The price we pay... (warning: lots of triggery stuff, politics and unpopular ideas)

[avevale_intelligencer]

So I had a quick look at FB again this morning. I'm staying off it, not because it upset me, but precisely because I was enjoying it too much--it was taking up all my time and taking me away from other things that I wanted to do and that I ought to have been doing, like writing and housework.

What did you see, Zanda? Well. I saw yet another casually sexist remark about Olympic athletes, this one briskly countered by Andy Murray, and good for him. I saw Vox Day, pumping out his usual toxic rubbish. And I read an article from the Guardian about Brunhilde Pomsel, who was one of Josef Goebbels' secretaries, and who has some things to tell us.

'“Those people nowadays who say they would have stood up against the Nazis – I believe they are sincere in meaning that, but believe me, most of them wouldn’t have.” After the rise of the Nazi party, “the whole country was as if under a kind of a spell,” she insists. “I could open myself up to the accusations that I wasn’t interested in politics but the truth is, the idealism of youth might easily have led to you having your neck broken.”'

Before you react to that, however you're going to, consider this:

How many people are speaking out against the Tories? What difference is it making?

How many people are speaking out against UKIP? What difference is it making?

How many people are speaking out against Vox Day? What difference is it making?

For what it's worth, and admitting that I have no knowledge of the matter, I'm sure there were people speaking out against the Nazis. I'm sure there were people getting very angry about them, maybe even signing petitions, having loud arguments in pubs, or just sitting and glowering like the old guy in the video from Cabaret. I don't think there was a spell, and I don't think most people went in fear of getting their necks broken. They just did what we are doing. They spoke out, and then they went and got on with their jobs, just like Frau Pomsel. And it made no difference, just as it makes no difference now.

When I was studying German at school, we looked at post-war playwrights Max Frisch and Friedrich Dürrenmatt, both of whom worked on very similar themes. Frisch wrote a play called Biedermann und die Brandstifter, in English The Fire-Raisers, in which a worthy middle-class man (Biedermann) and his wife, having expressed their alarm and outrage at the spate of arson attacks in their neighbourhood, find themselves playing host to two dodgy-looking door-to-door salesmen, who share their food, move into their attic and gradually fill it with oil drums full of petrol and fuses. Biedermann even gives them matches. Some interpret this as being about how gullible and easily manipulated ordinary people are. But the point to me is that Biedermann can not at any point justify doing anything else. His own moral code demands that he do exactly as he does.

Our own moral code demands that we do exactly as we do. Our own moral code tells us that freedom of speech is a fundamental right, to be accorded even to people who preach hate. Our own moral code tells us that our culture is intrinsically no better than anyone else's, and we have no right to dictate to other peoples how they should arrange their lives. Our own moral code tells us that if we just get on with our jobs and do our best, live and let live, we are being good people. Worthy. Bieder.

And this is where it has got us. UKIP is where it has got us. Vox Day is where it has got us.

Terry knew. The only reason Ankh-Morpork became, in spite of itself, the shining beacon of tolerance and equality that it gradually became, was because one man had the power, the will and the necessary ruthlessness to say "This is how it shall be, because I will it so." It would never have got that way through people speaking out, or writing articles, or signing petitions. It took a tyrant to raise a city.

If we really want to stop PoC being shot, trans people being beaten up, women being oppressed, and all the rest of it, then our course is clear. We have to silence the people who advocate these actions. Arrest them. Lock them up for saying things we don't agree with. Deny them a voice, deny them a vote. If they are in power, take that power away from them. If the majority voted for them, tell the majority they're suffering from cranio-rectal insertion and we know better. The only way to stop these terrible things happening is to stop them happening.

But we won't do that, because we believe in freedom and democracy. We believe in everyone having a right to an opinion, a voice, and (in America) a gun. And we believe that we are better people because we believe that. Giving up that belief would be sacrificing our good opinion of ourselves. Biedermann will let arsonists use his home as a headquarters and eat at his table rather than be a bad host. We will let hateful people spread their hate all over the world rather than be anti-democratic.

Racism, sexism, fascism, communism, homophobia, transphobia, all the other isms and phobias, are the price we pay for our continued good opinion of ourselves as enlightened, modern, progressive democrats. Except of course that it is not "we"--not the white, the male, the cis, the straight, the well-off, the Gentile--who pay it, every day, in blood. And when we say, with our hands held up in horror, "But that way lies oppression and tyranny!" we overlook the actual oppression and tyranny going on Right Now. What we really mean is "but it could be us next time!"

Of course it's true. The other side of the coin of Vetinari is Hitler. Even Vetinari has his cruel caprices--remember the mime artists. If, having seized power, we have the lack of consideration to let go of it, or to die, or to hand it back, then we have no control over what comes after. The possibility that, if we do seize power, one black child might go unshot now, one trans person unstabbed now, one woman achieve control over her body and her life now, is overshadowed and outweighed for us by the dangerous precedent, the slippery slope, the vast unknown of the future.

