The ten uncommandments
January 1, 2023 1:29 AM   Subscribe

 
Why cede [power] to governments?

Um, because governments are the only structures large-scale enough to deal with the oligarchy and with large-scale problems such as climate change? I mean, yes, governments should be more representative of the will of the people: abolish the US Senate! But this whole article, its crap prose style aside, is 2023's first example so far of Why Most Ordinary People Think Ardent Progressives Are Awful and should never be allowed close to power, even when said ordinary people know full well that they'd benefit from progressive policies.
posted by outgrown_hobnail at 10:02 AM on January 1, 2023 [8 favorites]


I clicked on the author link, clicked on his blog link. This was the first article I found, it talks a bit more about government. The article also mentions this book called "Radical Ecological Democracy: Searching for alternatives to unsustainable and inequitable model of ‘development’", which I now want to read.
posted by aniola at 10:27 AM on January 1, 2023


even when said ordinary people know full well that they'd benefit from progressive policies.

yeah, enough with the prosciptivism -- don't fucking tell me what to do
posted by philip-random at 10:42 AM on January 1, 2023 [1 favorite]


to be clear -- I do align with most (all?) of these positions. But at some point, style really does matter.
posted by philip-random at 11:15 AM on January 1, 2023 [1 favorite]


Where's "Dont be greedy"? Or "Don't seek power, and if you have power, don't abuse it?"

Without a proactive theory of change, one that points in a direction to out-compete capitalism, these nice-to-haves are modern color restating what some carpenter dude said 2000 years ago. Didn't get him very far either. (ie if your road map doesn't encompass dealing with the assholes, you'll get fed to the lions also)
posted by cfraenkel at 1:40 PM on January 1, 2023


Where's "Dont be greedy"? Or "Don't seek power, and if you have power, don't abuse it?"

Implicit in what's stated in the very first point?
posted by aniola at 4:55 PM on January 1, 2023


Feels like a list of solutions from the viewpoint of the author, when, quite honestly, I would have preferred a list of problems that need solving.

'Why give governments power', I'm sure, is a question that many readers immediately answer in their heads, but that is not actually what the author looks for you to do. There are good reasons to grant governments collective power, but the author's argument requires there are none. A more reasonable answer might be that a specific power should be granted only after some consideration; not 'grant power to other centralised bodies, just ones with smaller dominion'.

The question form of this would be something like 'In what circumstances is it appropriate to give governments power' or 'how do we ensure governments use their power appropriately'. And the value is in asking the question and provoking the proposal of hypothetical answers for evaluation. But you can't give a commandment without having The One True Answer. Thus, let us ... centralise power in this author, I guess?
posted by How much is that froggie in the window at 7:38 PM on January 1, 2023 [2 favorites]


1. Governments are power. Centralization is a way to multiply the "inherent power" of individuals (about 300W per each) and apply it to a single target. It's not the only nor the best way, but it's the most obvious and easiest to calculate.

2. You are nature, where "nature" is both the life that exists in this biosphere, and the physical principles that give rise to same. Nature cares not for your respect of disrespect. If you do the right things, you may preserve your own ability to exist. Otherwise, maybe no.

3. Fences are necessary where invasions would otherwise occur. Not all species can be reasoned with, some feel the need to spread indiscriminately. If it's a choice between a fence and a localized genocide... choose carefully, I don't have the wisdom to guide you.

4. Yes, other life forms (not just animals) stockpile and hoard more than they need. How are they supposed to know how bad the winter will be before it happens? There's no Squirrel Weather Channel.
Nature provides some things in great abundance, not necessarily synchronized with our needs. Feast-and-famine is a pattern established long before homo sapiens walked the earth. That said, come the hell on. How many houses, cars, video games, vinyl records, etc. do you need, and what does that cost others?

5. Hell yeah, if you don't eat where you're at, why are you even there? On the other hand, even Europeans deserve potatoes, for a treat

6. Humans are frequently not the producers of things. Farmers don't "produce" food, they regiment it. The land, air and sun produce the food. Beekeepers don't make honey, they "rob" it (their word) from bees. It's a pretty good deal for the bees maybe, but it's still stealing. The beekeepers don't ask permission.
Nearly everything humans do under our current systems is theft. The systems steal our time, our possessions, our homes, even our children. We should get that looked at

7. These systems also stole the commons from us. It wasn't a word before they stole it, it was just the normal thing to do with land that some jerk had not fenced off and defended with knives.

8. People are not "better" than other people. You can be taller or shorter, you can be better at a specific skill or worse; but humans have no set of attributes that can be honestly described as ordinal.
Ordinality is a lie bosses and other "superiors" use to steal from you. They like to call it leadership.

9. "Colonization" is just theft. People live in a place, other people come and kill, drive off or enslave them. Usually they tell each other they are "better" than the "savages" that were there before. Sound familiar?

10. The self is an illusion, and as such you (the self) can make it (you) whatever you want. Good luck, try not to dissociate too hard.

I did not read the postscript because I did not enjoy the writing of the piece. Not sure why I wrote all this actually. O well!
posted by Rev. Irreverent Revenant at 9:33 PM on January 1, 2023 [5 favorites]


Hell yeah, if you don't eat where you're at, why are you even there?

OK but when we did that, it turned into

People live in a place, other people come and kill, drive off or enslave them.

Because a whole lot of places on this planet can't actually feed people terrifically well, without a little help from elsewhere, it turns out.
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 3:54 PM on January 2, 2023 [1 favorite]


there's enough
posted by philip-random at 9:44 PM on January 2, 2023


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