| 11/03/2004 11:27:00 PM |
[ The State of Things ]
i'm still a bit greatly confused. there's so much to do now.
it makes me sad that people chose fear and hate over hope and open-mindedness. *sigh* busy, busy, busy. i guess it's time for a rant/manifesto even though it's pretty much out of character. i just want to get my thoughts about government straight. or do something to cope with this crisi-tunity. so... here's part of my system (which i'm making up as i go along)...
Large groups of people are very complex things, and I'm starting to wonder whether this isn't the cause of these destructive cycles. Jesus and Buddha and i guess Mohammed (although i'm not exactly sure) preached individual first, society second ideals: that society is made up of individuals, not parties, not corporations, not even religions, but people. The ideas these religions put forth are universal. Even if you disagree with a certain religion, it can't be the morals you disagree with but the traditions. To do unto others as you would have them do unto you is the basis of virtue, and civilizations with the goal of peace (internal and external) must be based on virtue.
So... "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all people are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." However, because time and technology has changed, the government must adapt. It's much harder for groups of people to adapt than individuals to adapt, but like adaptation in individuals is necessary for the survival of the individual, the adaptation of government necessary for the survival of virtuous civilizaiton.
It seems like people have greater control over their pursuit of happiness, while life and liberty are under group control. So government should first secure life and liberty and secondly provide for the pursuit of happiness. It has to do all of these things fairly or the system will break down.
So... the first and most important role of government is to give people freedom (including the freedom to live) and to ensure that their freedom is not sacrificed. If anyone's freedom is sacrificed, the government has broken it's promise.
Then the second role of government is to increase the well-being of it's citizens to the extent that their freedom isn't violated. This is the complicated part, and it has to be secondary.
So... the best way to do this now it seems is to divide the government... a lot. The national government should do very little.
Ooooh, here's my idealistic... complicated government. When the standard of living is high enough for everyone, when no one has to worry about food, clothing, shelter, health, and information, which isn't that far fetched. By information I mean, people can learn as much (or as little as they like) without any hindrance, and I think that's going to be important.
So...what if you divided people into groups of about 100. Let's call the group of 100 a kanass (for mr vonnegut). The kanass is composed of people all the same age (when they turn 18) and is representative of the population. That is, it's not 100 white men, but a group of people. Basically just get as much mixture as possible. So that there is no inherent bias when the kanass begins.
The kanass can 'meet' online or in person weekly or something like that to vote on issues which affect the kanass as well as higher levels of government (which I'll talk about in a sec). Outside influences are inevitable, but the hope is that the kanass will not disregard eachother. Perhaps there could be public projects that help make the kanass more connected. That's a somewhat sticky issue, and it's probably the weakest point of this silly idea.
But anyway, suppose you have a kanass, a group of 100 people who have at least considered eachothers viewpoints... as much as possible. Then 10 kanass's make up another group. Then 10 of these make up another group and so on up to the national level. These groups above the kanass have no power positions even up to the national level, but each group has a vote in the decisions which are made by the higher-level group it's a member of.
Problems between two people in the same kanass are, of course, handled by the kanass. Problems between people in two different kanass's are handled between the two different kanasses. Problems between kanass's are handled by the 10 kanass group, and so on.
The idea is that the kanass is divided yet united. So it's no longer united we stand divided we fall, but "to be united we must first be divided." Ideally they'd even be separated by geography. Try to put as much emphasis as possible on the individuals.
I think when technology is more wide-spread (20-30 yrs) this sort of pure democracy will be possible. I have no idea if it would work. I doubt it can be made fool-proof, or even if having 100 million fools in control is better than having 1000 fools in control. But that's my random distraction for the night, and it has served me well (distracting me from doing homework). *sigh* busy, busy, busy.
then there's this... which my mom sent me... it a sermon!
What if the wrong canidate wins? |
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Moosi
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