Well, that's true anyway. The future is unknown whatever happens. The present is ours to deal with as we choose, and at the moment, for instance, we choose to accept a stupid, disastrous decision made by about four per cent of however many per cent voted of a grievously misinformed and misled electorate, because "that's democracy." And we mouth Churchill's quote about democracy being the worst system of government apart from all the others, and smile ruefully, and think we have done our duty. Because we are enlightened, modern, progressive democrats who would never ever take the responsibility for making the world better, even if we can only do it during our lifetimes, even if we don't even last that long.

If utopia ever exists on this planet, it will not be a democracy.

And if that's too high a price for you to pay, ask yourself if you're the one paying it.

In blood. Every day.

If you don't agree with any of this, don't worry; I'm not even sure I do.

Comments

[weebleflip.livejournal.com]

I'm all for benevolent dictatorship.

The problem is that benevolent dictators are hard to come by.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

True, indeed, but that's another of those statements that is so often used to wrap the discussion up in pretty paper, tie a red ribbon round it and put it back on the shelf to gather dust. There are doubtless many people who aspire to be dictators, mainly so that they can stick it to some person or group to whom they have taken a disliking. I know for a fact there are many people who are benevolent, and I am sure that many of them, like me, would go to great inconvenience to avoid being made a dictator. In my case, I know why, and the reasons do me no credit.

But Vetinari is not benevolent. He doesn't wish anyone particularly well, and certainly not everyone. Ankh-Morpork isn't a kind place to live. We don't need benevolent. We just need someone who is "fair," in the sense that we really mean the word "fair" (as in the cartoon, when everyone gets to watch the game) and will use their wits to enforce that fairness against all prejudice and privilege.

Men on the moon were hard to come by. Treatments for cancer were hard to come by. This is nothing by comparison. But we'll never do it, because we would rather cling to the hollow shell of principle than see how the living spirit of that principle has drifted away from us.

[weebleflip.livejournal.com]

"Fair" is subjective. Which "we" are you referring to when you define it?

Treatments for cancer and men on the moon are each one step in a long history of scientific progress, not sudden changes, so I don't think that's a fair comparison. In each case, we had ideas as to where to start researching and followed where the results led.

Plane. Rocket to low-earth orbit. Rocket into space. Rocket capable of landing. (Gross oversimplification, I admit)

What would you see as the inbetween steps to get to a lasting benevolent dictatorship from a democracy?

If I thought I knew the answer to that, I'd be willing to try.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

"Fair" as I use it here is expressed quite well in the cartoon to which I referred, which if you aren't familiar with it can be found in my preferred version here: http://www.cipd.co.uk/community/cfs-file/__key/communityserver-discussions-components-files/196/CieuSLOVAAAN7Bk.jpg

A lasting benevolent dictatorship is beyond our power to ensure. As I said, we can only do the best we can with what we have right now, and hope that those who come after us will get the message and follow the example. As for the inbetween steps from here to there, I said right at the beginning that I had no idea. The only way I can see to take power from those who have it locked down at the moment involves a lot of bloodshed and suffering, and I am too much of a coward to take responsibility for other people getting hurt and dying.

Theoretically, though, the path we have already followed to this point is one I have written about elsewhere, in which progressively more effective attempts to construct a social system which protects the weak from the strong, the poor from the rich, and so on, are then subverted and nullified by the rich, the strong, etc., under the guise (among other names) of "conservatism." The direction in which we must go is fairly clear, and we are due for another attempt at progress; "conservative" forces have already rolled back a great deal of the social progress made after WW2. I do not see how, under our current form of democracy, these subversions can ever be prevented; maybe they never can be. We must try, though, somehow, at least for the present.

[weebleflip.livejournal.com]

It is a nice cartoon, and I very much approve of the concept, but it's overly simplistic when you have competing interests. It still leaves me with the "Who is "we"?" question - someone needs to decide what balance of competing interests is "fair".

To stretch the analogy of the cartoon further - would the carpenter whose livelihood revolved around making and selling the crates for people to stand on think that suddenly making them redundant was "fair"? How would the person who struggles to stand for a long period, and perhaps would struggle to carry a seat in, feel about the boxes s/he always sat on being taken away?

To look at a more real-world situation - disabled access to all things there is abled-bodied access to would be a good thing, preserving historical monuments and places of outstanding national beauty is also a good thing. I don't think many people whould disagree with either statement in general.

Preserving things necessarily includes not building ramps and lifts all over them in many cases. The two "good things" are in competition. However good remote viewing tech gets, it's unlikely to psychologically ever be the same as being there.

