Bay 12 Games Forum

Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
Advanced search  

Poll

Whaddya think about the Three Things?

Sounds good to me
's OK.
Nah.
Really don't like 'em
SSSSIIIIIINNNNAAARRRRRR!!!
[Voter is a lolcat playing with a keyboard.]

Pages: 1 2 [3] 4

Author Topic: Lol Polaticks  (Read 3861 times)

Tsarwash

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #30 on: October 26, 2010, 09:30:20 pm »

Tsarwash:

Ultimately, invading a country causes more problems for the invader. It becomes a constant cost to keep the occupation working. It's much better to have a better system of government and allow everyone to come to you.


I know. It's crazy the amount that the UK and US are throwing at Iraq and Afganistan, considering how much we are risking the future prosperity of our nations with the economic cutbacks that are happening. The Uk is quite likely to slip into recession again, after the cutbacks take hold, but we're spending silly money in Afganistan, fighting the Taliban. Iraq has cost a huge amoun tof money, and all we have to show for it are eight years of anarchy and a population that onced looked up to the west and now hate us. Politicians should not be allowed to wage war. They send troops in for entirely the wrong reasons.

Frankly I think that our current system of democracy is pretty flawed.
Logged
On the left a cannon which shoots dwarf children into the sun, on the right, a massive pit full of magma charred dwarfs and elves.

Urist Imiknorris

  • Bay Watcher
  • In the flesh, on the phone and in your account...
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #31 on: October 26, 2010, 09:32:25 pm »

I'm somewhat surprised there hasn't been a 'lolitics' pun, followed by a derail.
Logged
Quote from: LordSlowpoke
I don't know how it works. It does.
Quote from: Jim Groovester
YOU CANT NOT HAVE SUSPECTS IN A GAME OF MAFIA

ITS THE WHOLE POINT OF THE GAME
Quote from: Cheeetar
If Tiruin redirected the lynch, then this means that, and... the Illuminati! Of course!

dwarfguy2

  • Bay Watcher
  • Human Meta Knight... 0_o
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #32 on: October 27, 2010, 09:26:20 am »

You do realize you've now started it.
Logged
Caution: This user may or may not be a horrible evil Elder God from the deepest regions of space. He also may or may not be a lawyer.

Urist Imiknorris

  • Bay Watcher
  • In the flesh, on the phone and in your account...
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #33 on: October 27, 2010, 10:12:49 am »

Yup.
Logged
Quote from: LordSlowpoke
I don't know how it works. It does.
Quote from: Jim Groovester
YOU CANT NOT HAVE SUSPECTS IN A GAME OF MAFIA

ITS THE WHOLE POINT OF THE GAME
Quote from: Cheeetar
If Tiruin redirected the lynch, then this means that, and... the Illuminati! Of course!

Frajic

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #34 on: October 27, 2010, 10:41:42 am »

Logged
EoS company name: Vikings Inc.

Leafsnail

  • Bay Watcher
  • A single snail can make a world go extinct.
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #35 on: October 27, 2010, 04:07:12 pm »

I kindof agree with these... although that's mainly because all the important or difficult issues are skirted.  I mean, how would you deal with, say, social mobility and inequality in that sense?  Or if two people's perceived "rights" clash directly?  Heck, even sticking to the examples in the OP, how do you think Jehovah's Witnesses would react to being banned from going door to door?  And when do you say someone's too crazy to have a gun?
Logged

Calhoun

  • Bay Watcher
  • Reusable-Box
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #36 on: October 31, 2010, 08:14:07 pm »

Sure. Ideals are great. These things are great. But are they possible in execution.

I'd argue that a true communistic society is the best. Of course, there is no way to create a true communist society, due to human nature. Understandable, however. After all, if society is demanding electricity, you need people to mine for coal, but who REALLY wants to mine for coal, even though the community needs the coal to generate electricity. Sure, some people might even do it, but some people certainly won't. Who'd choose to mine coal instead of the much safer profession of shoe making? Or even simple farming? In such case you'd need some sort of authority to tell people who does what, and at that point you are creating inequality, and the who thing falls apart.

