:

If people were forced to vote in the UK, then the Monster & Raving Loony Party would have seats in the commons....almost certainly.








This may not be a bad idea <_<

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Originally posted by Rat Faced@29 December 2003 - 10:59
If people were forced to vote in the UK, then the Monster & Raving Loony Party would have seats in the commons....almost certainly.

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I have no idea what their politics might be but they have my vote based solely on the name.

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Alan Howling Lord Hope is the current Leader of the Official Monster Raving Loony Party. Until recently, Alan shared the Party Leadership with Cat Mandu, his cat. Sadly, Mandu was killed in a tragic road accident in 2002.

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Didn&#39;t someone say that they actually won a seat once and weren&#39;t half bad? I think we could do worse...

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The Natural Law Party offers a simple formula to create a perfect government capable of satisfying everyone. The formula is: establish A Group for a Government. The first act of the Natural Law Party when it takes office will be to establish a group of 7,000 Yogic Flyers in Britain, who will create a highly coherent national consciousness, bring the support of the evolutionary power of Natural Law to national life, and create an atmosphere in which everything will be right, positive and harmonious in our government. ... [then] we will have a clear sky and a new sunshine to make successful policies and programmes for all good to the nation.

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Originally posted by ilw@28 December 2003 - 02:15
I&#39;ve actually never voted...

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I stopped reading after that.

They&#39;ve won a couple of council seats in local elections, and were quite good...except for the main parties "Ganging up" against them, from what i have heard.

Unfortunatly, ive never had the opportunity to vote for them myself, as they&#39;ve never stood in this location..shame :)

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The Natural Law Party offers a simple formula to create a perfect government capable of satisfying everyone. The formula is: establish A Group for a Government. The first act of the Natural Law Party when it takes office will be to establish a group of 7,000 Yogic Flyers in Britain, who will create a highly coherent national consciousness, bring the support of the evolutionary power of Natural Law to national life, and create an atmosphere in which everything will be right, positive and harmonious in our government. ... [then] we will have a clear sky and a new sunshine to make successful policies and programmes for all good to the nation.

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Sounds like New Labour, except for the yogic flyers....give &#39;em time though............. :P


@ Clocker Here&#39;s their website :)

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Originally posted by Sid Hartha+29 December 2003 - 17:56--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Sid Hartha @ 29 December 2003 - 17:56)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-ilw@28 December 2003 - 02:15
I&#39;ve actually never voted...

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I stopped reading after that. [/b][/quote]
perhaps you should go back and try again, I did give vague details on why i tried & missed out on voting at the only general election i&#39;ve been eligible for.
I&#39;m also curious as to why my not having voted matters, as far as i can tell it has no bearing on the value or level of interest of my post&#39;s content except that i might know the joy of making a fairly insignificant (considering the distance between the two main parties in the constituency i live in) contribution to who will govern the country I live in.

So - in other words - you have never actually voted.

Despite my cynicism I invariably plod down to the poll booth. Sadly, more in hope than any real expectation that anything much will change.

Although far from perfect, what could one have other than a representative democracy. Although benign dictatorships tend to get things done there are far too few safeguards to prevent the "benign" part being dropped.

There is a school of thought that suggests that countries run best when politicians do least. :blink: But then a cynic would say that wouldn&#39;t he?

A quote I rather like is "It doesn&#39;t matter who you vote for - the government always gets in" - not that I am suggesting we all rush out and read Gramsci - he was a little too earnest for my taste. I prefer my anarchists to be more of the Tooting Popular Front variety. However, there is a sense of everything pretty much going on as normal regardless of the party in power. Despite all her dislike of public spending, Mrs T did not really make much impact on the % of GDP spent on public services.

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Originally posted by Sid Hartha@29 December 2003 - 19:04
So - in other words - you have never actually voted.

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Wow, theres no sneaking things past you, whats your nickname... Razor?

Do you perhaps have a point? and if so, would you mind sharing?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/ilove/year...ensmith173.jpg

Power to the People

And for all our younger viewers..Here&#39;s what we&#39;re talking about....










I&#39;ll get me coat......

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Originally posted by ilw+29 December 2003 - 21:08--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (ilw @ 29 December 2003 - 21:08)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-Sid Hartha@29 December 2003 - 19:04
So - in other words - you have never actually voted.

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Wow, theres no sneaking things past you, whats your nickname... Razor?

Do you perhaps have a point? and if so, would you mind sharing? [/b][/quote]
I&#39;m sorry.

I just find it hilarious that you bothered to offer an explanation for why you missed the last elections ("my flatmate..."), yet you question the intelligence of people who managed to make it to the polls - let alone the entire system.

The irony escapes you.

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Originally posted by Sid Hartha+29 December 2003 - 21:33--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Sid Hartha @ 29 December 2003 - 21:33)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>

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Originally posted by ilw@29 December 2003 - 21:08
<!--QuoteBegin-Sid Hartha

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@29 December 2003 - 19:04
So - in other words - you have never actually voted.

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Wow, theres no sneaking things past you, whats your nickname... Razor?

