Ask a Reactionary

[Jehoshua]

I'm rather astonished to see someone here actually advocating disenfranchising women, and even more surprised that no-one appears to have picked up on it. So here are some questions about it.

Firstly I would note that that my position on what an electorate should consist of, is entirely one which is contingent upon there being an electorate at all. I'm ambivalent about the merits of an electoral system to begin with (although currently think an electorate which votes representatives to a lower house is best, in order to better distinguish between legislative, executive and repository aspects of government, which respectively would be elected, appointed and hereditary [with some ecclesiastical input in the case of the latter]). In fact, it would seem I am more "democratic" than Kaiserguard about this subject in that I would reasonably consider an electoral system. Now to your actual questions.

First, it seems that your reason for wanting to stop women from voting is solely that they tend to vote for things that you don't approve of. This differs from the reason for not allowing children to vote, since one can actively point to characteristics of children (lack of experience and understanding) that explain why they're less able to make a useful contribution to the political process. When you complain that women vote for "increased government spending and legislative restrictions", you're assuming that that is something so bad that it's worth disenfranchising half the population to avoid it. But how can you be so certain of this? As a man, couldn't it be the case that women have a perspective on these matters that you've missed? Aren't you assuming that the typical male perspective is the correct, standard, default one, and that the typical female one is divergent and transgressive? And isn't that just irrational?

Firstly, I think your question is rooted in some key assumptions. Firstly that the decision making system we have (elections to parliament, close to universal franchise) is a neutral one, with the state being a neutral arbiter between competing views with this neutrality being an assumed good (which is why you object to my previous point, since I don't care for neutrality). This assumption is of course wrong, since neutrality is impossible in a given system of government, and indeed 'neutrality" in any given ethical position always tends to come down on the side of one particular system elevated to the public orthodoxy. That system at present is liberalism, and the moral presuppositions of utilitarianism. So you cannot really assert implicitly as you have or otherwise that the system we have is neutral morally (it exists within an ideological consensus) and thus in terms of the policy it proposes.

Which comes to my point. I don't wish to replace the liberals defective system for neutral decision making with a better one. Since I deny that there can be any such system. The so called virtue of tolerance is incoherent and ultimately contradictory in that regard. It is my conclusion that it is simply impossible to set aside a conception of the good, and then from an "original position" decide a fair arbitration between my beliefs and someone elses. Without ones full morality there is no way for me, or anyone to decide what a fair decision would be (our divergent moral beliefs being why we differ so much politically I would guess). For an ostensibly neutral liberal therefore to reach any conclusions at all, he then has to sneak some comprehensive moral suppositions into his original position John Rawls notes this when he says that men in the original position operate on a “thin” theory of the good, a theory which basically turns out unsurprisingly (Seeing as Rawls is liberal) to be utilitarianism.

This then leads to the nature of government. If neutrality is impossible then it is logically supposed that the state must take stands on matters of moral good and evil, the distinction between us then is that I think society might as well be honest about its moral groundings and take functional measures to ingrain a particular moral system in place. The form in which a government is chosen is properly I think a functional matter oriented towards this end and with regards to the common good, with participation in the choosing of government being a privilege and not a right (as you presume). Since as I have noted, womens votes are clearly associated with dis-civic outcomes, the expansion of state intrusion into spheres previously within the realms of civil society, ever more intrusive laws even to the point of tyranny (perhaps why the fascsist held as a key principle the female franchise, and why John Adams to refer to a US founding father in response to a letter from his wife on the subject of women spoke of the "despotism of the petticoat") and unsustainable expenditure particularly into welfare. These tendencies (which are have clearly been correlated to the female franchise) arising from the feminine perspective of things if you will, have on the whole been ruinous to the public good and have exceedingly damaged the social order (for example easy divorce, you would note massively favours the female partner, to the consequence of numerous broken homes, fatherless families and social disorder since the vast majority of initiations of divorce proceeding are done by women). If you take it as I do that the state cannot be neutral morally, and if you likewise take it as I do that the system of choosing a government is purely a functional consideration to that end, with participation in such a system being a privilege and not a right, than there is little to merit the womens franchise, and much to consider it a negative.

Second, you say that women's interests would be met by the votes of their male relatives. But what of women who don't have male relatives? In particular, what about whole classes of women who don't have male relatives, such as widows or the childless? More fundamentally, how can you guarantee that men will vote for what is actually in their families' interests, and not simply what they think is in their families' interests? Just to give one example, do you think that marital rape would ever have been made illegal if only men had ever voted on the matter? Indeed, would a "reactionary" prefer it if that change in the law had never happened?

You are making "male relative" synonymous with husband when it also includes sons, brothers and other relatives who would have the franchise in the hypothetical system where there is in fact an electorate I noted (suggesting a restricted franchise of male, age 21, owns land, needs to contribute more in taxes than they receive from the state to be eligible). As to them voting in whats their families interests, one can presume firstly that they engage with their relatives and vote for what they think best serves the collective family unit, this is ultimately a personal subjective judgement just as much as it is with regards to anyones voting decision under the current system (your objection to, well what if they only vote for what they think is in the families interests is nonsensical, since people voting for what they think is in the interests of them and theirs is what they do anyway, its not like people objectively are granted a "this is in the best interests of your family" perfect certainty of truth, card pointing to a given candidate for office). On your query regarding marital rape, I think the term is an oxymoron. Once you have given consent formally in public ceremony (which is what marriage is, seeing as its a legal form), it cannot be revoked within that contract; The form in which marital consent via that contract is revoked incidentally is well-established. It is called divorce (or annulment or legal separation in the Catholic context). Really I think its a simple matter of when consent is revocable (afterall, we can both agree an abusive spouse is acting immorally) and the specific form that revocation must take. If you believe that consent may always be granted and revoked at will, I would advise you to consent to join the army, then attempt to withdraw that consent, likewise for any other legal contract. This should clarify the matter for you I should think. The attempt by liberals to create a legal concept of "marital rape" is no less really than an attempt to destroy the basic concept of marriage as it has always traditionally been understood. This is also a testament of course to the fact that marriage should be carefully considered before being agreed too, a consideration which easy divorce and the morphing of marriage into formalised co-habitation which can be exited at ease (with the husband usually being fleeced of oodles of money in alimony) has somewhat degraded.

Third, and most fundamental of all, isn't it the case that when one group of people has less power than another, they get exploited and lose whatever power they had? Don't we see this today with the incredible aggregation of wealth into the hands of a very few super-wealthy people? Those with power inevitably exercise that power for their own interests, not for the interests of those without it. A world where men vote and women don't is a world that's run for the benefit of men, not women. Even if all the men are benign and attempt to look out for the interests of women - something that wouldn't happen - it would still marginalise women because they would have to put up with what men think is in their interests, not with what they they think is in their interests. Doesn't this infantilise women and patronise them, by making them out to be little more than children who have to be looked after because they're too stupid or irresponsible to understand what's in their own best interests? And isn't this not only a profoundly immoral outlook, but one that's irrational and lacking in evidence? If not, what evidence can you give to show that men know what's best for women better than women themselves do?

Your question starts with an example of power differential in the present system, and then expresses fundamentally the concern that a limited franchise which excludes women (or no franchise at all) would perpetuate the same kind of power differential, distinct only in that women are further marginalised. The first part of your question is a recognition that distinctions in power and the presence of inequality are inevitable (that's just human nature and the nature of society) and secondly and more implicitly I would suppose, it is a recognition that under the current system power subsides (as I have said) in an elite and fairly closed class, which renders the votes of the electorate male and female mostly a meaningless formality under the current "democratic" complex.

This (together with my previous statements regarding the relationship of morality to th state) leads I think to the subject of the conservative (the traditionally conservative) vision of authority, which also underpins what I have said on this thread pertaining to the principle of subsidiarity in particular. This vision of authority (to put it very basically) considers that since a man gains his since of identity by his association with multiple groups to which he belongs, but gains an ultimate sense of his self by reference to an ultimate loyalty, it is necessary for the unitary polity to point towards a moral order outside of itself and for the group to refer itself to a common affirmation of Justice and the good, with the authority this instantiates being then particularised to that community. Therefore, since man is loyal to multiple groups and intersecting authorities, understanding loyalty to them as being rooted in that single loyalty to a higher order resolves mans need for identifications, and enables the coexistence of multiple particular loyalties and group-associations. It likewies results in authorities being obligated to promote all the virtues and constrain the vices not only for the benefit of the group but for everyone, since there is something beyond themselves to which they are obliged (this distinction being what constitutes the difference between an authoritative ruler, and a mere agent of the popular will). Although this is rather simplifying it, Authority is the answer to the cosmopolitan’s claim that loyalty to particular groups bespeaks a limited moral vision, that it is merely a form of collective selfishness.

This directly pertains to your point (a point interspersed across your entire argument I will add) regarding men voting only in their own interests, a point which you make because the current liberal system functions precisely upon (as I have noted) a utilitarian presupposition in which self-interest is the entire ruling dynamic of government. Holding this moral conceptualisation you logically conclude a universal franchise is essential precisely lest one interest group in pursuing its utilitarian interests subjugate the equally valid (in the orthodox moral calculus you are referring too) interests of another group (in the context of this discussion women) violating the principle of the greatest "good" (which is defined as maximised satisfaction for all groups) for the greatest number. This concern is rendered meaningless within my consideration of things, precisely because self-interest is not the overruling concern of the polity, but rather fidelity to a higher order (God, and associated divine and moral law) and with the particular instantiation of that good in the particularised context of the given polity. Both this restriction, and the one pertaining to tax contribution incidentally render ones vote more substantial, and give the voter some greater degree of influence than is currently the case since candidates for office cannot so easily bribe the electorate in pursuit of office (which is what constitutes much of modern election campaigning), while in the local sphere the electorate is more strongly entrenched to a specific community and place.