No matter what, I don't see how an legislation can create freedoms. If you legislate you that murder is illegal, then you are taking away a freedom. No matter what else.
« Last Edit: October 31, 2010, 08:16:01 pm by Calhoun »
Logged
I know it's unrealistic, but I can't help but imagine little bearded babies for dwarves. In my mind, they come out of the womb fully bearded. That's how the mother carries them around, too, she just drags them around by the beard or ties it to her belt. When the father's on duty, he just ties their beards together and the baby just kind of hangs there, swinging to and fro with Urist McDaddy's movements.

Renault

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #37 on: November 01, 2010, 03:54:48 am »

Calhoun-I'm not sure if legislation is meant to "create" freedoms so much as protect them. I think the general theory behind most enlightenment-influenced governments is that humans possess natural liberties, but willingly submit some of those liberties to the state in order to preserve order. Social contract or something, ya know? So its not so much creating freedoms as minimizing the amount of suppression--which I think you'd be hard-pressed to call impossible.
Oh, and I don't think "freedom to murder" is really a freedom that anyone actually expects, so that might not be a great example. It's sort of like saying that physics is taking away your freedom to leap to the moon, and expecting that to be a rebuke somehow.

Also, is it wrong to summarize the "Three Points" as
1. Government will provide essential public services,
2. Protect the liberty of its citizens, and
3. attempt to ensure general prosperity?

Because, um, that sounds sort of like this:
1. Provide for the common defense
2. ensure the blessings of liberty
3. promote the general welfare.

Which, uh, you know. Should probably sound familiar to a lot of the people on this forum.
In short, what I'm saying is that perhaps these three points aren't really that groundbreaking.
Logged

Eugenitor

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #38 on: November 01, 2010, 04:20:09 am »

Don't mean to interrupt a discussion of the basic premise of a free State, but I need to post this somewhere.

Logged

ed boy

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #39 on: November 01, 2010, 05:00:53 am »

Consider the following:

Under your propasal, there are many contradictions, espcecially with the one about maximum liberty. Does your right to party in the street at all hours of the morning take precedence over everybody else's right to a good night's sleep? If you have the right to take herion, why shouldn't your children? If you stop them from taking drugs, you're infringing their liberties. And would your right to not have people trying to convert you to their religion take precedence over their right to save you from eternal damnation? They're doing it for your good, and it is their duty to save your soul. Surrely such a duty with eternal benefits is more important than any earthly laws?

I put it to you that the government already does these, and to a far better extent than your proposal. As far as I can tell, rules 1 and 3 are already done by the government (in fact, they could be consolidated into one rule, that the government provides goods and services that would not be provided by the free market but people would be better off having) to the best of its abilities. Rule 2 is why we have the entire legal and crime system, which essentially tells people what and when they should do things in order to maximise the total benefit of the actions. I challenge you to give me any function that the government currently performs that does not qualify as either proving goods and services which would not be provided without it yet people are better off having, or restricting what people do to ensure the maximum benefit.

I further put it to you that you are incredibly egotisical, as you are basically saying that you (with no experience in the matter) know better how to run a country that hundreds of people with years of experience.
Logged

Fayrik

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #40 on: November 01, 2010, 05:06:50 am »

Why are there four five so many lolcats on the forum?
Meow?
... I MEAN! UHH...
sdfjlaipojtweijsgijfdjfgjrdsiaplwklgijrlekm
Yes. That is better.
Logged
So THIS is how migrations start.
"Hey, dude, there's this crazy bastard digging in the ground for stuff. Let's go watch."

Zangi

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #41 on: November 01, 2010, 10:26:58 am »

Don't mean to interrupt a discussion of the basic premise of a free State, but I need to post this somewhere.

Epic.

The only way to get a working communist society is to enact plan "If I can't have it, you can't either."
And even then, there is like... a 5% chance out of the many survivor communities that are bound to form and kill each other.