Do you perhaps have a point? and if so, would you mind sharing?

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I&#39;m sorry.

I just find it hilarious that you bothered to offer an explanation for why you missed the last elections ("my flatmate..."), yet you question the intelligence of people who managed to make it to the polls - let alone the entire system.

The irony escapes you. [/b][/quote]
One of you reminds me of J&#39;Pol.

how about this-- instead of having people go into the booth and pull lever A for the party on the left or lever B for the party on the right...

... they put a slot machine (brits call it a fruit machine, i believe) in the booth, with pictures of the candidates&#39; faces on the wheels, and whoever&#39;s face lines up after you pull, that&#39;s who you&#39;ve voted for. if you don&#39;t get three in a row, then your vote doesn&#39;t count. :D

I don&#39;t think i&#39;m qualified to vote either, but I don&#39;t feel that intelligence is really an important deciding factor rather it is the understanding and knowledge of the issues that i find important in deciding who should vote, the 50% intelligence thing was merely a vaguely humorous (to me) throw away comment. However, seeing as even greatly increased intelligence would likely not have helped me locate a postal vote that was basically hidden (without malice) from me by a flatmate, i still fail to see the irony or your point.

Do you actually have a real point to make on the subject of democracy, or on any of the material contributed by others in this debate or is this just trolling?

Unfortunatly, there is no way to measure wisdom as their is intelligence....and Common Sense is in no way common.

Added to which, it doesnt really matter, as whoever gets in will probably not keep their manifesto promises... due "to the legacies of the previous government" even if its 10 years since a the opposition were in power.

We&#39;ve seen it all before...

The electorate will always vote for "Cakes and Circus&#39;s"......cant remember who im quoting there, however it basically means that they will vote for whats best for them personally, and not the country as a whole.

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Originally posted by ilw@29 December 2003 - 11:23

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If 50% of people are below average that is half the population that needs to be represented.

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Surely you don&#39;t really mean this? If you do then i sincerely hope you are never involved in electoral reform :ph34r:

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I can&#39;t belive you&#39;re serious :o
If any group has power over anohter nothing is going to stop them from depriving the powerless group of the things they want and need. If everyone can play a part in making the decisions more people are happy, and cared for . What is the point of having a powerfull government if half of the people are unhappy?
Also, like i ws saying, we don&#39;t have an accurate mesure of intelligence. 50 percent is kind of an arbitrary number. the tests and the way the results are interpreted are constantly adjusted to fit a bell curve with 100 as average. Without the adjustment iq has been improving since the 40&#39;s so that a person with a score of 100 in 1940 would now have score of maybe 75.

I hardly ever vote for anything when it comes to larger elections, on the basis that I either don&#39;t know enough about the agendas of each party, or that what I know about these parties seem stupid.

I fear that many voters in my country only vote a certain way because they always have, or because their union sympathizes with a certain faction, or because they are doing like their parents, or because they are suckers ready to follow whoever shouts the loudest about feminism or enviromental preservation or whatever the next fad may be.

The politicians might not necessarily make a good point, mainly it&#39;s just empty rhetorics but still votes are given them because they are noticed.

To make matters worse, in my country, I sometimes can&#39;t even discern who is supposed to left-wing or conservative or whatever else just by looking at their politics, they just claim to be part of a certain ideology on the basis of tradition.

And if that isn&#39;t enough the media usually manages to make matters even more diffuse. I usually just vote blank just to show my displeasure with the system. That way the mistakes made aren&#39;t mine, of course this still makes me guilty of omission, which is a mistake in itself.

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Originally posted by ilw@29 December 2003 - 22:10
Do you actually have a real point to make on the subject of democracy, or on any of the material contributed by others in this debate or is this just trolling?

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Guilty as charged. I apologize - this does deserve a reply.

Where I live - not too long ago - a very major election was blown (in my opinion) because a minor third party candidate ran mostly on the premise that there wasn&#39;t any appreciable difference between the two "established" candidates. This message apparently caught on, mostly with moderate/liberal voters. They voted for the third party candidate - not because they thought he had a chance, but as a symbolic "other" vote to protest the mediocrity of the other two candidates.

Result: Bad, bad president. Two wars, economy in the shitter... hated by most of the world. I sometimes wonder if anyone who voted for Ralph Nader still believes there was essentially no difference between Bush and Gore.

Just a few votes would have changed all that. Voter apathy fucked us. When intelligent people stay at home (is this you?), that means the dumbasses pick our leaders (eg: USA).

There&#39;s always a difference between candidates.

edit/ so I guess I get a little cranky when someone who doesn&#39;t vote starts a thread like this. ;)

me being a teenager have talked and heard other youngins talk about politics and tho the media portrays most teens today and violent morons whose cant walk 2 feet with out tripping it seems as tho most of us give more of a shit about what way the country is going then the so called parents. their will eventually be a generations that dramatically changes the future for tha good whether that me my generation or a few futher down the road i duno all i know is that at this piont in time the only flaws i see in America has to do with the goverment.