Hong Kong leader to announce formal withdrawal of extradition bill

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 05, 2019, 2:00 PM UTC

throwaway_law wrote: post #340

mattdeboard wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am using "democracy" as a synonym for "liberal democracy." If you tell me about a country that: - Has a beautiful founding document that ensures what we'd recognize as basic rights of all citizens - Has a well-designed federal system that empowers individuals and lower-level governments at the expense of the federal, - Has hundreds of thousands of enslaved people who form the foundation of their economy and are ind…

>If you would, that's fine; you wouldn't be objectively wrong. I call the US a Constitutional Republic, where the representatives are elected through various implementations of the democratic process. Otherwise, I'm just highlighting the fact that the "inventors" of democracy had slaves just the same as the US (among other limitations on who had voting rights) at the time of the Revolutionary War/Independence. In som…

Post by pteredactyl » Fri, Sep 06, 2019, 3:01 AM UTC

camgunz wrote: post #324

pteredactyl wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a failed state scenario, as you mentioned, what's the recourse of the people?

Well, sadly, it's of course violence. The basic contract of government is you give up some liberty for safety (Hobbes), i.e. you don't go around robbing people, and the government will see that no one else goes around robbing you. But this sort of first form of government was inflexible, and if you wanted to change it you basically had to kill the people in charge. The chief innovation of liberal government was "self…

Post by camgunz » Sun, Sep 08, 2019, 2:59 PM UTC

pteredactyl wrote: post #343

camgunz wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, sadly, it's of course violence. The basic contract of government is you give up some liberty for safety (Hobbes), i.e. you don't go around robbing people, and the government will see that no one else goes around robbing you. But this sort of first form of government was inflexible, and if you wanted to change it you basically had to kill the people in charge. The chief innovation of liberal government was "self…

Exactly. Hence, to me, the 2nd Amendment of US Constitution. Obviously it's and absolute last ditch, not taken lightly and very undesirable. But, to have the option, is true sovereignty to me.

Post by artsyca » Sat, Sep 14, 2019, 5:20 AM UTC

Retric wrote: post #56

arcturus17 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the drastic shift we have undergone as a human consciousness I don't really know what this means, but if you think that the inherent nature of the human soul has changed in the last few decades, think again... If tomorrow there was a catastrophic event such as a worldwide nuclear fallout, humans would be at each other's throats in the blink of an eye. The only thing really keeping us together are institutions and c…

I think “human consciousness” is perhaps a poor way to describe the core idea. When you put on a glove you stop thinking about your hand as the flesh inside the glove, but rather as including this new exoskeleton. Technology gets integrated in a similar fashion. “I will call you back” is arguably not just a linguistic shortcut for “I will initiate the process that starts a phone call.” Rather it’s an inclusion of tec…