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Originally posted by rwingettI just found this terrifying video of the rioting in Tunisia:
I merely ask that you argue the position on its own merits, without regard to what my personal opinion may, or may not, be.
I consent that the Tunisian people (or any portion thereof) may request that their president resign. I further consent that the president, of his own free will, may accede to that request. But he is not in any . Otherwise what you have is not democracy, but mob rule, which is the antithesis of democracy.
"A riot is an ugly thing .............................."
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Originally posted by rwingettAnd my position here is that mob violence has no place within the democratic process
I will ask that you confine yourself to arguing against my position as it is presented here, and not as you imagine it ought to be.
And my position here is that mob violence has no place within the democratic process. Tunisian politics allows for unpopular presidents to be removed from power via democratic means. But the fact remains that ...[text shortened]... f that process. The only legitimate means of transferring power is through democratic elections.
This is quite a volte-face from your previous unconditional support and praise for the chaos in europe, brought about by the unions and the students rebelling against austerity measures. What is the reason for this sudden change in your view of what is or isn't appropriate within the realm of democracy?
Furthermore, If Im not mistaken not too long ago you were responsible for a thread where you emphatically stated your disillusionment with the current state of affairs as regards the people's inability to have a true revolution against the government and the fact they're forced to operate within conventional means of participation despite the fact their effort might be ultimately unavailing. Its a twist of irony that you of all people should be the one to condemn unruly mobs.
Originally posted by generalissimoI am perfectly capable of arguing positions I don't agree with. So please stick to the topic and quit the psychoanalysis.
[b]And my position here is that mob violence has no place within the democratic process
This is quite a volte-face from your previous unconditional support and praise for the chaos in europe, brought about by the unions and the students rebelling against austerity measures. What is the reason for this sudden change in your view of what is ...[text shortened]... iling. Its a twist of irony that you of all people should be the one to condemn unruly mobs.[/b]
Originally posted by rwingettSo you're saying you don't really believe the mobs are justifed but you're arguing in their defense simply for the sake of arguing? are your personal convinctions about the political process usually this malleable?
I am perfectly capable of arguing positions I don't agree with. So please stick to the topic and quit the psychoanalysis.
*(scratching beard)* hmmm, I see, so tell me about your childhood.
Originally posted by rwingettDemocracy is the mob; the mob is democracy. http://socialistworker.org/2010/12/13/their-fear-of-democracy
I merely ask that you argue the position on its own merits, without regard to what my personal opinion may, or may not, be.
I consent that the Tunisian people (or any portion thereof) may request that their president resign. I further consent that the president, of his own free will, may accede to that request. But he is not in any ...[text shortened]... . Otherwise what you have is not democracy, but mob rule, which is the antithesis of democracy.
More from our friends at Socialistworker.org:
DEMOCRACY IS supposed to mean popular sovereignty, not the unimpeded rule of a no-mandate government. It is supposed to mean that the will of the majority governs, not the interests of the rich. It is supposed to mean at minimum that people get the policies they vote for, not those they are overwhelmingly hostile to.
In liberal democratic theory, the people are sovereign inasmuch as their aspirations and prerogatives are effectively mediated through a pluralist party-political state. They may not get all that they want all of the time, but the decision-making process will be guided by the public mood, which rival parties must compete to capture and express.
Yet this system has only ever been effective to the limited extent that it has been when it has been supplemented by militant extra-parliamentary pressure--by the threat of disruption to stable governance and profit-accumulation. To the extent that the parliamentary system is ever really democratic, it is parasitic on a much more fundamental popular democracy.
Frances Fox Piven (along with her late partner Richard Cloward) has long argued that the electoral-representative system is most democratic when the working class and the poor are deliberately disruptive--when they are organized, but not institutionalized.
This distinction is made in a particular way that it's important to get right. By "institutionalized," Piven means incorporated into the state. Thus, the lesson of the 1930s, she argues, is that the working class was most effective when it withdrew its participation, went on strike, took wildcat action, performed sit-ins, etc. The bosses of the big steel companies and car manufacturers responded, just as the federal government did, by trying to institutionalize industrial action, turning it into a regulated, far more predictable and manageable occurrence, and incorporating organized labor into a deliberately de-escalating machinery.
But there are other examples of being institutionalized in this negative sense--being incorporated into a parliamentarist or electoralist machinery, for example. Or you might add being co-opted by conservative NGOs, wherein politics becomes a kind of showmanship, a spectacle where the main thing that counts is media reception and public relations. Whatever happens, you become absorbed into the tacit rules that actually reproduce social power, rather than effectively rebelling against it.
By contrast, what Piven calls "disruptive power" is that which shuts down processes and events that make capital and the state run efficiently. Closing down a main road with a sit-down protest is an example of this. Occupying a public building, or flash-mobbing a retail outlet, or blockading a nuclear facility, are also examples of disruptive power. Withdrawing one's labor is another, and picketing to obstruct the effective utilization of the means of production is another.
This disruptive power doesn't have to be particularly noisy or violent or attention-grabbing in and of itself. Nor is it necessary that it should be meek, amiable and nonviolent. Any question of noise and street theatre is a secondary tactical question, and any violence is a matter of exigency rather than principle. But what "disruptive power" exploits is the fact that economic and political power in complex capitalist societies rely on a series of intricate interdependencies and specializations, which distributes the capacity to disrupt the system rather widely.
Different agencies will be better placed to exploit this than others, because they are differently endowed with the relevant structural capacities, and each situation involving this capitalist or that state authority will open up different opportunities. And there will always be subjective difficulties in adapting the repertoire of learned methods of resistance to any new situation. But the exercise of this disruptive power has been the hallmark of the "mob" throughout history, and it has also accompanied every democratic breakthrough.