Unless you can make everyone have identical levels of physical ability (i.e. everything equally accessible to everyone, ignoring money issues), access will always be harder for some people than others. Someone has to decide where the "fair" balance lies.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

Well, then, just out of shot in the third panel of the cartoon there can be a box for someone to sit on if they need it, made by a carpenter whose livelihood no longer depends on his making one box per person willy-nilly whether they are needed or not because he gets UBI. :)

This sounds rather like that proverb I can't remember right now, whose gist is that just because we can't make things perfect that's no reason not to make them better if we can. We can certainly do a lot better right now than we have been doing. Some historical monuments need disabled access (as indeed does the remarkably ugly listed building in Westbury which houses Lloyds Bank, whose wheelchair-bound customers at the moment have, I kid you not, to discuss their private business on the steeply sloping pavement outside) and if it destroys the ambiance it's just too bad. Others may be manageable without.

The cartoon may indeed be overly simplistic as a blueprint for social improvement. It may be that "fairness" is something you can't make a system of universally applicable rules for, that case by case is the only way to get it right as often as possible. What the cartoon does, in a way that's resonated with a fair number of people besides me, is to indicate a wrong and a right way to go about thinking around the problem.

Who gets to decide? The people adversely affected, and the people with the power to make the decisions, working together with the support of society as a whole. It wouldn't be perfect, and some people would still be less than happy, and some things wouldn't work at all. It may be life can't be made completely fair for everyone. I don't know.

But we could do a lot better than we are doing now if we could only thwart and disempower those who are actively working against any kind of fairness at all.

[weebleflip.livejournal.com]

Now that I can agree with whole-heartedly :)

[alun dudek (from livejournal.com)]

Not only are benevolent dictators hard to come by, but making sure their successors are also benevolet is harder still.

Lenin may well have been totally commited to the admirable ideals of Marxism, and a benevolent dictator (he was certainly a lot better than most dictators) but Stalin most certainly was not benevolent.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

I mentioned that point in the post. This is the logic of not doing the laundry today because it may rain tomorrow, or next week. The future is beyond our knowledge or our control; all we can do in the present is make a difference, set an example, send a message, and hope. If the difference we make is no difference because we're terrified someone else will make a different difference another day, if the example we set is of the frightened fourth monkey sitting on his hands for fear of what someone else might do, if the message we send is that we are helpless pawns (or rather flotsam) in the maelstrom of history and the best thing anyone can do is do nothing...

...well, then, we will have deserved everything that our successors (who do not) will get. And hope is without point or purpose.

Cut the fourth monkey some slack.

[polydad.livejournal.com]

Hi, Zanda --

I'd prefer to preface this discussion by pouring your favorite drink into you, whatever that might happen to be; for this kind of discussion I'm partial to Irish coffee, myself, but it's too hot for that at the moment. Iced sangria, perhaps, or tea if you prefer.

I disagree with your rebuttal, here: Pointing out that a system has a decay property that must be dealt with for that system to continue longer-term is not the same logic, or even the same point, as claiming that the existence of entropy is valid and sufficient motive for despair.

If we assume a benevolent dictator, or even (as Vetinari) a functional and functionally-beneficient chaotic-neutral one, the status 'dictator' creates a succession problem, in that a dictator can subvert whatever successor-selection mechanism may have been devised in the original system.

Your comment about the future is spot-on, and relates to the larger question that I'm still working on in your original post.

If I interpret your list of possible fear-cases correctly, it boils down to "Do *something*", with a separate inferred point of "do something effective and useful", which is much harder, and also harder to *tell*. ("How do I *know* this is useful and effective?") Is that right?

Back to stewing on the main point,

Joel

RE: Cut the fourth monkey some slack.

[zanda-myrande.livejournal.com]

I haven't had anything alcoholic for several years now (not by choice or compulsion, it just worked out that way) so ordinary tea would be best.

I'm not sure what you mean by "a decay property," especially when what we are talking about is people, but I disagree with your disagreement. :) The logic at work here is not simply that of fear--I rather overstressed that angle. It is the logic of depression and anxiety, the logic that has one (to cite yet another analogy) eating off dirty plates because what's the point of washing them when they'll only get dirty again. We have been eating off political dirty plates for decades, they are long overdue for washing, and we simply pile more food on there to be corrupted by the germs from the last lot. If we wash them, then assuredly they will get dirty again, but for now they will be clean. And washing them will be easier next time.

I think it boils down to "Choose to do something (preferably well-intentioned and well-planned) or choose to do nothing, but be aware what you are choosing in each case, and who will reap the harvest of your choice."

Re: RE: Cut the fourth monkey some slack.

[polydad.livejournal.com]

You phrased it much better this time; thank you.