Finally, to your assertion that saying that women should not vote (due to assertions that female participation in this sphere of society is essentially discivic) is immoral. I would respond that it isn't, mostly since I don't hold to the liberal idea that equality is a virtue (And concordantly, that denial of equality between any two groups is a sin, or as you say, immoral). If the means of choosing a government is a functional concern, to the purpose of maintaining and perpetuating the orientation of the polity to the higher order (ergo, the function exists to facilitate and maintain the guiding principle of the whole, which then applies collectively to all who dwell in that society. As compared to being a means of satisfying the self-interest of diverse groups within that whole, who then compete to institute policy towards that end) than there is no moral reason why womens franchise should be held as something that is morally mandated.

Fourth, and relatedly, black people (at least in Britain, and I think in the US too) are statistically much more likely than white people to vote for left-wing parties and causes. Does it follow, by your logic, that they should also not be allowed to vote? If not, how does their case differ from that of women?...

Having referred to the vision of how society (and the state) exists within a moral dimension, I think much of the assumptions inherent to this question are addressed in the response to the previous question you made, particularly with regard to the assumption you make that voting exists as an expression of utilitarian self-interest with the goal of maximising general contentment amongst diverse groups within society. However to specifically answer this question, I think its speaks not so much to the vote (since I think black people, and the various other groups you mentioned in the section I excised for special reasons vote as they do as an expression of self-interest within the system that they exist within, which is only natural and understandable. Black people and others are perfectly reasonable in voting for the good of their group, to which they hold primary loyalty, and for the policies of those parties which directly advantage them over other groups) but to an objection to mass immigration, and to the principle of state neutrality when it comes to matters religious (I have noted I think the state should preference the Catholic religion, but could equally apply to others)

Placing diverse groups, racial, religious and otherwise within the single polity as multi-culturalism has done, is a recipe for social discord and for hostile relations between the distinct groups. This is seen quite clearly I think in the long history of racial conflict in for example the United States between black and white, and is an ongoing (if politically incorrect) concern regarding the mass influx of muslims into Europe, and largely I think explains the ascent of nationalist and even neo-fascist parties on the continent. I think therefore that the best recipe is each to his own allotted dwelling place (as the good book says, myself paraphrasing), with such diverse groups of cultural and religious distinction being best in their own polities and communities distinct and separate, and free to maintain their own particularised instantiations of authority. Indeed I think the desire to exist in a distinct communities is a natural impulse, as is evident by the human tendency to self-segregate into ethnically, racially and religious uniform communities, something which is directly observable (London for example is divided very much into religious enclaves iirc, according to some article I recall reading some years ago. A starker division can be seen racially in such places as Detroit, where black and white are very starkly separated). The liberal experiment of multiculturalism (and in the case of the united states and much of the Americas the inhuman institution of slavery) has therefore created a very problematic situation where a number of such diverse groups are bunched uncomfortably together, which risks in the future very many social problems ,and perhaps even greater violence than that which is already ongoing between communities.

So in short answer, no I don't think blacks (or other minority groups) should be denied the (limited if at all) franchise. I think the existence of a multi-racial polity is a negative product of liberal social experimentation that is evidently problematic by simple observation. I also don't think one should be denied (a limited franchise) for disagreeing with a traditionalist position. The distinction in the case of the latter though is that in they would just have to accept living within a society that rejects their principles and does not run according to them (much as anyone who isn't liberal now must tolerate the orthodoxy). Afterall as I noted right at the beginning, no society is morally neutral.

Similar points apply to the suggestion of rolling back the clock so that only landowners can vote. That's again giving the wealthy more privilege than they already have. It makes the fundamental error of assuming that those with wealth and power are more "invested" in society than those without it. But of course this isn't true. They're just luckier. Indeed, isn't the reverse the case - they are less invested in the good of society? If I have no job and no wealth, it's very much in my interest that the economy should be in a good condition such that the state is able to support me while I look for work and that there are jobs out there for me to find. But if I'm as rich as Croesus' lawyer then I really don't care how things are going, because I've got enough to be assured of a comfortable life no matter what happens. It's the people who are losing out under the current system who know what's wrong with it, not those who are doing well. Aren't you just making the same mistake as the Prosperity Gospel, the assumption that moral value and material success are directly correlated? Would you really think that Francis of Assisi should have less right to a vote than Silvio Berlusconi? And do you really think that people were, overall, better off when voting systems like the ones you prefer actually existed, e.g. in Dickensian Britain, than they are today? Were the poor better off? Were women?

My consideration that (if there is an electoral system) a property qualification (owning land) and tax qualification (must contribute more in taxes than you take in government money) firstly, is hardly exorbitant, and not equivalent to requiring that (to be eligible to vote) one must be as rich as Croesus' lawyer, or owner of a vast landed estate (although I suppose in the case of Britain, as compared to Australia or America, the number of land-holders would be decidedly reduced due to the fact much land is still owned by the old aristocracy and as a consequence of the high population in such a restricted space). Rather it speaks very much to concerns noted previously at the risk pure self-interest has to the common good of the whole, in recognition in particular of the realities of the decidedly non tabula-rasa human nature.

The whole point behind my suggestion that perhaps (should such a system apply) one should contribute more in taxes then one receives to be eligible to vote is that when people gain more in from the state than they receive, then precisely because it is in their self-interest to do so they vote for politicians who promise them more cash from the government cash cow. This is clearly observable both here and elsewhere, and indeed people admit quite readily (and it is clear in the media cycle) that the primary concern is how government policy will affect their "hip pocket" as compared to the ultimate economic sustainability of the state. The attempt being made in a system where one must contribute more in taxes than one receives in order to vote, is precisely to dampen the affect of such greed, by ensuring that only those who are ultimately paying a positive cost for other peoples benefits (to their own detriment you could say) can vote. In this way we avoid what effectively amounts to state theft in a robbing peter to pay paul scenario, in which the state extorts more and more money from the people (or goes into debt to do so) to satisfy the interests of a dependant class (welfare dependency) to the eventual ruination of the economy and the state.

The principle behind requiring ownership of land, is distinct in that it would constitute a basic attempt to assess household stability and ones permanent association with a particular place and community. If one is transient, or spends ones time travelling hither and thither across the world, it is highly unlikely that ones loyalties and concerns are primarily invested in the community one nominally is voting in, or that you would have its interests and values at heart. This is why many polities already put in restrictions on non-residents or require one be resident for a certain length of time (yearly or over time) to be eligible to vote. Now considering the British context of land-ownership (as compared to my own country, Australia) some other principle could be considered to assess this concern for stability and the electorates investment if you will within the particular local context, but the principle it points too remain valid I would think.

Finally, are views such as the ones you've articulated here common among those who identify as "reactionaries"?

I as Kaiserguard graciously acknowledged somewhat, don't call myself a reactionary, but rather simply a traditionalist. I agreed to request to add me as a respondent here because my position is close enough in general scope to the ideological spectrum he places within "reactionary" (and to be fair some traditionalists do outright call themselves reactionaries, presumably in some bid to turn the negative impression the term has amongst liberals, into a positive). As to whether the views I articulated here are common amongst them, I would say to a lesser or greater degree they are. Obviously my positions are my own, but I know some people (bloggers, writers, and so forth) who share such positions that women shouldn't vote for example amongst others.

 

[Ajidica]

In the 20th century, what countries would you (Jehoshua, Kaiserguard, and others) consider reactionary and want to live in?
If you do not currently live in one of these countries and the country currently exists, do you wish to live in that country? If no, why?

 

[Jehoshua]

Firstly, you must note that my system of thought makes no claims to universalism. Rather it adopts the principle that culturally particularised instantiations of authority are not only legitimate, but are a good thing.

Having made that clear, I can say there is currently no country which currently maintains a Christian traditionalist system of authority and government of the kind I refer too (albeit certain states do have good aspect while not being essentially of the idealised "type", such as Switzerland with its cantonal system, or Liechtenstein). This being a consequence of the fact the international political order is decidedly one of liberal universalism (which even non-liberal countries, such as China refer too) an the fact the rare exceptions tend to be totalitarian dystopias (such as North Korea).

 

[Ajidica]

So, no going to live in the Vatican City?

 

[Jehoshua]

It is recognised that the Vatican is not an ordinary instantiation of how a polity should be run. It serves rather the specific purpose of facilitating the agency and sovereign independence of the Holy Church. The traditionalist perspective on the matter (which is to say the historic western one as well) is that there is a distinction between the state and the Church, even if they are not completely separate (as the liberals would have them be). Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and many other theorists on the subject aside have maintained this view.

 

[Senethro]

This is why we need representation of women in positions of authority in society. We need kids to grow up thinking it is obviously absurd to hold such a belief as women being unworthy of the vote. Especially for such a petty reason as they use it in ways you don't like.

I mean, do you not have relationships with women? I mean like just as human beings. Sisters, co-workers, friends, bosses whatever. Do you really hold them all in contempt?

 

[Tahuti]

I mean, do you not have relationships with women? I mean like just as human beings. Sisters, co-workers, friends, bosses whatever. Do you really hold them all in contempt?

More than you might think. And no, I don't hold them in contempt for being women.

In the 20th century, what countries would you (Jehoshua, Kaiserguard, and others) consider reactionary and want to live in?
If you do not currently live in one of these countries and the country currently exists, do you wish to live in that country? If no, why?

In terms of political structure, I'd consider Andorra, Monaco and Liechtenstein the poities most worthy of emulation from a reactionary perspective for European countries.

The Arab monarchies are perhaps the most finest examples of reactionary thoughts in action in the Middle East, though we (Westerners) should be wary of emulating them, given the cultural divergence.

I'd do not want to move to a state for ideological convictions, unless I am compelled. I find it important to live close to hearth and home, so I am here to stay in the Netherlands.

 

[Mouthwash]

The Arab monarchies are perhaps the most finest examples of reactionary thoughts in action in the Middle East, though we (Westerners) should be wary of emulating them, given the cultural divergence.

Answer honestly: would you want to live in one of those Arab monarchies?

 

[Tahuti]

Answer honestly: would you want to live in one of those Arab monarchies?

No 5char.

