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Mark Meijer

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Disagreeing with U.S. politics.

rafael melendez wrote:

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Daring to disagree is a vital part of a healthy society, analogous to allowing our human immune system to strengthen by learning from exposure to foreign invaders for, in the same manner in which the immune system learns from these interventions, so does our society from disagreements. Hence, it fundamentally helps maintain the integrity of its fabric by guaranteeing accountability and understanding and clearing of its complexity to realize better solutions to problems. Silence this tool and opportunity to invite concealment in a free society becomes inevitable and with it, the establishment of systems of inequity, partiality and general contempt. The level of lack of disagreement is a telltale of things to come and proportional to the disintegration of this same fabric and the weaving of another, cleverly harmonized for public acceptance.
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...continued in rafael melendez's three bottom-most comments below.

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Topics: government politics social change
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    Fritzie Reisner 100+

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    Aug 10 2012: It would be agreeing with "U.S. politics" that would be uncommon. I am puzzled at the claim of "lack of disagreement" in the quotation you put forward.

    • Mark Meijer 100+

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      Aug 10 2012: I don't speak for Rafael, but one would wonder why U.S. politics is what it is, if agreement with it is uncommon. Unless you've forgotten who the masters are and who the servants. If nobody agrees with what those people serving in office are doing, then whatever it is they are doing in office, it is not serving. And one also wonders how they got voted in there. The implication being that the majority wants them there. The U.S. was supposed to be a country by the people for the people.
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        Fritzie Reisner 100+

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        Aug 11 2012: I don't know anything about the government and political system in the Netherlands, but perhaps I can provide some clarification about the United States.
        People are much more likely, typically, to criticize those they did not vote for, or the party they don't support, than the one they did. As policy decisions are the result of negotiation among elected officials from different parties, this automatically provides opportunity to criticize those they didn't vote for for being foolish or corrupt or of weak moral stature. It also provides opportunity to criticize those they did vote for for compromising with members of the other party.
        Then there is the matter that sometimes people are not thrilled with anyone who wants to run for office and therefore vote for the better of two evils or for the less objectionable.. This situation provides lots of opportunity for lament.
        Capable people often choose not to run for office because they don't think they can accomplish what they would like to, given the positions of those they would need to compromise with. Others don't run for office because they would not welcome the invasion of privacy this would inevitably entail here.
        I am not a careful follower of politics myself, so anyone who wants to jump in with further clarification, feel free.

        • Mark Meijer 100+

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          Aug 11 2012: So what you're saying is that politics is the way it is because the people are keeping themselves occupied with pointing fingers at the other side. Sounds about right.

          Btw. I would tend to agree that those who are likely most capable of serving as an actual representative of the people, are those who don't want it.

        • rafael melendez

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          Aug 15 2012: In regards to the lesser of two evils comment, it reminds me of a comment from a former colleague. He said that the difference between Soviet communism and American democracy was one more party, so if you did not like one party, you better like the other one because that's all you get.

    • rafael melendez

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      Aug 15 2012: Disagreement takes a back seat to unsubstantiated and ill-conceived opinions and it is a social epidemic in today's society for we all wish to offer our opinions and hence, declare our existence by forcing others to hear our voices and our empty rhetoric, provided we have not done our required due diligence on the topic at hand. That being the case, if this sort of discussion is what transpires among the majority of the population, may that be because they are too busy to do their homework or otherwise, then, it is very simple to see how the wrong conclusion could and would eventually be reached on their topic of discussion, i.e. 9/11. After all, how many working parents did take the time to find out that steel melts at 2500 deg Farenheit and not at 800 deg which is the temp reached inside the towers, yet molten steel flowed underneath the ground at Ground Zero for weeks after the attacks. This form of human social interaction is even further aided, directed and augmented when systems are put in place within the people's grasp to further guarantee this sort of outcome, i.e. programmed news, talk shows, etc. You, your neighbor, your other neighbor and everyone else down the road will listen to the same language and spit out the same planned rhetoric at the water hole the next morning. This is analogous to entire neighborhoods being built using one single home model. Do that and you will always know what every single one of your neighbors' homes looks like inside, just like yours. Individuality lost, guaranteed. Add the mass sale of cheap allergy-causing wheat products to the nationwide food chains and now you have modeled the perfect serf: oblivious, duplicate and obese.
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        Fritzie Reisner 100+

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        Aug 15 2012: I agree with much of what you have said about the challenges of forming independent opinions in the domestic context.

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