You’re only able to choose two options, how is that democracy? I thought democracy was about being able to choose anyone you think is suitable to be a leader, not one of two pre-selected people. At that point, it’s not much different to a one-party system, just with two people rather than only one person.
If you watch the video you’ll see that there’s an ongoing process that gradually eliminates parties until there’s only two remaining. Canada has been progressing along this path. There’s only one national conservative party of any note now, and on the left only the Liberals have any chance at forming a government. The NDP can only act as a spoiler for the left. Give it some time and the NDP will wither away, leaving only the Liberals and Conservatives.
I consider Trudeau’s betrayal of his electoral reform promise to be one of the worst political stabs in the back that has happened to the Canadian electorate in recent history.
And yet, in the upcoming election I’m going to vote Liberal. Hell, I’m probably going to do volunteer work for their campaign. Because in my particular riding the projections are currently a tossup between Liberal and Conservative, with the NDP having only a 1% chance of winning and no other party having any meaningful chance of winning. So in my riding Liberal and Conservative are the only choices that matter. The two party system has already arrived in the spot where I live.
I hate this. But I recognize the reality of the system I live in. This is basic game theory, voting third party would only harm my own interests.
The purpose of a system is what it does. If this wisdom was truly internalised by most people, there would be global revolution.
There’s a lot of stupid shit in philosophy, but this is one of the dumber beliefs.
Do you notice how what you just said is not a conversation starter or even a joke? What’s your goal here, just to talk shit? What’s your ideal outcome for leaving this remark, exactly? Do you even have one.
Calling out dangerously foolish rhetoric is a civic duty.
Calling out disinformation takes effort. If I’m wrong and you give a shit, talk to me. I’m a regular person who is generally pleasant, maybe you can be too.
Well, this is a bit of a tangent, but the effectiveness of calling out disinformation actually correlates inversely with effort imo. It’s the typical sealion asymmetrical warfare thing. It’s a lot easier to say a lie than it is to disprove one. Mocking and insulting a disinfo statement is far more effective. Parity of effort.
In terms of “the purpose of a system is what it does”, I’m not quite sure how to start. Believing such a statement requires a level of disassociation with reality that makes intelligible discussion difficult. You’re flatly disallowing the entire possibility of someone setting up a system with a purpose, and the system failing to achieve that purpose.
The dangerous part of the theory though, is the implied malevolent intent. It’s like the evil inverse of religious “everything happens for a reason”. If a scientist comes up with a new strain of drought-resistant corn, and the corn develops a previously unknown mutation and crops fail and millions starve, well clearly that evil scientist intended to kill millions of innocent people. It’s absurd.
Thanks for taking the effort. I know that it’s a losing battle when you’re dealing with people spreading disinfo in bad faith and you’re trying to counter everything. The worst part is that it makes conversations far harder to have, so I really do value that olive branch of trust.
I can’t speak to what others are thinking when they talk about “the system” in this way, but I’ll try to explain where I’m at. I do have to allow that it’s a bad rationale to ascribe any overt intent to the incredibly vast and dynamic nature of “the system”. We’re talking about a single sentence that is broadly gesturing at not just centuries of continually changing case law, but also the ongoing interactions of massive regulatory, financial, and legal systems run by many thousands of people and is also constantly changing. That is too wide a swath to cut. To equivocate further in your favor, it is also wrong by what it fails to account for - failed systems.
The main takeaway I would hope people get from the idea (one that I heard from a forgotten source and then began using in the light of my own understanding I have to confess) is that we are living under a system that has been disproportionately and consistently shaped over much of its history by moneyed interests in various ways for the specific aim of winning the class war for the wealthy. That’s what the system is doing, that is its purpose.
In the future to avoid raising anyone’s hackles (at least those whose hackles don’t deserve raising) I should be more specific and speak of the 1971 Powell memorandum and how we are essentially living in the aftermath of its victory. Would that be more acceptable?
I agree with the point you’re making about moneyed interests influencing the system we live in. All I take issue with is the philosophical idea that every bad thing that happens was explicitly intended to happen by some evil “them”.
Sometimes that’s true (prison industrial complex, for example) but more often it’s not. Often it’s bad actors undermining a system set up to do good, or taking advantage of a system that arose organically without anyone designing it.
Basically, I think the phrase “the purpose of a system is what it does” is both objectively wrong in almost every case, and a dangerous thought-terminating philosophy. Any time I see it, I call it out. If you can be convinced that “they” are intentionally harming you through some nebulous, nefarious means…it’s only a couple more steps to convince you who “they” are. Jews, immigrants, “terrorists”.
Another objection to “the purpose of a system is what it does” is that it implies that systems have purposes in the first place. Many systems don’t have a purpose because they were never designed. Ecosystems are the biggest example of this.
Talking more specifically about our political and economic systems, I think the ecosystem view is helpful. Believing that an elite have conspired over centuries to create a system which entrenches their interests is dangerous, conspiratorial thinking which most importantly does not lead in any positive direction.
Violent revolutions rarely work, yet Americans have a peculiar affinity toward them, perhaps due to their history. It’s a particular sort of societal sickness which I believe leads to perfectionist, radical thinking and shuns graassroots, reform-oriented work.
The original topic of discussion (for this thread) was voting systems and two party systems. Grassroots political work can and has been proven to work at solving problems like this. There are many cases around the world where such voting systems have been changed thanks to the efforts of grassroots politics.