 

[Jehoshua]

Don't judge him too harshly, one of my friends grew up in Oman (expat) and said it was pretty good and that the sultan was great, competent and generally respected. Thats not to mention as well the oil emirates like Kuwait, which has no income taxes and free higher education and healthcare for its citizens

-

PS: Wahabbi Saudi Arabia of course is another matter

 

[Agent327]

Fascism is against liberal democracy. Considering it is totalitarian, it decidedly has a democratic element in it, as it claims to represent the majority - and with justice. Totalitarianism is essentially the synthesis between authoritarianism and democracy.

Again, you are ignoring an obvious fact: totalitarianism isn't limited to weak democracies only. It can also result from Communism's 'dictatorship of the proletariat'.

Because all this is part of a general trend towards creating an intellectual climate that is hostile to the reactionary. Consider the popularity of Marxism and Postmodernism among Humanities faculties.

Never noticed any of that. But then again, humanities aren't 'actual' science, are they? Consider the irrelevance of your statement with regards to the 'hard' sciences.

I'm rather astonished to see someone here actually advocating disenfranchising women, and even more surprised that no-one appears to have picked up on it.

Perhaps because, from a reactionary point of view, it is completely illogical. Since women gained the vote, they have voted consistently more conservative than the average voter.

 

[Plotinus]

I'll make my response to this quick.

Firstly, I think your question is rooted in some key assumptions. Firstly that the decision making system we have (elections to parliament, close to universal franchise) is a neutral one, with the state being a neutral arbiter between competing views with this neutrality being an assumed good (which is why you object to my previous point, since I don't care for neutrality). This assumption is of course wrong, since neutrality is impossible in a given system of government, and indeed 'neutrality" in any given ethical position always tends to come down on the side of one particular system elevated to the public orthodoxy. That system at present is liberalism, and the moral presuppositions of utilitarianism. So you cannot really assert implicitly as you have or otherwise that the system we have is neutral morally (it exists within an ideological consensus) and thus in terms of the policy it proposes.

I make no such assumption. I don't think the state is neutral; rather I think it embodies, or at least tends towards embodying, the generally accepted morality of the people. And of course that's something of a rough estimate since it's pulled in different directions by different interest groups.

Utilitarianism has nothing to do with it. I can never understand why religious people think all secular morality boils down to "utilitarianism", as if Kant never existed. Now certainly there are particular values that most modern western states represent, but to suggest they're anything like as well-worked-out a system as utilitarianism defies the evidence; they are at best an expression of what philosophers like to call "folk morality".

Which comes to my point. I don't wish to replace the liberals defective system for neutral decision making with a better one. Since I deny that there can be any such system. The so called virtue of tolerance is incoherent and ultimately contradictory in that regard. It is my conclusion that it is simply impossible to set aside a conception of the good, and then from an "original position" decide a fair arbitration between my beliefs and someone elses. Without ones full morality there is no way for me, or anyone to decide what a fair decision would be (our divergent moral beliefs being why we differ so much politically I would guess). For an ostensibly neutral liberal therefore to reach any conclusions at all, he then has to sneak some comprehensive moral suppositions into his original position John Rawls notes this when he says that men in the original position operate on a “thin” theory of the good, a theory which basically turns out unsurprisingly (Seeing as Rawls is liberal) to be utilitarianism.

A liberal isn't ostensibly neutral. A liberal thinks some things are good and some things are bad, and she wants the state to promote the good things and prevent the bad things. In that respect a liberal is exactly like you, except that she disagrees about which things are good and which things are bad. Again, utilitarianism is neither here nor there.

This then leads to the nature of government. If neutrality is impossible then it is logically supposed that the state must take stands on matters of moral good and evil, the distinction between us then is that I think society might as well be honest about its moral groundings and take functional measures to ingrain a particular moral system in place. The form in which a government is chosen is properly I think a functional matter oriented towards this end and with regards to the common good, with participation in the choosing of government being a privilege and not a right (as you presume). Since as I have noted, womens votes are clearly associated with dis-civic outcomes, the expansion of state intrusion into spheres previously within the realms of civil society, ever more intrusive laws even to the point of tyranny (perhaps why the fascsist held as a key principle the female franchise, and why John Adams to refer to a US founding father in response to a letter from his wife on the subject of women spoke of the "despotism of the petticoat") and unsustainable expenditure particularly into welfare. These tendencies (which are have clearly been correlated to the female franchise) arising from the feminine perspective of things if you will, have on the whole been ruinous to the public good and have exceedingly damaged the social order (for example easy divorce, you would note massively favours the female partner, to the consequence of numerous broken homes, fatherless families and social disorder since the vast majority of initiations of divorce proceeding are done by women). If you take it as I do that the state cannot be neutral morally, and if you likewise take it as I do that the system of choosing a government is purely a functional consideration to that end, with participation in such a system being a privilege and not a right, than there is little to merit the womens franchise, and much to consider it a negative.

So women voting has introduced "tyrannical" laws. Can you give examples?

(I'd add that from a British perspective, the notion that women should be kept out of the political process because they're too left-wing is especially baffling given that our one female prime minister wouldn't normally be characterised in such a way.)

You are making "male relative" synonymous with husband when it also includes sons, brothers and other relatives who would have the franchise in the hypothetical system where there is in fact an electorate I noted (suggesting a restricted franchise of male, age 21, owns land, needs to contribute more in taxes than they receive from the state to be eligible). As to them voting in whats their families interests, one can presume firstly that they engage with their relatives and vote for what they think best serves the collective family unit, this is ultimately a personal subjective judgement just as much as it is with regards to anyones voting decision under the current system (your objection to, well what if they only vote for what they think is in the families interests is nonsensical, since people voting for what they think is in the interests of them and theirs is what they do anyway, its not like people objectively are granted a "this is in the best interests of your family" perfect certainty of truth, card pointing to a given candidate for office).

You can "presume" that the men will confer with their relatives and vote for what's in their best interests; but given that you seem to think women are incapable of voting for what you consider the "right" policies, why would you want the male voters to pay any attention to their female relatives' views at all? You seem inconsistent. Given your views about women, it would make more sense for them all to shut up and leave everything to the men.

On your query regarding marital rape, I think the term is an oxymoron. Once you have given consent formally in public ceremony (which is what marriage is, seeing as its a legal form), it cannot be revoked within that contract; The form in which marital consent via that contract is revoked incidentally is well-established. It is called divorce (or annulment or legal separation in the Catholic context). Really I think its a simple matter of when consent is revocable (afterall, we can both agree an abusive spouse is acting immorally) and the specific form that revocation must take. If you believe that consent may always be granted and revoked at will, I would advise you to consent to join the army, then attempt to withdraw that consent, likewise for any other legal contract. This should clarify the matter for you I should think. The attempt by liberals to create a legal concept of "marital rape" is no less really than an attempt to destroy the basic concept of marriage as it has always traditionally been understood. This is also a testament of course to the fact that marriage should be carefully considered before being agreed too, a consideration which easy divorce and the morphing of marriage into formalised co-habitation which can be exited at ease (with the husband usually being fleeced of oodles of money in alimony) has somewhat degraded.

This is one of the most appallingly immoral things I have ever read on this forum, and I'm not going to respond to it in any more detail than that.

Your question starts with an example of power differential in the present system, and then expresses fundamentally the concern that a limited franchise which excludes women (or no franchise at all) would perpetuate the same kind of power differential, distinct only in that women are further marginalised. The first part of your question is a recognition that distinctions in power and the presence of inequality are inevitable (that's just human nature and the nature of society) and secondly and more implicitly I would suppose, it is a recognition that under the current system power subsides (as I have said) in an elite and fairly closed class, which renders the votes of the electorate male and female mostly a meaningless formality under the current "democratic" complex.

Inequalities of power are indeed inevitable, just as domestic violence, war, and poverty are inevitable. But one of the businesses of government is to attempt to reduce all of these things, because they are detrimental to the good of society. Saying that inequality is inevitable so we might as well just build our system of government around it is absurd.

This (together with my previous statements regarding the relationship of morality to th state) leads I think to the subject of the conservative (the traditionally conservative) vision of authority, which also underpins what I have said on this thread pertaining to the principle of subsidiarity in particular. This vision of authority (to put it very basically) considers that since a man gains his since of identity by his association with multiple groups to which he belongs, but gains an ultimate sense of his self by reference to an ultimate loyalty, it is necessary for the unitary polity to point towards a moral order outside of itself and for the group to refer itself to a common affirmation of Justice and the good, with the authority this instantiates being then particularised to that community. Therefore, since man is loyal to multiple groups and intersecting authorities, understanding loyalty to them as being rooted in that single loyalty to a higher order resolves mans need for identifications, and enables the coexistence of multiple particular loyalties and group-associations. It likewies results in authorities being obligated to promote all the virtues and constrain the vices not only for the benefit of the group but for everyone, since there is something beyond themselves to which they are obliged (this distinction being what constitutes the difference between an authoritative ruler, and a mere agent of the popular will). Although this is rather simplifying it, Authority is the answer to the cosmopolitan’s claim that loyalty to particular groups bespeaks a limited moral vision, that it is merely a form of collective selfishness.

This sounds to me very close to fascism, which also defines individuals in terms of their loyalties to larger groups, and seeks to re-orient all individuals towards a single larger group, in their case the state or the Volk. You're saying precisely the same thing except that your larger group is religious in nature. That's an improvement, but not much of a one, because you're still making that basic assumption that, as you put it, "a man gains his since of identity by his association with multiple groups to which he belongs, but gains an ultimate sense of his self by reference to an ultimate loyalty". Well, I don't.

This directly pertains to your point (a point interspersed across your entire argument I will add) regarding men voting only in their own interests, a point which you make because the current liberal system functions precisely upon (as I have noted) a utilitarian presupposition in which self-interest is the entire ruling dynamic of government.

Just to note, this is an inconsistent claim. Utilitarianism and self-interest are diametrically opposed ideologies. The whole point of utilitarianism is that self-interest has no place in moral deliberations.