We are now in a situation where the ruling classes are uneasily realigning their forces, scrutinizing their techniques of dominance, restless about their ability to hold the line in the new situation. Meanwhile, we are coming out of a generation that has spent many years going through defeats, and only occasional and partial victories, and we are trying to find out what works and what does not.
Listening to protesters, you hear people say that the lesson of the last decade is that the tactic of the big march and rally didn't work, even with over a million people and more in attendance. The media spectaculars didn't work either, even with Snoop Dogg in attendance. So now people are trying out occupations, sit-down protests, flash-mobs and other forms of disruptive protest. They are learning what their legal position is if they do protest, and if they're arrested. They're learning how to handle the press.
The question of what kinds of industrial action is most effective looms over us again. The one-day general strike? Sustained, indefinite walkouts by strategically important groups of workers? Recurring strikes of lengthening duration? And what kind of picketing is effective? How to handle the media and the police? What to accept in negotiations? And so on.
The mob is re-learning, applying and reinventing the principles of democracy. And the law is having once again to prepare itself to resist the threat of democracy.
Originally posted by generalissimoDoes the term 'devil's advocate' mean anything to you?
So you're saying you don't really believe the mobs are justifed but you're arguing in their defense simply for the sake of arguing? are your personal convinctions about the political process usually this malleable?
*(scratching beard)* hmmm, I see, so tell me about your childhood.
Originally posted by no1marauderI am going to ask the court to adjourn until tomorrow. I've begun making a batch of derby cheese which will require my immediate attention, and I need time to pinpoint the inevitable flaws in your shabby argument.
Democracy is the mob; the mob is democracy. http://socialistworker.org/2010/12/13/their-fear-of-democracy
More from our friends at Socialistworker.org:
DEMOCRACY IS supposed to mean popular sovereignty, not the unimpeded rule of a no-mandate government. It is supposed to mean that the will of the majority gov ...[text shortened]... the law is having once again to prepare itself to resist the threat of democracy.
Socialistworker, indeed! My alter ego has that site bookmarked on his computer.
Originally posted by rwingettI'm channeling zeeblebot and for the rest of this thread will answer any arguments that you have obviously spent any time thinking about with cut and pastes of questionable relevance.
I am going to ask the court to adjourn until tomorrow. I've begun making a batch of derby cheese which will require my immediate attention, and I need time to pinpoint the inevitable flaws in your shabby argument.
Socialistworker, indeed! My alter ego has that site bookmarked on his computer.
This discussion of mobs does remind me of my first mob (you never forget your first they say): http://www.workers.org/2008/us/ww_1974_0619/
I got a baton swung at me by a cop on a horse that day. Sweet memories!
BTW, derby cheese is nasty.
Originally posted by rwingettFirstly, these cosmetic election victories are possible in the context of the jailing and exiling of political opponents, the operation of an extensive police state in which informers make it unwise to discuss any political matter even in private, state control of media and corrupt control of economic life. Their objective is simply to confuse anyone unhappy with economic collaboration, including tourism. This sort of democracy helps to keep things sweet with the West but without any system of accountability in political and economic life, these elections mean nothing whatever.
What I am questioning in this thread is your slapdash use of the term 'dictator.' Is it possible for someone who was popularly elected within the confines of an ostensibly "free and fair" multi-party electoral process, and who does not subsequently dismantle that electoral process, to be termed a dictator?
It is clear that Ben Ali enjoyed popular supp ...[text shortened]... inority subverting the democratic process and thwarting the democratic will of the people?
Secondly, the status of those causing violent disruption is unclear, with many indications that the regime is actively generating such violent disorder to provide cover for an imminent crackdown and period of brutal supression.
Thirdly, other oppressive regimes in that region (Egypt, Saudi Arabia among others) have a huge interest in controlling the outcome and helping to manage the transition to something pretty similar.
I am sure the US will be in there up to its armpits, continuing to promote the farcical illusion of democracy in exchange for comfortable economic gain. Wait for a future Wikileaks expose.
If implemented, the following proposals could be a radical step for the Arab world:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12209621
Tunisia has formed a national unity government, the country's prime minister has announced, days after a popular revolt ousted the president. The prime minister, foreign, interior and defence ministers are to retain their jobs, with several opposition figures joining the government. PM Mohammed Ghannouchi pledged to allow greater political and media freedoms.
Unveiling the new government, Mr Ghannouchi said all political parties would now be allowed to operate in Tunisia. Political prisoners would be freed and the media would be permitted "total freedom", he added. "We have decided to free all the people imprisoned for their ideas, their beliefs or for having expressed dissenting opinions," the AFP news agency reported him as saying. The announcement of the new government included a pledge to abolish Tunisia's information ministry and to create a state where the media had "total freedom".
Originally posted by TeinosukeMobs should rule more often!
If implemented, the following proposals could be a radical step for the Arab world:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-12209621
Tunisia has formed a national unity government, the country's prime minister has announced, days after a popular revolt ousted the president. The prime minister, foreign, interior and defence ministers are to retain thei ...[text shortened]... unisia's information ministry and to create a state where the media had "total freedom".
Originally posted by FMFnah, I think it would be far more interesting to see what would come out of some extensive research into the effects of dissociative identity disorder combined with constant internet use and an overall lack of purpose in life. 😉
Some research into the effect of thesaurus usage upon the onset and progress of puberty would be interesting, come to think of it.
who knows, maybe we might even begin to understand how this relates to other anomalies, such as gender identity disorder.