Louis Ingenthron @LouisIngenthron@social.cleverlibre.org

@skrishna Sorry to hear that. Let's hope it's just due to a period of adjustment to the culture shock of Mastodon vs their old home, and the wave vanishes as quickly as it appeared.

@Pat @Biggles @freemo @Adrasteianix Any reasonable person would understand why that's an unjust law and vote against it, even if doing so would be against their own best interests.

The goal, then, is for a society to consistently produce and select new generations who are more reasonable than selfish.

Obviously, that tends to work better with larger sample sizes and lower margins of error, but we'll see if this poll can end up demonstrating my point anyway...

@taz "Back in the states where it belongs"?
If we left civil rights to the states, black folks still wouldn't be able to vote in most of the south.

Why are you so confident in state legislatures to get the Roe question right, but believe that a small council of oligarchs should override the will of the masses at the federal level? How does that square up?

As for your claim that the 13th and 14th amendments weren't popular, then why did their predecessor, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, pass with such overwhelming support as to override a presidential veto? Especially following a period where the "mob" you so loathe *went to war* to defend the rights of others not to be enslaved.

@taz So then you support those same courts taking away rights if they feel it just?

The courts overturned Roe. If a democratically-elected Congress passed a law protecting abortion rights, would you feel any differently about which power structure you prefer?

Also, it's worth noting that the courts don't have any interest in "protecting minorities". Their interest is in upholding laws. Period. When the law was that slaves were property, they upheld that.
Not until the democratic republic as a whole passed the 14th Amendment did they start, on its basis, enforcing "Equal Protection Under The Law"... an idea imposed by... "mob rule".

@taz Those courts only did so by interpreting laws put into place by the very system you so oppose.

@taz It literally did happen under my preferred system.

@taz What happened since then proves my point. "The moral arc of the universe is long" and all that.

Reform doesn't happen overnight. It has to be preceded with changing public opinion, which comes with increasing education. As ignorance falls, tolerance spreads.

We now live in the information age. Ignorance is no longer an immutable question of upbringing; it's a choice. Do some still choose the creature comforts of seeking information that reinforces their biases? Sure. Such is the human condition.

But more and more people seem to be seeking to educate themselves and seek real justice. And I believe that, as information continues to proliferate and expand, along with our increased free time due to automation, that widespread desire for self-improvement will only accelerate.

@taz There's no perfect solution. But I'll take "the whims of the collective whole" over "the whims of a single individual" to determine which rights should be enforced by the state any day of the week.

@freemo Exactly. Ultimately, this philosophy is likely rooted in my whole-hearted belief that "power corrupts". Even if we found someone venerated for peace and wisdom (i.e. Ghandi, Mother Theresa, etc.) and made them king of the world, I believe that power would corrupt them, as it would any man or woman.
That's the real beauty of democracy: It puts the most devastating power collectively in the hands of those who wield no power individually.
(Although, that's not to say the system is without its own flaws.)

@toiletpaper That's nice in theory, but in practice, the world just isn't that simple.

How do you say "no" to someone polluting the river you depend on to live 500 miles upstream?

There are a lot of benefits to individualism; I'll give you that. But at some point, this rock will get crowded enough that we need to start thinking as a collective species.

@freemo I wouldn't support the abolition of rights, but I would prefer to live in that situation over one where we still have rights but live under a dictator. Mainly because I believe that a free and equal democracy provides the best chance for the restoration of rights when they are taken away.

In other words, I believe a true democracy lacking rights has a tendency to mend its attitude towards rights to appease voters.
Whereas in the flip side, an authoritarian regime with rights, those rights are likely on their way out.

So, that's why I see democracy as a foundation for equal rights: We the people demand them.

@ZhiZhu That does go pretty strongly against the ethos of this community, though.

@skanman Disagree. The fact that it's easier to send a machine is exactly why we shouldn't do that. The higher requirements for sending humans induces us to push our boundaries in ways that robots wouldn't.
Exploring new frontiers drives new innovation and technologies second only to war. And the former is obviously far more preferable.

@skanman Yep. Plus it seems like a lot of times, they were just scared of over-correcting. Last thing they needed was to be stuck like a turtle on its back on the moon.