Having referred to the vision of how society (and the state) exists within a moral dimension, I think much of the assumptions inherent to this question are addressed in the response to the previous question you made, particularly with regard to the assumption you make that voting exists as an expression of utilitarian self-interest with the goal of maximising general contentment amongst diverse groups within society. However to specifically answer this question, I think its speaks not so much to the vote (since I think black people, and the various other groups you mentioned in the section I excised for special reasons vote as they do as an expression of self-interest within the system that they exist within, which is only natural and understandable. Black people and others are perfectly reasonable in voting for the good of their group, to which they hold primary loyalty, and for the policies of those parties which directly advantage them over other groups) but to an objection to mass immigration, and to the principle of state neutrality when it comes to matters religious (I have noted I think the state should preference the Catholic religion, but could equally apply to others)

I find it very disturbing that you treat a question about black people as leading directly into one about immigration. Most black people in the west are not immigrants. Now you may bewail the immigration policies that allowed their ancestors to come here, but that doesn't address the issue of the status of black people born in the UK or the US or any other country.

Placing diverse groups, racial, religious and otherwise within the single polity as multi-culturalism has done, is a recipe for social discord and for hostile relations between the distinct groups.

Here too you make a disturbing jump, from multi-racial society to multi-cultural. That is a mistake for two reasons. First, race does not equal culture. A black person and a white person may be culturally identical. So a society in which many people are black and many people are white is not necessarily a society in which two different cultures co-exist. Indeed there are far more and more significant cultural divides within and across racial divisions. Just consider the divide in America between "liberal" and "conservative". Or the divide in universities between "humanities" and "sciences". Or the divide in schools between "jocks" and "nerds".

The second reason it's a mistake is that multiculturalism is the idea of not enforcing a single culture upon everyone in a society. So under multiculturalism, you can have people of quite different cultures living alongside each other without really mixing. Now not all societies that have experienced (or continue to experience) immigration from other cultures practise this. France, for example, notoriously does not, and it expects those who migrate there from Muslim countries to follow French cultural norms. The UK takes a different approach with more minimal British norms being expected of migrants. It's a mistake to label these different approaches as all "multiculturalism". Moreover, the French monoculturalist approach appears - at least to me - to result in more tension than the British multiculturalist one.

This is seen quite clearly I think in the long history of racial conflict in for example the United States between black and white, and is an ongoing (if politically incorrect) concern regarding the mass influx of muslims into Europe, and largely I think explains the ascent of nationalist and even neo-fascist parties on the continent.

Racial conflict in the US has nothing to do with multiculturalism, and everything to do with the fact that the main reason there's a large black population there is because they were shipped over as slaves and subjected to hideous degradation, and they received equal civil rights throughout the country only within living memory, and Americans are still dealing with the toxic fallout from the whole appalling business.

As for Muslim immigration into Europe, leaving aside the fact that it's on a far smaller scale than those on the right would suggest by their constant rhetoric about it, multiculturalism is (as I've said) one possible response to the existence of Islam within a largely non-Muslim country. It's not the only one.

I think therefore that the best recipe is each to his own allotted dwelling place (as the good book says, myself paraphrasing), with such diverse groups of cultural and religious distinction being best in their own polities and communities distinct and separate, and free to maintain their own particularised instantiations of authority.

If you mean they should exist in their own communities within the same country, distinct from each other and with their own cultures though ultimately subject to the same general law, that is precisely the multiculturalism that you criticise.

If you mean they should all go back to the countries that their ancestors came from, that is a policy I associate with the British National Party.

Which do you mean?

Indeed I think the desire to exist in a distinct communities is a natural impulse, as is evident by the human tendency to self-segregate into ethnically, racially and religious uniform communities, something which is directly observable (London for example is divided very much into religious enclaves iirc, according to some article I recall reading some years ago. A starker division can be seen racially in such places as Detroit, where black and white are very starkly separated).

Again you confuse race and religion. There is de facto racial segregation in Detroit not because white people like to live with white people and black people like to live with black people but because black people migrated to that city en masse in the 1930s and 40s and, being poor, all found work in the car factories, and lived in ghettoes because they couldn't afford to do otherwise. And white people, being at that time largely racist, moved away from them because they didn't want to be near the horrid black car workers. You see the same thing in other northern US industrial cities such as Chicago.

As for religious enclaves in London, I don't know what you're referring to. There are different areas of London where people of different national or ethnic backgrounds tend to congregate, certainly. Peckham, for example, is sometimes known as Little Lagos. But this works fine.

The liberal experiment of multiculturalism (and in the case of the united states and much of the Americas the inhuman institution of slavery) has therefore created a very problematic situation where a number of such diverse groups are bunched uncomfortably together, which risks in the future very many social problems ,and perhaps even greater violence than that which is already ongoing between communities.

What would you say about Singapore? That is far more multicultural than either Britain or the US, in the sense that it regards people of different ethnic and religious backgrounds as more distinct and keeps them more separate. They even have to learn different languages at school. And yet they seem to get on pretty well.

So in short answer, no I don't think blacks (or other minority groups) should be denied the (limited if at all) franchise.

But why not? Why doesn't the logic that would deny the vote to women apply to black people as well, given that there are black people here? You can't just say that they shouldn't be here at all. In a multi-ethnic society, where (for whatever reason) some racial groups have clear voting tendencies that do not match what you prefer, why would those racial groups be allowed to vote at all, given that women aren't?

I think the existence of a multi-racial polity is a negative product of liberal social experimentation that is evidently problematic by simple observation.

So, again, what would you do about this? Would you "repatriate" all non-white people from white-majority countries? And all non-black ones from black-majority countries?

What is your opinion on mixed-race marriages? I am white and my wife is black. Should we never have been permitted to marry in the first place? Do you think there must be inevitable cultural incompatibility between us?

II also don't think one should be denied (a limited franchise) for disagreeing with a traditionalist position.

Then why do you say that women should be? That was, remember, your sole justification for this position. How is this not massively inconsistent? Do you think that women have some kind of innate inability to think rationally about political and social matters, which doesn't apply to the other groups? Perhaps their wombs prevent their brains from working properly?

My consideration that (if there is an electoral system) a property qualification (owning land) and tax qualification (must contribute more in taxes than you take in government money) firstly, is hardly exorbitant, and not equivalent to requiring that (to be eligible to vote) one must be as rich as Croesus' lawyer, or owner of a vast landed estate (although I suppose in the case of Britain, as compared to Australia or America, the number of land-holders would be decidedly reduced due to the fact much land is still owned by the old aristocracy and as a consequence of the high population in such a restricted space).

I didn't say that it would be that exorbitant. My point was that the richer a person is, the less motivation that person has for caring about the overall good of society. A person of moderate means still has less motivation than a person of more limited means.

I'm a person of moderate means myself. In the past, I was a person of much more limited means. And I certainly find that I have less interest in the overall good of the economy and of society in general than I did then.

IThe whole point behind my suggestion that perhaps (should such a system apply) one should contribute more in taxes then one receives to be eligible to vote is that when people gain more in from the state than they receive, then precisely because it is in their self-interest to do so they vote for politicians who promise them more cash from the government cash cow. This is clearly observable both here and elsewhere, and indeed people admit quite readily (and it is clear in the media cycle) that the primary concern is how government policy will affect their "hip pocket" as compared to the ultimate economic sustainability of the state. The attempt being made in a system where one must contribute more in taxes than one receives in order to vote, is precisely to dampen the affect of such greed, by ensuring that only those who are ultimately paying a positive cost for other peoples benefits (to their own detriment you could say) can vote. In this way we avoid what effectively amounts to state theft in a robbing peter to pay paul scenario, in which the state extorts more and more money from the people (or goes into debt to do so) to satisfy the interests of a dependant class (welfare dependency) to the eventual ruination of the economy and the state.

But that doesn't make sense at all. A person of means, who contributes more than they take, would also want to reduce the amount they contribute and increase the amount they take (if any). Everyone wants to pay less tax to the state and receive more goods from it. How does restricting the franchise to the better off change that? Do you think that people with more money are somehow more altruistic than those with less? No - if only better off people are allowed a say in the political process, that process will be geared towards helping better off people. If the poor are denied a vote then their interests will not be met. You define welfare as "robbing Peter to pay Paul" and think it creates a "dependent class", but your solution would abandon the poor to their poverty. They would, at best, be dependent on the charity of those altruistic wealthier people who bothered about them. And as Attlee said, quite rightly, charity is deeply inferior to state-sanctioned welfare, because charity makes the poor person the subject of the benefactor: they exist only at the pleasure of the benefactor. Whereas state-sanctioned welfare recognises that they have equal worth.


Well, let's sum up. On the views given here, women have no right to vote; black people shouldn't be in western countries in the first place; a woman who marries gives up all right ever to withhold sex and it is morally OK for her husband to force it upon her; those with wealth and power are wiser, more altruistic, and generally morally superior to those without it; poor people should be abandoned to whatever random fortune brings them; and there is no value in democracy, equality, or tolerance. Ultimately what all of these views come down to is a fetishisation of power and strength (a festishisation which, as I said previously, is diametrically opposed to the consistent teaching of the Bible, if that matters to you). Those who hold power already are just better than those who don't. In this world, the weak must simply shut up and do as they're told, because it's a world run by white, wealthy, heterosexual men for the benefit of white, wealthy, heterosexual men. I find it extremely disturbing that posters here, particularly ones whose comments I've respected in the past, should be posting such ideology under the name of "reactionary" or "traditionalist" thought as if it's some kind of reasonable political philosophy.

So I'd say that the thread has certainly succeeded in its aim of helping us understand precisely what those who identify as "reactionary" or "traditionalist" are really like.

 

[Lone Wolf]

Originally Posted by Plotinus
If you mean they should exist in their own communities within the same country, distinct from each other and with their own cultures though ultimately subject to the same general law, that is precisely the multiculturalism that you criticise.

If you mean they should all go back to the countries that their ancestors came from, that is a policy I associate with the British National Party.

It seems that the solution the Reactionary ideology suggests is legislated segregation within the country borders as a natural solution, as opposed to the supposedly deeply unnatural cultural and racial mixing. It's ironic, though, that certain communalist flavours of multiculturalism also come close to such views, though, of course, they'll shrunk away from segregationist legislation.

