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[McTraveller]

That's a serious misunderstanding of how democracy works - you only "vote them out" if the majority (simple or 2/3 or whatever, doesn't matter) of the people want what you want.

You can say you don't like what the majority does, but you can't say that isn't "a functioning democracy."

Democracies are only dysfunctional if the vote is so corrupt it doesn't actually represent the will of the people.  In the US the "problem" is that the general population is so homogenous that it's close to 50/50 on about every issue, so a very small change results in big policy impact.  All the arguing about gerrymandering, etc. wouldn't be a factor if we required 2/3 vote instead of 50%+1.  But even in that case, then you would just have 100M people not getting their way instead of 150M people not getting their way.

[MorleyDev]

A functioning democracy also has other legal safeguards protecting the basic rights of citizens from even a majority of votes, otherwise it's not a functioning democracy it's tyranny of the majority. Democracy is more than just voting, it's the institutions around that core which make it functioning.

There can be debates at the edges of those rights and slow expansion/retraction of them there, but a functioning democracy has extra checks and balances beyond simply voting to prevent the ignoring/steamrolling of them. If you don't have them, you aren't a functioning democracy in my opinion.

[Maximum Spin]

But in a working Democracy you do that by voting them out.

Who decides whether a democracy is "working"? Most people thought American democracy was "working" before the Civil War. Formally speaking, it was; the majority was in control, as democracy intends.
A democracy is just as capable of disenfranchising oppressed people and forcing them under the tyranny of the majority as any other form of government. That's why we now understand that slave rebellions were justified. Every person has the absolute right to make that choice.

ETA:
The antebellum south had legal safeguards to protect what they thought were the "basic rights" of slaves. They were still slaves, though.

[MorleyDev]

Well, if you're a slave being denied the right to vote as an equal....you're not a part of the functioning democracy, which is why rebelling is justified. You aren't in the democracy anymore.

If you have the right to argue your case, and to vote for it, and you still lose but can continue fighting anyway, and the basic human rights remain intact then you're part of a functioning democracy because you can win that fight again in the future. The battle is one of ideas, not bullets. And there, there is no such thing as "done".

[Maximum Spin]

"By my standards of a functioning democracy, my slaves will get all the rights I decide they should be allowed to have!"
You know, slaves in the antebellum south had the right to argue cases in court too, as long as it was informally understood they wouldn't win.

Going by what you've said, it sounds like that was a perfectly functioning democracy by your standards, since we "won that fight in the future". After all, what's all that time in between worth, really?

[MorleyDev]

Slavery interferes with what we have come to accept as fundamental human rights, ergo by modern standards very much would not count.

My conception of the human condition is funnily enough summed up by a Warhammer quote of all things:
"When the battle is over, your work is not done. Your duty is not a destination. It is a journey. Victory is merely a landmark on that road, you will never reach a point where your work is done and you can leave the fighting to others. You will die with the road still to be walked."

This to me, is basically a defining trait of what keeps it going. The capacity to keep pushing to improve things, and the inevitability of never reaching the end of that.

[Maximum Spin]

Slavery interferes with what we have come to accept as fundamental human rights, ergo by modern standards very much would not count.

So "modern standards" define what's right and wrong? You know that, in the 1700s, the "modern standards" were a little different, right?

The problem is that you think there is a single defined status of "slavery", and you're not in it. The right to hope the system may one day condescend to grant your wishes is not good enough. If you don't have the right of exit, you are a slave, or at best a serf working for a feudal lord.

[MorleyDev]

Slavery interferes with what we have come to accept as fundamental human rights, ergo by modern standards very much would not count.

So "modern standards" define what's right and wrong? You know that, in the 1700s, the "modern standards" were a little different, right?

I mean, morality is flexible and fluid and evolves over time, yes? Moral standards are what we have now, there's plenty we all accept now that could very much be viewed as monstrous later. I'm fine with that? Like, I'd like to know what it is and push for us to be better and for me to be better? But I acknowledge that it's never done and every generation in human history will be and should be viewed as monsters by future standards, and that's fine. Why judge the past without accepting that you shall be just as judged by the future?

[Maximum Spin]

I mean, morality is flexible and fluid and evolves over time, yes? Moral standards are what we have now, there's plenty we all accept now that could very much be viewed as monstrous later. I'm fine with that? Like, I'd like to know what it is and push for us to be better and for me to be better? But I acknowledge that it's never done and every generation in human history will be and should be viewed as monsters by future standards, and that's fine.

That's not the question, though. The question here is, should the people you are being monstrous to today have the right to make you stop, or should they just suck it up because that's how we do things today and maybe things will be better next century?

[MorleyDev]

sure, but we're talking about a poorly thought out technology law that overreaches because what it's trying to stop covers a whole bunch of other things due to the nature of technology, not people being gunned down in the streets on state orders or marched into warzones against their will?

Like, there's...a scale of proportionality there. You can't just nope out just because you feel like you don't benefit personally from the current tax regime, for example.

(Incidentally I do think rebelling against the draft is more justified, for example)

[Maximum Spin]

I was talking about EuchreJack's example of users here from authoritarian governments being unable to express their dissent because they no longer have access to VPNs, but frankly, so what? The right of exit is for everyone.
Your "scale of proportionality" amounts to "it's okay to exit because of the things I think are bad enough, but not the things I'm okay with". Which, again, is slave-owning.

[MorleyDev]

Okay? I mean, you're frankly going into far end anarchic philosophy there. Frankly it's what I'd call "Intellectual masturbation", and if you want to go down that philosophy then at the end of the day, only the dead have true freedom. We all have shackles, can't have society without them, and can't have humanity without society. Just need to make sure they're not too uncomfortable.

[Maximum Spin]

Okay? I mean, you're frankly going into far end anarchic philosophy there. Frankly it's what I'd call "Intellectual masturbation", and if you want to go down that philosophy then at the end of the day, only the dead have true freedom. We all have shackles, can't have society without them, and can't have humanity without society. Just need to make sure they're not too uncomfortable.

I'm literally just asking for the right of exit, though. You can have all the shackles you want as long as you let people have the keys. Then the question of whether the shackles are comfortable enough resolves itself, since people can take them off if they aren't. This isn't a hard concept, and retreating into a strawman isn't helping.

[MorleyDev]

Exit from what, exactly? A country, sure. That's the idea behind seeking asylum, at the end of the day. Internationally agreed things that if a person is facing they have the right to gtfo and seek safety elsewhere. But you're still exchanging the society and the 'shackles' you're in for those of another region, not 'escaping' them entirely.

But being able to 'withdraw' whilst staying physically where you are? No, I don't think that's a right.

[Maximum Spin]

Exit from what, exactly? A country, sure. That's the idea behind seeking asylum, at the end of the day. Internationally agreed things that if a person is facing they have the right to gtfo and seek safety elsewhere.

But being able to 'withdraw' whilst staying physically where you are? No, I don't think that's a right.

Ah, you're against freeing the slaves, but okay with deporting them to Liberia. I see.