A Continuation; Plus a Message

Hey guys. I have a couple of things to say, then I'm going to post a continuation of Murph's last post. It is actually a reply to my Belgian friend, but worthy of posting. Rather than break up the topic with something of mine, I will keep this flowing for another day. I have a couple of my own posts nearly ready to go, and tomorrow will begin posting those.

As for the here and now, I have received some disturbing information from a highly reliable source. As I have been saying for some time now that the economy is soon to crash, it appears that we may well be at the point of implosion. Very, very soon. I do not have enough information to go beyond that right now, but will work my tail off to try to find out what is really happening and get it up here. My advice for the moment is to not be surprised by ANYTHING that may happen over the next 30 days or so. The end is here, I believe. More later.....Now to Murph's reply.

Murph email to Belgium

In any proposal to alter social structure in a radical way, there is a tendency to overlook, ignore, or pass off practical considerations. This is the sign of an idealization, and with humans, the ideal is seldom ever realized. It simply appears that a utopia in practical living is not going to happen.

Our friend in Belgium made a comment that asked a lot of questions concerning my criticisms and proposal. My reply to him was so long that I need it as a posting. This is the reply smoothed out some and amplified a bit. So to understand the nature of this posting, check out Belgium’s comment in the posting concerning documents and elections.

I was using the term visionary very loosely. I was thinking at the time of King but not restricted to him. Specifically, I am referring to anyone that has foresight enough to talk of how things can be a whole lot better in a very practical way, one which allows humans to be the best they can be. Idealistic maybe. Those that are in favor of a strong central government and authority of some nature seem to leave out the basic questions. Who is going to be in authority? How would it be determined? And what would give them the special insight to judge between what is good or bad for me or you? Right off the top I reject the divine right concept and God told me B.S.

It is perfectly true that one man's visionary is another mans nut case. That is because we do not share the same general values concerning the very act of living. Do we or do we not want to guarantee equal freedom of choice for all? Are we going to say that the only crimes are going to be damaging another person and/or property, or not? Are we going to codify and make legal or illegal that which someone takes offense to? You can now even be prosecuted for the very language you use. We even have court cases to sanctify perspectives on history.

As for King and his fight against segregation. Segregation and racial prejudice has not gone away either socially or legally. It is alive and well, believe me. The fact that lip service is paid to desegregation and equality of the ‘races’ only enforces my contention that we lead a socially hypocritical life. Kings contribution was, at the minimum, to focus attention on that aspect of society and some of its consequences. While some of the more obvious aspects of segregation have been smoothed over, hidden in many cases, it is not done and finished. And that is why I contend that the basic issues have to be addressed.

It is true that a visionary is not restricted to those belief systems that I subscribe to. I’m sure that Strauss and Machiavelli would be called a visionary by their disciples. So yes, I am only interested in those visionaries that want to make living better for everyone, not just a selected group. Oh yes, that is my bias.

You are quite correct in pointing out that if the majority elect to live under feudalism, what of those not liking the idea? You have just pointed out dramatically the very big problem with consensual decision making. Whatever affects all the people should be decided unanimously, or not acted on, at least in my conception of social organization. The original concept of majority consensual decision making was fairly unique for society as a whole. Previous to our countries founding, the consensual part was for those in power and the upper class, not for the society as a whole. We could look at this type of decision making as a statistical government. What is not taken into account is the data that is outside of the norm. Those who are most emphatically not in agreement and see detrimental effects of the decision are marginalized. I am of the opinion that if you are not able to acquire the unanimous consent then it is a bad idea.

Remember the first posit I made. Thou shalt not damage another person or their property. The shop owner that harms a customer is held liable, either in faulty or harmful goods. Oh yes, dueling would sure solve that problem quickly. In the society that I envision, such shop keepers would not long be in business. Our society is riddled with business owners that are neither honest nor responsible. And nauseating as it is, the government allows it. Try buying a used car or life insurance. Here in the U.S. even our advertising is built on lies and distortion. I will give credit to the European advertising. It is incredibly entertaining; ours has a tendency to be numbing in its deceit.

You mention an altruistic society and what to do with those that refuse to work. First off, most of what we call work today is so numbing and irrational I don’t blame a bit anyone that doesn’t want to do it and give them credit if they find a way around it. I maintain that what we call the ‘work ethic’ is an artificial construct for wage enslavement. When given the opportunity to do what you like to do, what is meaningful to you, what contributes in a meaningful way to the tribe, society, village, group, whatever, there is far less reluctance to participate. It is particularly not an issue when survival is at stake. From what I understand, non industrialized societies flat out do not have that problem. Why do we?

Hard druggies? AIDS? We never had a drug problem until the government got into the act in the first place. The war on drugs is another government control and a means of supporting our economic system. That subject I can get really upset with. Hell, our government in alliance with European bankers support the drug trade. AIDS is still on the block for the accusation of being government created virus. Even if not, pandemics will always be with us. But, I suspect that most of them are caused by people being packed together, unhealthy life styles and diets.
I do not think that the government of a free society has any business in the social construction for its citizens. And I mean ANY social construction. When you have that going on, you open up for more corruption. A very interesting book by a Choctaw who got himself educated maintains that the level of literacy declined dramatically with the advent of government education. His name is Joel Stream. He wrote Education and The Rise Of The Corporate State" and numerous other books on the subject. He is/was a professor at the University of Cincinnati in the 80’s. He has immense documentation to support his contentions. I will have to dig out my notes on him. Very interesting reading.
By the way, the famous anarchist Max Stirner defined anarchism as 'people who own their own minds-free of ideological control'. I really do subscribe to that ideology. Interestingly, it appears to me that when this concept is presented as a way to live without using the term anarchy, people agree with it. I don’t even care if we give that idea another name. But that is surely the way I want to live and the type of society I would like to live in.

From Murph