I find it extremely disturbing that posters here, particularly ones whose comments I've respected in the past, should be posting such ideology under the name of "reactionary" or "traditionalist" thought as if it's some kind of reasonable political philosophy.

What else you would expect from self-proclaimed Reactionaries? I guess that a scholarly, even scholastic, presentation of such views brings a certain spice, and even victimization, to this philosophy. Certainly beats racist boneheads shouting obscenities on "race mixers" *, or even the people at Conservapedia. **

* But the boneheads are populist, so they don't count as proper Reactionaries. Always remember that. Ah, the times when politics was limited sorely to negotiations between educated gentlemen in smoke-filled rooms. How civilization had fallen, indeed.
** Who, on the whole, fail to make a proper break with liberal-democratism by occasionally veering too closely to populism and despising educated experts a bit too much.

So I'd say that the thread has certainly succeeded in its aim of helping us understand precisely what those who identify as "reactionary" or "traditionalist" are really like.

It certainly did!

 

[Jehoshua]

I make no such assumption. I don't think the state is neutral; rather I think it embodies, or at least tends towards embodying, the generally accepted morality of the people. And of course that's something of a rough estimate since it's pulled in different directions by different interest groups.

Utilitarianism has nothing to do with it. I can never understand why religious people think all secular morality boils down to "utilitarianism", as if Kant never existed. Now certainly there are particular values that most modern western states represent, but to suggest they're anything like as well-worked-out a system as utilitarianism defies the evidence; they are at best an expression of what philosophers like to call "folk morality".

So you say that the state embodies the general zeitgeist of the peoples moral position, which is functionally the same as saying it exists in a neutral moral space between the competing interests which you refer too, which was precisely my point. Likewise since we are referring to how government functions, I think very much it boils down to a utilitarian moral position in which the proper course of action is considered to be one that maximizes total benefit and reduces as far as possible suffering or the negatives of a given sphere. This is precisely since as the liberal state is pushed and pulled by a myriad of competing interests its actions inevitably boil down to the one which satisfies as many of them as possible at a given time within the presumptions of the ruling party.

A liberal isn't ostensibly neutral. A liberal thinks some things are good and some things are bad...

Which I don't deny since I was talking about the de-facto realities of the liberal state, in which the state presumes its processes as being a neutral one for making decisions when in reality they rest on basic moral presumptions.

So women voting has introduced "tyrannical" laws. Can you give examples?

I didn't say womens voting has introduced tyrannical laws, I said it produced discivic outcomes even to the point of tyranny. These discivic outcomes being a tendency to support interventionist policy to the detriment of freedoms. This discivic effect in the economic sphere can be seen by an observation of US voter turnouts in the US around the time the female franchise was introduced. The average increase in voter turnouts of 26 and 33 percent that occurred 25 and 45 years after the enactment of women's suffrage in a US state mirror the 24 and 31 percent increases in state spending over the same periods of time. Interestingly in this regard, the two countries with the greatest economic freedom have some of the most limited franchises (Singapore and Hong Kong).

Likewise with regards to the approach of tyranny, it is an observed historical fact that totalitarian movements have rested on (and supported) the female franchise and manipulated the female vote to that end. For example in the 1930's women were more likely to vote Nazi than for the left in Germany, and in 1932-3 they did so in much greater proportion to men forming a large majority of the Nazi vote. In a less totalitarian example, consider the fate of Switzerland. Women were not permitted to vote there until 1971, much later than the rest of Europe. This is the primary reason why Switzerland retains its sovereignty whereas neither democracy nor national sovereignty presently exists in any of the member states of the European Union, which is ruled by an unaccountable, unelected European Commission. Yet even there it only took 28 years post-suffrage for the national constitution to be modified to permit the passage of gun laws, and for extensive restrictions to be placed upon the ownership of firearms undermining the long militia tradition of the Swiss state. This is also not touching on the increases in divorce and illegitimacy that were predicted by opponents of women's suffrage at the time the movement was gaining momentum, nor the monstrous and diabolical evil of abortion, which has slain millions of lives.

Either way it is a demonstrable fact that when women are given free and full political license, the collective actions of women have reliably had the result of eradicating freedom, destroying economic growth, and demographically murdering the societies in which they live. This outcome is not in the common good.

You can "presume" that the men will confer with their relatives and vote for what's in their best interests; but given that you seem to think women are incapable of voting for what you consider the "right" policies, why would you want the male voters to pay any attention to their female relatives' views at all?

Because while the female franchise might be discivic, women (and others who do not vote) do exist in society and hence society cannot completely ignore their existence. While women are not obviously children, the same principle currently applies to them in that their interests are considered covered by their parents vote (a privilege not a right, and a fairly minor one at that)

This is one of the most appallingly immoral things I have ever read on this forum, and I'm not going to respond to it in any more detail than that.

I basically said if a wife is being sexually abused by her husband she should separate from him, since she has given consent in the marital contract which comes with obligations. Which is not unreasonable I would think. Furthermore I would note that laws exist against assault, and a woman (or man) is perfectly at rights to avail herself (or himself) of those if they are so assaulted. I might not think sex in marriage can possibly constitute rape (precisely due to consent be given by fact of marriage) but that does not justify assault in any form.

Inequalities of power are indeed inevitable, just as domestic violence, war, and poverty are inevitable. But one of the businesses of government is to attempt to reduce all of these things, because they are detrimental to the good of society. Saying that inequality is inevitable so we might as well just build our system of government around it is absurd.

On the contrary, I would say that it is absurd to think that government should endeavour on a futile quest to try and resolve a situation (power distinctions) that is as we both agree inevitable. All such a quest does is result in the development of favoured groups over others (thus affirmative action, and the absurd promotion of homosexuality in liberal societies) and policies that perpetually strive towards some end that will never eventuate and tend if anything to promote conflict between classes of people. It is far more reasonable for a society to accept that hierarchy and distinctions in power exist, and to organise itself in such a way that the hierarchical arrangements best serve (as humanly possible) the common good, rather than the selfish interests of a particular class (as is instantiated in the current liberal system, which is dominated as you yourself noted by a rich and unnacountable elite)

This sounds to me very close to fascism, which also defines individuals in terms of their loyalties to larger groups, and seeks to re-orient all individuals towards a single larger group, in their case the state or the Volk. You're saying precisely the same thing except that your larger group is religious in nature. That's an improvement, but not much of a one, because you're still making that basic assumption that, as you put it, "a man gains his since of identity by his association with multiple groups to which he belongs, but gains an ultimate sense of his self by reference to an ultimate loyalty". Well, I don't.

Its not fascism at all in that I am not referring to nations, but to communities. For example ones parish, ones town, one province, ones country, ones religion, ones football club. If you deny that a person ends up defining himself by these associations than you are living in a different world than the one I observe. My point is that a person in order to maintain these distinct loyalties in harmony (and precisely to avoid tyrannical identification with a single loyalty, like say the nation becoming the entire ruling conception of the good) and facilitate subsidiarity, all these loyalties must subsists within an ultimate loyalty to a moral order, which is to say an objection conception of the good to which all these personal identifications must orient themselves too. If you want to frame that as fascist due to your own ideological disagreement with me go ahead, but you would be quite erroneous.

Just to note, this is an inconsistent claim. Utilitarianism and self-interest are diametrically opposed ideologies. The whole point of utilitarianism is that self-interest has no place in moral deliberations.

This was addressed in the first section of this response.

Here too you make a disturbing jump, from multi-racial society to multi-cultural. That is a mistake for two reasons. First, race does not equal culture. A black person and a white person may be culturally identical. So a society in which many people are black and many people are white is not necessarily a society in which two different cultures co-exist. Indeed there are far more and more significant cultural divides within and across racial divisions. Just consider the divide in America between "liberal" and "conservative". Or the divide in universities between "humanities" and "sciences". Or the divide in schools between "jocks" and "nerds"....

Firstly you are making a strawman leap from your argument, unless of course you are denying that the policy of multiculturalism has indeed resulted in an increase in the diversity of western societies racially, religiously and so forth. I'm not talking about the effect of the policy on society, but the affect of the presence of such diverse groups in a single space which that policy in particular has created. Secondly you then leap to saying that the concerns I noted reduce down entirely to culture, while I would maintain that diverse cultures does indeed pose problems for civil order (since there is no longer a shared conception of the good, a common consensus if you will, since other groups have their own particularised values and moral frameworks), this assertion you make is false in that I would maintain that racial differences of themselves are not conductive to social peace, and indeed studies show that people naturally are less empathetic to people of other races with this having nothing to do with social structures or legacies, which is a problem when it comes to maintaining harmonious relations between diverse races in close proximity. This problem is why my position is that it is best for peoples to be separate.

As for Muslim immigration into Europe, leaving aside the fact that it's on a far smaller scale than those on the right would suggest by their constant rhetoric about it, multiculturalism is (as I've said) one possible response to the existence of Islam within a largely non-Muslim country. It's not the only one.

I'd disagree, seeing as the moral values of liberalism which dominates in the west and Islam are anathema to each-other. It is no surprise I think that you see young well educated muslims born and raised in the west becoming radicals and waging jihad in distant lands, while their parents tend to be at peace with the land they migrated too. Indeed it was just recently that a british jihadi beheaded an American journalist in Syria.

If you mean they should exist in their own communities within the same country, distinct from each other and with their own cultures though ultimately subject to the same general law, that is precisely the multiculturalism that you criticise.

If you mean they should all go back to the countries that their ancestors came from, that is a policy I associate with the British National Party.

Depends on the context, although you could say both. In the case of say African Americans there is no place for them to go back too, seeing as they have lost all but the most tenuous connections to "place" in Africa, prudence then dictates that the US polity should interact with them in whichever way it can that minimises the problems racial diversity brings in that country. I would emphasise here though that in such cases it is necessary for these groups to be held to the standards and norms of the majority group (not exist as some cultural ghetto apart from those norms). In the case though of recent immigrants and their children, I think a state is perfectly at rights in the defence of the host societies best interests to expatriate them to their homelands for the good of both groups (indeed one problem with mass immigration is that it results in a perpetual brain drain of resources from poor countries into the west, exacerbating problems in poor countries so afflicted).

