It's going to take more than voting [LWN.net]

It's going to take more than voting

Posted Feb 9, 2011 13:10 UTC (Wed) by NAR (subscriber, #1313)
In reply to: It's going to take more than voting by drag
Parent article: Moglen on Freedom Box and making a free net

Other human beings being able to exist without external controls are far too frightening of a concept.

In the late '90s the Albanian government collapsed. What was the first things its citizens started to do? They grabbed guns and started to kill each other. There is a reason we need those external controls. This is where most utopist get it wrong - humans by their nature are more than willing to settle differences by violence.

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It's going to take more than voting

Posted Feb 9, 2011 20:05 UTC (Wed) by martinfick (subscriber, #4455) [Link] (1 responses)

In what utopian world is a government not violent? That is after all, a very defining characteristic of a government, it is violent. Take that characteristic away and, it will cease to be a government, it will be nothing more than a committee, a steering group, a club.

Perhaps you have this perception because people are so unbelievably overwhelmed by the force of government, that they usually do what ever it takes to comply with it, to avoid the utterly complete and overwhelming threat of violence the government holds over their heads daily? In other words, a well controlled mafia neighborhood where no one dares to confront them, may seem less violent on the surface, than one where a new gang is attempting to takeover power by scaring people into submission. But I would hardly claim that perception to be an accurate assessment of the relative violence of the mafia.

Living with successful extortion (living in compliance to a real threat of violence to avoid it) is still living with violence.

It's going to take more than voting

Posted Feb 17, 2011 19:38 UTC (Thu) by hozelda (guest, #19341) [Link]

Like with the mesh technological concerns, the question is not of inefficiencies (violence) existing but of total inefficiencies when contrasting competing models. The ideal case includes cooperation at a high level, but cooperation in order to defend "good" principles.