We are talking about communists right?
Logged
All life begins with Nu and ends with Nu...  This is the truth! This is my belief! ... At least for now...
FMA/FMA:B Recommendation

Leafsnail

  • Bay Watcher
  • A single snail can make a world go extinct.
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #42 on: November 01, 2010, 12:16:12 pm »

No matter what, I don't see how an legislation can create freedoms.
Go to Somalia.

Then try saying that again.

Incidentally, I'd put "hard" libertarianism in much the same place as communism - nice idea, wouldn't work in practise.
« Last Edit: November 01, 2010, 12:20:33 pm by Leafsnail »
Logged

Sir Pseudonymous

  • Bay Watcher
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #43 on: November 01, 2010, 01:44:43 pm »

No matter what, I don't see how an legislation can create freedoms.
Go to Somalia.

Then try saying that again.

Incidentally, I'd put "hard" libertarianism in much the same place as communism - nice idea, wouldn't work in practise.
Except full-fledged, second stage communism (more commonly called anarchism) does work, just not in groups much larger than Dunbar's number, since, in the absence of a central power structure enforcing order, one must rely upon mutual dependence and respect, which have little to no effect when a criminal can easily strike outside their personal circle of familiarity, or a group of criminals can conspire to coerce a population outside their own to do their work for them.

In small, tight knit groups a criminal cannot properly exist, because no matter their victim they alienate the rest of the group, which can either violently deal with them or without which they otherwise cannot survive. There's also the matter of personally knowing their potential victims, and so being more sympathetic to them, since very few criminals are proper sociopaths. In larger societies, their victims are strangers, and they are not dependent on the same social circle as the victim, and without a central authority to dole out justice in such cases, you end up with the victim's families and friends taking the matters into their own hands, while the family and friends of the criminal will stand by him, leading to conflict and fragmentation. In a state of conflict, a charismatic (or cunning) member of a group can sway said group, becoming a de facto leader, and so you get petty warlordism, and less fragmentation as the leaders struggle against each other, and the weak fall, leaving their followers either dead or in the thrall of the victor. Should one warlord gain the upper hand, their power grows exponentially as they bring weaker ones under their control, until you get a full-fledged dictatorship. Of course that's simplified a bit, and such processes usually took generations, and fell apart upon the dictator's death, but the essence is the same. Modern governments are the evolution of that (in most places at least, others are still in earlier stages), and are the result of efforts to remove the brutality and risk of dictatorships, deciding to get rid of them and go back to stage one is just silly.

Not only is there the problem of fragmentation and warlordism without a central authority: logistics and infrastructure also suffer, so that everyone is essentially reduced to a farmer and/or petty craftsman, and modern luxuries like healthcare and sanitation can't exist, let alone things like electricity and transportation.


Hard-line libertarianism is just outright silly, as it boils down to "but what if we like, got rid of all the people who at least have to look like they're helping us to keep their jobs, and let people who have no obligation not to just kill us if it's the more profitable route run things, that'll be great!" At least anarchism visibly functions in a primitive context.
Logged
I'm all for eating the heart of your enemies to gain their courage though.

Calhoun

  • Bay Watcher
  • Reusable-Box
    • View Profile
Re: Lol Polaticks
« Reply #44 on: November 01, 2010, 02:35:35 pm »

No matter what, I don't see how an legislation can create freedoms.
Go to Somalia.

Then try saying that again.

Incidentally, I'd put "hard" libertarianism in much the same place as communism - nice idea, wouldn't work in practise.
I never said it was pretty. I just said that laws do limit in some way or another. No matter what. I'm not saying the benefit can't be greater than the cost. I'm just saying that from a purely logical standpoint, it does not make sense.
Logged
I know it's unrealistic, but I can't help but imagine little bearded babies for dwarves. In my mind, they come out of the womb fully bearded. That's how the mother carries them around, too, she just drags them around by the beard or ties it to her belt. When the father's on duty, he just ties their beards together and the baby just kind of hangs there, swinging to and fro with Urist McDaddy's movements.
Pages: 1 2 [3] 4