Again you confuse race and religion. There is de facto racial segregation in Detroit not because white people like to live with white people and black people like to live with black people but because black people migrated to that city en masse in the 1930s and 40s and, being poor, all found work in the car factories, and lived in ghettoes because they couldn't afford to do otherwise. And white people, being at that time largely racist, moved away from them because they didn't want to be near the horrid black car workers. You see the same thing in other northern US industrial cities such as Chicago.

I make no such confusion, but simply pointed out examples of religious self-segragation in the one case, and racial segregation on the other. As for why white people left their homes in Detroit, you (following perhaps your own prejudices) say its because the whites were racist, I would argue on the other hand its because the presence of blacks caused problems and proved intolerable, thus resulting in mass segregation that persists today. Either way the essential point I'm making that races in proximity causes problems (we can both agree I think that hostile relations between races is not good) remains. As to London, heres a BBC article which mentions it.

What would you say about Singapore? That is far more multicultural than either Britain or the US, in the sense that it regards people of different ethnic and religious backgrounds as more distinct and keeps them more separate. They even have to learn different languages at school. And yet they seem to get on pretty well.

Singapore is 75% chinese, and is pretty clearly dominated by that group (indeed its why they left a political union with Malaysia, which preferences ethnic malays. So you can't say racial conflict was not an issue in singapore). Religious diversity in Singapore then exists within a fairly monogamous racial paradigm (if you include malays, Singapore is around 88% east Asian, with the remaining 9% being indian and the rest being various expats. This would likely aid in maintaining civil order combined with its strict laws, restricted franchise [something I support] and clear domination by a single group (which doesn't kowtow to liberal doctrines that see the west give affirmative priveleges to minorities).

But why not? Why doesn't the logic that would deny the vote to women apply to black people as well, given that there are black people here? You can't just say that they shouldn't be here at all. In a multi-ethnic society, where (for whatever reason) some racial groups have clear voting tendencies that do not match what you prefer, why would those racial groups be allowed to vote at all, given that women aren't?

There may well be good reason to restrict the voting rites of groups hostile to the interests of the host society. However I don't think that blacks and ethnic minorities in the west a) constitute such an actively hostile group and b) racial differences don't constitute an essential difference in the way sex does. I refer to essential differences of sex below in more detail.

What is your opinion on mixed-race marriages? I am white and my wife is black. Should we never have been permitted to marry in the first place? Do you think there must be inevitable cultural incompatibility between us?

While I personally think mixed-race marriage is ill-advised, there is nothing morally wrong with it and it shouldn't be prohibited or restricted in law in any way.

Then why do you say that women should be? That was, remember, your sole justification for this position. How is this not massively inconsistent? Do you think that women have some kind of innate inability to think rationally about political and social matters, which doesn't apply to the other groups? Perhaps their wombs prevent their brains from working properly?

Or perhaps you are ignoring the clear science which informs us that men and women do in fact have clearly distinct biological differences neurologically that directly affect their thinking and reason, with a measurable difference between men's and women's brains. In this sense women, are quite unlike different races. There are biological and psychosexual reasons that women are inordinately inclined to favour the "security" offered by Big Daddy government intervention, which leads them inordinately when given the franchise to use the privilege of voting in a way that is detrimental to the common good. While minorities might vote for such policies out of self interest, this is just a product of the system in which they find themselves in, which functions entirely on appeal to competing interest groups. Heres a study on sex differences in impulse resistance for your perusal as an example of scientific research on the subject.

I didn't say that it would be that exorbitant. My point was that the richer a person is, the less motivation that person has for caring about the overall good of society. A person of moderate means still has less motivation than a person of more limited means.

I'm a person of moderate means myself. In the past, I was a person of much more limited means. And I certainly find that I have less interest in the overall good of the economy and of society in general than I did then.

Than you are either an exceptional individual, or perhaps more likely falling into the intellectual trap of thinking that all people are as noble as yourself. Most people aren't, and most people are concerned primarily about themselves. This is observable from any cursory assessment of the electorate and its collective concerns.

But that doesn't make sense at all. A person of means, who contributes more than they take, would also want to reduce the amount they contribute and increase the amount they take (if any). Everyone wants to pay less tax to the state and receive more goods from it. How does restricting the franchise to the better off change that?

however if they gained more from the state than they contributed they would lose the franchise. Hence the broad majority of the electorate would maintain something of an interest in ensuring government largesse directed at them does not become exorbitant (and encouraging hence self-reliance and independence from the state, ensuring the economy is not subject to ruinous expenses on various forms of welfare) thus depriving them of the privilege. The tendency we have in the current system for middle-class welfare to be doled out would then be somewhat circumscribed, as welfare expenses towards that class would be in some sense against their political interests to vote for. If they are willing to deprive themselves of that privilege, well that's up to them.

Do you think that people with more money are somehow more altruistic than those with less? No - if only better off people are allowed a say in the political process, that process will be geared towards helping better off people. If the poor are denied a vote then their interests will not be met. You define welfare as "robbing Peter to pay Paul" and think it creates a "dependent class", but your solution would abandon the poor to their poverty. They would, at best, be dependent on the charity of those altruistic wealthier people who bothered about them. And as Attlee said, quite rightly, charity is deeply inferior to state-sanctioned welfare, because charity makes the poor person the subject of the benefactor: they exist only at the pleasure of the benefactor. Whereas state-sanctioned welfare recognises that they have equal worth.

Firstly, welfare to the poor would not necessarily be affected inordinately should such a restricted electorate be put in place, as I noted before, for welfare directed to the poor wouldn't risk the political influence and position of the electorate. If you think then that the electorate would withhold all welfare to these groups, than I suppose you are more doubtful as to peoples moral agency than I (I tend to think that people do tend to think that the poor should be looked after) or the states interests in maintaining social serenity and order (things that poverty disrupts). Secondly I have no objection to charity, since I see it not as a cynical manifestation of superiority (as you and Attlee do) but as an expression of recognition of the humanity of the other person. Likewise I think you are being facetious seeing as you object to charity on the basis of the person receiving charity existing at "the pleasure of the benefactor", but have no problems with state sanctioned charity which makes them dependant on the pleasure of the state. At least with the formal there is a personal relationship between the two people, with the latter the person receiving the charity is dehumanised and rendered a statistic in a bureaucratic and depersonalised state machine.

Well, let's sum up. On the views given here, women have no right to vote; black people shouldn't be in western countries in the first place; a woman who marries gives up all right ever to withhold sex and it is morally OK for her husband to force it upon her; those with wealth and power are wiser, more altruistic, and generally morally superior to those without it; poor people should be abandoned to whatever random fortune brings them; and there is no value in democracy, equality, or tolerance. Ultimately what all of these views come down to is a fetishisation of power and strength (a festishisation which, as I said previously, is diametrically opposed to the consistent teaching of the Bible, if that matters to you). Those who hold power already are just better than those who don't. In this world, the weak must simply shut up and do as they're told, because it's a world run by white, wealthy, heterosexual men for the benefit of white, wealthy, heterosexual men. I find it extremely disturbing that posters here, particularly ones whose comments I've respected in the past, should be posting such ideology under the name of "reactionary" or "traditionalist" thought as if it's some kind of reasonable political philosophy.

Well to sum up my thoughts on your response, I am disappointed in that you (who on your theology thread make your points with reason and well considered thoughts) have here resorted to strawmen, direct mischaracterisations of my positions (intentionally or otherwise) and to general dishonest attempts to frame your response to support your view. Now I can empathise as to why you might do that, from what you revealed of yourself here and considering your own liberalism (to which I am diametrically opposed ofc) but that's no justification for it.

Now to correct the mischaracterisations you stated in the above quote, the things you wrongly attribute to me are a) that it is morally ok for a husband to force sex on his wife (I explicitly said an abusive husband is acting immorally, and noted she has the avenue of separation. I objected to saying that rape can exist in marriage, since consent has been given through the marital contract) that the wealthy are wiser and more altruistic (they aren't, which is why the system I propose is an attempt to maximise their interest towards acting within the collective interests) or that poor people should be subject to random fortune (I never said anything of the sort, that is just you creating a strawman) or that I fetishise power and strength (I don't, I refer to the very Christian principle of authority). You say erroneously that I say that "the weak" meaning non-westerners in particular in the world should shut-up and accept the supremacy of said west and the world run for its benefit (a total falsehood, seeing as I have said quite clearly that I think separation is superior, precisely because all peoples have a right to their own cultures and traditions and that the west has no right to impose its traditions on theirs).

Things which you say which are half-correct (although warped) are when you say I say black people have no right to be in western countries (which isn't essentially true, my position is that people don't have a "right" to immigrate anywhere, its a privilege resting in that community to allow someone to come amongst them. If foreigners are given that privilege than that privilege they have even if I think the decision to give it originally was imprudent)

The things in your summary which are actually correct more or less, is when you say that I hold no value (morally) by democracy, tolerance and equality as they are understood in liberal theory. Democracy is not a moral value, but a prudential and functional means of appointing a government. Tolerance likewise is not a virtue, but rather something one does in order to avoid some greater evil, or to facilitate a good that would otherwise be hindered by intransigent policy. Equality (quite apart from spiritual equality before God, which I believe in, and the limited temporal sphere of equal treatment before the law) I think is essentially a lie (since people are different from eachother, and thus essentially unequal, some being stronger, smarter and so and so from others) with this feeding into all aspects of human endeavours. Attempts to institute policy to create some utopian world where all people are functionally equivalent, or treated as such, are doomed to ram directly into the wall of reality and subsequent failure. As you yourself admitted in your response when you agreed that inequalities of power are inevitable.

