Isn't the whole point of liberation (y'know, libertarian, freedom, etc.?) to find and acquire freedom, instead of forcing people to conform?
[RD] George Floyd and protesting while black
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Berzerker
Deity
If CHAZ set up shop at your house I doubt you'd be calling yourself a fascist for removing them
CHAZ doesn't have the right to occupy your land
CHAZ doesn't have the right to occupy your land
Zardnaar
Deity
Even here CHAZ would get rolled up.
All the authorise have to do is wait it out for tensions to lower and complaints to roll in. Public opinion will also turn against them once things start going wrong.
All the authorise have to do is wait it out for tensions to lower and complaints to roll in. Public opinion will also turn against them once things start going wrong.
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
Who will protect the people of Seattle from the Seattle police department?
Zardnaar
Deity
Seon
Not An Evil Liar
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/07/03/us/george-floyd-protests-crowd-size.html
Current wave of protests may go down in history as the largest movement/civil unrest in American history, with estimated 6-10% of all Americans having partaken in active protest.
Current wave of protests may go down in history as the largest movement/civil unrest in American history, with estimated 6-10% of all Americans having partaken in active protest.
JohannaK
Heroically Clueless
I think that's more people than partook in the October Revolution, or even the Iranian Revolution?
Yet, no revolution.
Yet, no revolution.
Zardnaar
Deity
You can change the American system.
It's when you can't change the system or it's functionally impossible you'll trigger a revolution. Or if the repression is to much and to widespread and people/army lose faith in the system.
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And have massive support from foreign powers.
Zardnaar
Deity
Some revolutions are bloodless, others a relative handful (Ceucescu in Romania).
Yes, but in the other two cases which you mention those were formally absolutist states with unaccountable autocrats. The U.S. of A., flawed as it may be, still is formally a democracy with an impending election and the right to petition the authorities.
JohannaK
Heroically Clueless
Well, no, one of them was of a fledging allegedly democratic state that had just celebrated its first elections after a revolution overthrew the autocrats eight months before already.
Zardnaar
Deity
USA is coming in the high end of flawed democracies.
It's not a top ten place I would want to live in the world. It's still top 20 or 30 despite the flaws.
I might consider living in some autocratic state as a foreigner but not as a local.
you don't have the right to occupy indigenous land
the US doesn't even fit its own standards for ''democracy'': there's blatant electoral fraud, targetted especially at places with a lot of black people, as well as a first-past-the-post system that sometimes makes the loser the winner, plus elections happen on ordinary weekdays with no dispensation to get off work to vote
Zardnaar
Deity
And that's why it's a flawed democracy. It got marked down due to things like gerrymandering.
Other countries are so bad you know the results before you vote. You can often guess the margins as well.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index
And often overlaps with......
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index
And happiest
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.fo.../03/20/ranked-20-happiest-countries-2020/amp/
Recurring trend in top 10.
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Yes, but the Russian Empire had no democratic culture, which is what I'm driving at. It had one election (with over 3,000 deputies elected) and even then the Petrograd Soviet was already sharing power (see Dvoyevlastye). Given that the country was disintegrating and still at the same time trying to fight WWI, I think of it as more of a stillborn democracy rather than a fledgling one.
Meanwhile, the US has over two centuries of presidents ceding power to their successors and that, in the collective consciousness, does weigh.
But that's where the police come from. The sheriffs were the first line of defence against the Injuns.
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in the US, you know that either a Democrat or a Republican will win, and especially in more local elections you do know the result before you vote. those metrics are also worthless, Bhutan often manages to be the ''happiest country in the world'' while being a totalitarian dictatorship, there's no real way to measure ''democracy'' and the perception of corruption =/= actual corruption
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
There is a tradition of electing leadership (between two parties that are fully institutionalized), but this doesn't necessarily indicate that these traditions will avail the political change necessary to avert this crisis. Taking your mention of the impending election, what if Joe Biden and the Democrats administer a half-measure that does nothing? What if he then loses his Congress before he can do anything, bringing us right back to square one? The nominal ability of democracy to peacefully address dissent assumes that system is also able to successfully generate and administer policy.
As for petitioning authorities, Black Americans have consistently had this right denied to them, which is also part of the reason the situation has developed to the point it has.
It's possible this situation can be reformed through progressive politics, but my feeling is that that vision isn't really there in the political class. If Biden et al feel like they can't alienate the center, again, and pass a half-measure, again, we'll be kicking it up stream and pulling back the rubber band a little bit more.
I agree in general with what you say, Crezth, but there's the example that until three and a half years ago the president was a Black citizen of the U.S. of A. And things were better, even if still bad, and during their lifetimes they've seen some positive change. Of course their situation is still a bad one. But they've seen a civil rights movement that -from my POV- should have achieved more, but at least achieved some things, and gay rights being upheld even by this packed court of all courts, and they see that things can be changed within the existing legal, socioeconomic and cultural framework. They want to tear down the Confederate battle flag, but not the US flag. In pre-revolutionary Russia and Iran, by definition, you had to change the laws themselves because they said that a hereditary monarch had the sum of public power, including the right of life and death, over everybody, and nobody else, by law, had the right to anything except bow down tremblingly before him and ask for mercy and boons.
As you say, if the system keeps being abused it's still a rubber band pulled back a bit further each time.
As you say, if the system keeps being abused it's still a rubber band pulled back a bit further each time.
Crezth
i knew you were a real man of the left
Well there's also the economic situation, which perpetually worsens. You're right that there's reason to be hopeful, but it's also true that other avenues of change are distinguishing themselves more and more. Taking to the streets is just the first part of that.
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