Now if you respect me less now, that we have discussed political matters. So be it. I don't respect you less for you holding monstrous and inhuman political positions regarding a number of things, for example for your atheism since a) I don't judge people by their political beliefs and b) I don't seek to impose my beliefs on the unwilling as the liberals so often do. If you can't find it in you to respect people who disagree with you, or to address them through emotive rhetoric that mischaracterises, and makes false claims, than that's a diminution of your own person and has no consequence for me. For example I know full well that I think the races are equal and shouldn't be subject to abuse from eachother as much as is possible, likewise that women are different and distinct, differentiated in function at least while being equal to men. Shouting at me that I'm a racist or misogynist because I think racial proximity leads to harmful actions of one race on another (or both races on eachother) or the female franchise is ultimately against societies interests (btw I have no objection to women in the workforce, you are responding entirely to an objection that they should vote on the presumption that the vote is a privilege and not a right, and one that serves the common good rather than an individual imperative) does not render those assertions true nor does it really affect me either way other than perhaps to make me a little disappointed that rhetorical outrage has taken the place of dialectic.

 

[Ailedhoo]

The Gender Similarities Hypothesis needs to be bought in challenge to the case bought up. This also looks at similarities. Whatever the case even from the exaggeration points of difference should not justify the denial of women suffrage.

 

[Borachio]

I find it practically impossible to envisage anything other than Universal Suffrage. And I can't see restricted suffrage ever being implemented once people have enjoyed having the vote. That would be like a turkey voting for Christmas.

 

[Plotinus]

All right, I'll try harder this time to be brief, because I don't think that this discussion is going to have much constructive outcome.

I didn't say womens voting has introduced tyrannical laws, I said it produced discivic outcomes even to the point of tyranny. These discivic outcomes being a tendency to support interventionist policy to the detriment of freedoms. This discivic effect in the economic sphere can be seen by an observation of US voter turnouts in the US around the time the female franchise was introduced. The average increase in voter turnouts of 26 and 33 percent that occurred 25 and 45 years after the enactment of women's suffrage in a US state mirror the 24 and 31 percent increases in state spending over the same periods of time. Interestingly in this regard, the two countries with the greatest economic freedom have some of the most limited franchises (Singapore and Hong Kong).

For that to work you'd have to show that the increases in voter turnouts at the times when certain policies were enacted were (a) the causes of those policies being enacted, and (b) a matter of more women voting. An increase in voter turnout could be an increase in men too. Merely stating that these events occurred after women got the vote doesn't tell us anything.

Plus of course you're assuming that an increase in state spending is, as you call it, "discivic" and restricts people's freedoms, something that I would not accept, but we won't go into that here.

Likewise with regards to the approach of tyranny, it is an observed historical fact that totalitarian movements have rested on (and supported) the female franchise and manipulated the female vote to that end. For example in the 1930's women were more likely to vote Nazi than for the left in Germany, and in 1932-3 they did so in much greater proportion to men forming a large majority of the Nazi vote.

That is not correct. In 1928, 2.6% of male voters and 1.8% of female ones voted Nazi. In 1930, these figures went up to 19.3% and 16.7%. So the Nazis increased their vote among women more than they did among men, with this continuing into 1933, by which time it seems that their vote share among women was somewhat higher than among men. But it certainly wasn't a "much greater proportion". Moreover, the reason why this happened was that the Nazis recognised the importance of appealing to women voters and presented themselves in terms designed to attract them. For example, women were more likely than men to vote for Christian parties, and so the Nazis presented themselves in some areas as a Christian party, with some success in attracting female voters. After 1930 Gregor Strasser was specifically charged with attracting and organising the female vote, which he did by creating the National Socialist Women's Organisation.

Be aware, also, that more women than men were eligible to vote at all during this period, so in absolute numbers there were more female Nazi votes than male ones even when the proportion of women voting for the Nazis was lower. This skews the figures.

We also see that in the presidential elections of 1932 Hitler enjoyed consistently greater support from men than from women. In the first round, 28.4% of men and 26.7% of women voted for him. In the second round, 36% of men and 33.8% of women voted for him.

All of this information comes from Boak, H. (1989) "'Our Last Hope': Women's Votes for Hitler: A Reappraisal" in German Studies Review 12:2 pp. 289-310.

In a less totalitarian example, consider the fate of Switzerland. Women were not permitted to vote there until 1971, much later than the rest of Europe. This is the primary reason why Switzerland retains its sovereignty whereas neither democracy nor national sovereignty presently exists in any of the member states of the European Union, which is ruled by an unaccountable, unelected European Commission.

This is absurd: of course there is both democracy and both national sovereignty in the states of the EU, since they control many of their own affairs and are not simply directly governed by the European Commission. Moreover, the European Commission is both accountable and elected. It is elected by the members of the European Parliament, who are themselves directly elected by the voters of the EU. So the European Commission is effectively elected in precisely the same way as the British government - unless you're going to say that David Cameron is an unelected leader because he's not directly voted in by the voters.

Yet even there it only took 28 years post-suffrage for the national constitution to be modified to permit the passage of gun laws, and for extensive restrictions to be placed upon the ownership of firearms undermining the long militia tradition of the Swiss state. This is also not touching on the increases in divorce and illegitimacy that were predicted by opponents of women's suffrage at the time the movement was gaining momentum, nor the monstrous and diabolical evil of abortion, which has slain millions of lives.

With the exception of abortion, which I regard as mostly morally neutral or undesirable to a moderate degree, all of the changes you mention here are ones I would regard as positive. However, this again is something that we will have to agree to disagree about.

Either way it is a demonstrable fact that when women are given free and full political license, the collective actions of women have reliably had the result of eradicating freedom, destroying economic growth, and demographically murdering the societies in which they live. This outcome is not in the common good.

It is only a "demonstrable fact" if you regard the policies you mention above as destructive to freedom, economic growth, and life. But such a view is itself hardly demonstrable.

I basically said if a wife is being sexually abused by her husband she should separate from him, since she has given consent in the marital contract which comes with obligations. Which is not unreasonable I would think. Furthermore I would note that laws exist against assault, and a woman (or man) is perfectly at rights to avail herself (or himself) of those if they are so assaulted. I might not think sex in marriage can possibly constitute rape (precisely due to consent be given by fact of marriage) but that does not justify assault in any form.

Well, first, consent is not automatically bestowed by the marriage vows, because they do not contain any clause to the effect that one will be permanently sexually available no matter how one feels about it at the time. No-one swears such a thing when getting married, so I don't see any grounds for thinking that a married women exists in some kind of permanent state of consent to sex. Second, even if you do believe she exists in such a state, you presumably accept that there are times when she doesn't want to have sex. If the husband forces her to have sex at these times, would you say that this is necessarily assault? If so, then the disagreement between us is purely verbal: I would regard this as rape and you would regard it merely as assault, but we would both think that it is wrong and should be illegal and that the woman should have the right to leave the man. But if not, then you need to explain under what circumstances it wouldn't be assault, and why not.

On the contrary, I would say that it is absurd to think that government should endeavour on a futile quest to try and resolve a situation (power distinctions) that is as we both agree inevitable. All such a quest does is result in the development of favoured groups over others (thus affirmative action, and the absurd promotion of homosexuality in liberal societies) and policies that perpetually strive towards some end that will never eventuate and tend if anything to promote conflict between classes of people. It is far more reasonable for a society to accept that hierarchy and distinctions in power exist, and to organise itself in such a way that the hierarchical arrangements best serve (as humanly possible) the common good, rather than the selfish interests of a particular class (as is instantiated in the current liberal system, which is dominated as you yourself noted by a rich and unnacountable elite)

No, it is better to attempt to minimise the dominance of some groups over others, particularly those groups that are already dominant. There are certainly issues with affirmative action policies, but at least they favour groups who are weaker, thereby balancing things out somewhat.

It is, by the way, absolutely ridiculous to say that liberal societies "promote homosexuality". No-one promotes it. Liberal societies permit and disallow discrimination against gay people. That's not promotion; you might as well say that when Catholicism was legalised in Britain that constituted "promotion" of Catholicism.

Firstly you are making a strawman leap from your argument, unless of course you are denying that the policy of multiculturalism has indeed resulted in an increase in the diversity of western societies racially, religiously and so forth. I'm not talking about the effect of the policy on society, but the affect of the presence of such diverse groups in a single space which that policy in particular has created. Secondly you then leap to saying that the concerns I noted reduce down entirely to culture, while I would maintain that diverse cultures does indeed pose problems for civil order (since there is no longer a shared conception of the good, a common consensus if you will, since other groups have their own particularised values and moral frameworks), this assertion you make is false in that I would maintain that racial differences of themselves are not conductive to social peace, and indeed studies show that people naturally are less empathetic to people of other races with this having nothing to do with social structures or legacies, which is a problem when it comes to maintaining harmonious relations between diverse races in close proximity. This problem is why my position is that it is best for peoples to be separate.

If you had linked to the paper itself rather than a brief summary of it, you would have noticed that the authors conclude like this:

On the positive side, even if we do not intuitively grasp out-group members' inner states; there may be ways to compensate. Cognitive perspective taking, for example, can increase interpersonal sensitivity and understanding, thereby reducing prejudice (Galinsky & Moskowitz, 2000) and increasing helping (Batson, Chang, & Orr, 2002). In addition, it fosters self-other merging - a process during which the cognitive representations of the perspective-taker and target increasingly overlap (Galnsky, Ku, & Wang, 2005). This overlap, is cognitive in nature, but also translates to an embodiment of the other person; for example, perspective taking not only leads people to include stereotypes of the other into the self, but also to act stereotypically (Galinsky, Wang, & Ku, 2008; Wheeler, Blair, Jarvis, & Petty, 2001). Therefore, even if taking another's perspective is an effortful form of interpersonal sensitivity, over time it can change the way people perceive and help people overcome their biases.

In other words, the authors do not see this cognitive bias against people of other races as inherent and fixed, but as something that can be overcome. There is nothing in their paper to suggest that it's innate. There's also nothing in their paper to suggest that it's common to all races, as they studied only the reaction of white people to non-white people. They characterise it as "prejudice" and it would be perfectly consistent with their paper to suppose that it is wholly the product of conditioning rather than some basic fact about how the brain works. It's therefore quite illegitimate to use this research to support the claim that people of all races naturally can't get on with each other.

Depends on the context, although you could say both. In the case of say African Americans there is no place for them to go back too, seeing as they have lost all but the most tenuous connections to "place" in Africa, prudence then dictates that the US polity should interact with them in whichever way it can that minimises the problems racial diversity brings in that country. I would emphasise here though that in such cases it is necessary for these groups to be held to the standards and norms of the majority group (not exist as some cultural ghetto apart from those norms). In the case though of recent immigrants and their children, I think a state is perfectly at rights in the defence of the host societies best interests to expatriate them to their homelands for the good of both groups (indeed one problem with mass immigration is that it results in a perpetual brain drain of resources from poor countries into the west, exacerbating problems in poor countries so afflicted).

The child of an immigrant has no more connection to the place of origin than anyone else. My wife is the daughter of immigrants from Nigeria but she's never been there, never wants to go there, and has nothing to do with the place. Yet under your policy it would be better for her to be deported to that foreign country, simply because of who her parents were! Do you think that's consistent with justice?

I make no such confusion, but simply pointed out examples of religious self-segragation in the one case, and racial segregation on the other. As for why white people left their homes in Detroit, you (following perhaps your own prejudices) say its because the whites were racist, I would argue on the other hand its because the presence of blacks caused problems and proved intolerable, thus resulting in mass segregation that persists today. Either way the essential point I'm making that races in proximity causes problems (we can both agree I think that hostile relations between races is not good) remains.

The "presence of blacks caused problems"? Or the presence of poor manual workers? Do you really think that the ghettoisation of black people in American cities in the mid-twentieth century was solely a factor of the colour of their skin and not of the massive social implications that skin colour had, such as class, wealth, and prejudice?

Singapore is 75% chinese, and is pretty clearly dominated by that group (indeed its why they left a political union with Malaysia, which preferences ethnic malays. So you can't say racial conflict was not an issue in singapore). Religious diversity in Singapore then exists within a fairly monogamous racial paradigm (if you include malays, Singapore is around 88% east Asian, with the remaining 9% being indian and the rest being various expats. This would likely aid in maintaining civil order combined with its strict laws, restricted franchise [something I support] and clear domination by a single group (which doesn't kowtow to liberal doctrines that see the west give affirmative priveleges to minorities).

You can't lump Chinese and Malays together. In southeast Asia they are regarded as racially, culturally, and (especially) religiously quite distinct. You are right that ethnic Chinese dominate in Singapore, but it is absolutely not a "monogamous racial paradigm", because the 25% of Singaporeans who are not ethnic Chinese are expected to maintain their own cultural identity and distinctness, including their own languages and their own religions (Malays are typically Muslim - indeed in Malaysia they're automatically regarded as Muslim irrespective of their actual beliefs). This is a paradigm case of a multicultural society. Now it brings with it serious problems of its own, such as the terrible prejudice that mixed-race couples face, but it does not at all bring about the collapse of society that you seem to attribute to multiculturalism.

While I personally think mixed-race marriage is ill-advised, there is nothing morally wrong with it and it shouldn't be prohibited or restricted in law in any way.

Why is it ill-advised?

Or perhaps you are ignoring the clear science which informs us that men and women do in fact have clearly distinct biological differences neurologically that directly affect their thinking and reason, with a measurable difference between men's and women's brains. In this sense women, are quite unlike different races. There are biological and psychosexual reasons that women are inordinately inclined to favour the "security" offered by Big Daddy government intervention, which leads them inordinately when given the franchise to use the privilege of voting in a way that is detrimental to the common good. While minorities might vote for such policies out of self interest, this is just a product of the system in which they find themselves in, which functions entirely on appeal to competing interest groups. Heres a study on sex differences in impulse resistance for your perusal as an example of scientific research on the subject.

You have misunderstood the scientific paper you cite. It does not say anything about men and women behaving or thinking differently. In fact, it says precisely the opposite.

The paper is about the neural capacity to counteract impulsive desires, and how this capacity differs in men and women. It finds that different areas of the brain are used at such times depending on the sex of the subject. But this is so even though men and women actually behave in the same way - that is, they are equally able to counteract impulsive desires. In fact the subjects of the study were selected specifically on the basis of the similarity in how they behaved and thought. The purpose of the research was to see if the neurological basis of a similar ability in men and women to counteract their impulsive desires differed. It found that it did. The authors state:

In line with previous evidence on the effects of biological sex on human brain function (Arnold, 2004, Cahill, 2006, Cosgrove et al., 2007 and Hines, 2010) the present results demonstrate gender differences in the neural mechanisms mediating choice behavior in a sequential forced choice task. We found that despite similar behavioral performance, age and personality characteristics (Table 1), men and women recruited somewhat different brain regions to resolve the ‘desire-reason dilemma’.

They also add that even these results are provisional, since they studied only 32 people and didn't take into account other complicating factors such as menstrual cycle phase.

So in other words, this article does support your claim that men's and women's brains work differently in some ways, but it undermines your claim that this results in different behaviour. Men and women use different bits of their brains to achieve the same outcomes.

Than you are either an exceptional individual, or perhaps more likely falling into the intellectual trap of thinking that all people are as noble as yourself. Most people aren't, and most people are concerned primarily about themselves. This is observable from any cursory assessment of the electorate and its collective concerns.

You misread me. I said that my concern about society diminished as I became less reliant upon it. I think this is the case for most people. Those who are wealthy are less likely to care about the health of the economy because they have their own reserves. As you say, "most people are concerned primarily about themselves". That's precisely why restricting the franchise in the way you describe would result in policies that primarily benefit those who have it.

however if they gained more from the state than they contributed they would lose the franchise. Hence the broad majority of the electorate would maintain something of an interest in ensuring government largesse directed at them does not become exorbitant (and encouraging hence self-reliance and independence from the state, ensuring the economy is not subject to ruinous expenses on various forms of welfare) thus depriving them of the privilege. The tendency we have in the current system for middle-class welfare to be doled out would then be somewhat circumscribed, as welfare expenses towards that class would be in some sense against their political interests to vote for. If they are willing to deprive themselves of that privilege, well that's up to them.

I think what you'd end up with would be a system where the enfranchised reduce both payments and benefits to the bare minimum. That would minimise the negative effect on themselves with the unfortunate effect of also minimising the positive effect on the disenfranchised.

Firstly, welfare to the poor would not necessarily be affected inordinately should such a restricted electorate be put in place, as I noted before, for welfare directed to the poor wouldn't risk the political influence and position of the electorate. If you think then that the electorate would withhold all welfare to these groups, than I suppose you are more doubtful as to peoples moral agency than I (I tend to think that people do tend to think that the poor should be looked after) or the states interests in maintaining social serenity and order (things that poverty disrupts).

Well, look, we don't have to speculate about what this system would be like, because it's happened. It was called the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, before the Great Reform Act. Now do you think that the poor were better off then than they are now? Is that really a question that needs to be asked?

If you can't find it in you to respect people who disagree with you, or to address them through emotive rhetoric that mischaracterises, and makes false claims, than that's a diminution of your own person and has no consequence for me.

If I mischaracterise it's simply because what you say seems to me to have the consequences I state. And certainly I can respect people who disagree with me. I've aimed to do so in the religion thread you mention and elsewhere, where I've consistently argued - contra people like Dawkins - that one can disagree profoundly with someone about religious matters without denigrating their intelligence or moral outlook. And while I've disagreed about many things with you and my other Catholic friends on this forum, and others of different views, I haven't diminished my respect for them as a result. But extremist views like these are another matter altogether.

I say only "extremist" because while I've said that some of the attitudes here are akin to fascism, I think you're right to reject that label - there are clear differences. It seems to me that your position is very similar to that of someone like Franco, i.e. not really fascist but extremely right-wing socially, anti-democratic, and authoritarian. You will, I suppose, at least agree with me that these views are extreme from the viewpoint of most people in modern western society.

For example I know full well that I think the races are equal and shouldn't be subject to abuse from eachother as much as is possible, likewise that women are different and distinct, differentiated in function at least while being equal to men. Shouting at me that I'm a racist or misogynist because I think racial proximity leads to harmful actions of one race on another (or both races on eachother) or the female franchise is ultimately against societies interests (btw I have no objection to women in the workforce, you are responding entirely to an objection that they should vote on the presumption that the vote is a privilege and not a right, and one that serves the common good rather than an individual imperative) does not render those assertions true nor does it really affect me either way other than perhaps to make me a little disappointed that rhetorical outrage has taken the place of dialectic.

And yet the policies you have endorsed don't reflect the noble aspirations you give here. You say that you think "the races" are equal and shouldn't abuse each other, yet your prescription to achieve this is segregation, something that historically has been imposed by just one race upon another. And will you seriously say that when segregation was in force in parts of the US, this resulted in greater harmony between the races? Would you find many black Americans who would prefer to return to that state of affairs? Again, you say that men and women are equal but different; but if you would deny women the vote you deny their equality because you withhold from them an equal share in the decision-making process. You may protest that you are not a racist or a sexist, and perhaps you do not intend to be, but the positions you hold would inevitably lead to the subjugation and abuse of the people you claim to view positively. I did not say at all in my previous post that you're either a racist or a misogynist; but I think that what you've said here speaks for itself.

 

[Tahuti]

I find it practically impossible to envisage anything other than Universal Suffrage. And I can't see restricted suffrage ever being implemented once people have enjoyed having the vote. That would be like a turkey voting for Christmas.

I consider the benefits of universal suffrage to be an illusion. It's essentially like the stuffing of the turkey before Christmas: You assume it's alright and good, until disaster strikes.

Democracy only works in small tightly knit groups where even the slightest dissent can sway the debate. This is essentially the checkmate for democracy as a means of governance when it comes to polities the size of thousands of inhabitants, let alone millions.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

I consider the benefits of universal suffrage to be an illusion. It's essentially like the stuffing of the turkey before Christmas: You assume it's alright and good, until disaster strikes.

Could you be more specific?

 

[Tahuti]

Could you be more specific?

Well, when you vote, do you really exert influence? It is more likely that the news media already has shaped the election results. Your vote is unlikely to render change, which makes democracy an essentially dishonest form of government because its supposed strength is that everyone has influence.