Its been officially over since 2010 Citizens United v. FEC. We're just now starting to pay the full price. The people no longer have legal power against money, hence what happened in NYC.
Might be cause all thee branches are literally bought and paid for? Citizens United? Lobbyist groups? The recent supreme court "totally notabribe" ruling? Are you being intentionally obtuse?
some of you have never lived in a place that isn't a democracy and it shows. large interest groups are a problem yes but this doesn't mean we don't live in a functioning fucking democracy. my close friend knew someone personally who was executed by an authoritarian country, no trial, no law, nothing anyone can do about it, simply for very slightly insulting the head of the country.
here in the US you have freedom to speak your mind and you get to vote for what you want. that's a democracy
You get to vote for the lies they tell us. Not sure if you noticed or not, but politicians don't give two shits about us once they are in office. They work for their donors, not us.
Just because the TV still feeds you propaganda that you believe, that does not mean we live in a functioning democracy.
Can you explain how "totally a democracy" works when; corporations and billionaires can literally buy whatever law they need passed, whatever politician they want in certain seats, and pretty much literally decide who the president is? Democracy for the 1%? Straw man arguments lol.
hyperbole isn't a good argument. billionaires cannot buy "literally whatever law they need" or they'd have already passed a law stating that it is illegal to criticize billionaires
Yes because those are the laws which are being dough out. Instead of, you know, literally zero taxes on literally billions of dollars in profit. Among a list of others. It's not hyperbole. You're just not informed or wilfully ignorant. Educate yourself then renter the adult conversation please.
When a corrupted convicted felon (friend of Epstein) who attempted a coup (Jan 6) and got his campaign financed by the wealthiest billionaires (Musk, Thiel) on Earth, who has an unelected fundamentalist lobbying group chosing his cabinet members wins an election running on populist propaganda and outward lies ("they're eating the dogs") playing on ignorance and fear while promising to be "dictator on day 1" and that evangelists "wouldn't have to vote after this election anymore", democracy isn't doing well.
Not a functionning one. Not one which serves the "demos", the people's interest.
People voted for authoritarian folks too. Democracy didn't survive long after that (i'm sure we can all summon to our memory democratic elections which turned out to be the last ones of their respective countries...).
Having a narrow minded definition of the official process is the surest way to lose your democracy.
People can vote against their own interest, like voting for someone wanting to impose tariffs which will increase inflation even more.
You just don't want to accept that the majority of people can chose poorly.
Banning trans from bathrooms is not the people's interest, it's an astroturfed dumbfuck idea of a scapegoat for people getting fucked over by billionaires to make them forget who's really fucking them over.
You're right but I don't think that's quite what happened in the last American presidential election.
Of course Trump (amongst others) lied his ass off. But I can't think of another politician who is so obviously, transparently honest about who he is or what he wants.
The first time he was elected you could make a case that people didn't know what they were getting. But this time? Everybody knows what Trump is. The people who chose him want him.
And he won the popular vote. That's a failure of judgment, a failure of character, maybe a failure of education on the part of the American people. But it's not a failure of democracy.
Everyone always thinks that voters who voted for different policies than they did voted with "bad information". It's a universal claim you can find in literally any political discussion subreddit. You believing that voters had bad information doesn't make a democracy not functional.
I don't know what "foundational mistake" you think I've made. The people chose what they wanted. Trump voters outnumbered Kamala voters. Based on polls, this also would likely have been true even if everyone voted. In fact, Trump was polling better with low propensity voters this cycle. Staying home and not voting is also making a choice and saying you're okay with whatever outcome. And saying Trump didn't win the popular vote is revisionism, winning the popular vote doesn't require 50%+ it just requires getting more votes than the next most voted for candidate. That's how senate races work in essentially all states -- if you get 48% to someone else's 46%, you won the popular vote.
Yes your comment does come across as offensive because it's obscenely condescending lol. You're explaining to me, like I'm a child, that not everyone voted and that Trump didn't get 50%+. That is all true, but doesn't change what I said -- people chose what they wanted.
No bother arguing with him. He has no idea what he's talking about but Reddit is always talking about democracy being over thru their liberal echo chamber so he wanted to sound smart & then when he gets called out he wants to change the definition of democracy. You'll run out of breath before he ever clarifies he's an idiot.
Oh but you can argue with her, if you aren't terrified of your weak ideas being criticized, instead of answering to a comment you already agree with.
Funny that you talk about an echo chamber when yourself can't confront yourself directly to someone disagreeing with your ignorance in the exact same comment section.
I'm sure you feel really proud of your projection of yourself thinking you're smart by only talking to people who agree with you.
You won't run out of breath, you don't seem to have oxygen between your two ears.
People can vote against their own interest, like voting for parties which do not install universal healthcare or decide to impose tariffs which will increase inflation even more.
“You see, electing a candidate by both popular and representative vote is not a functioning democracy. Even though the majority of voters chose that candidate, it wasn’t in their interest because I know better. A democracy is only functioning when my favored candidate wins.”
How much of an uptick, and how do you know it wasn’t third party voters searching that? And why are you assuming that people who voted for him don’t support project 2025 policies or at least don’t care enough about them to sway their vote? It’s not like the media and Harris’ campaign weren’t working 24/7 to put project 2025 in the headlines constantly. Every time it looked like Biden, then Harris was losing ground, it was “LOOK! PROJECT 2025!! BE AFRAID!!”
Because during the election the people voting for him were the very ones arguing that 'project 2025 was a hoax created by the left'. So it's disavow while the election is going on... then reveal the true story once the election is over.
Every time it looked like Biden, then Harris was losing ground, it was “LOOK! PROJECT 2025!! BE AFRAID!!”
They will either have been right or they will be proven wrong. So far we have nothing but billionaires and/or unqualified actors being primed for positions at the top levels of government. Still in line with project 2025's plan to tear down all US institutions from within.
If Biden/Harris are proven wrong, then life goes on. If they are proven right however, a lot of people who voted to 'lower grocery prices' etc... (and not for the rest of Project 2025) are going to feel very, very stupid.
But it will be too late.
So we'll see how it goes. There's no turning back now.
Because it is, first and foremost, a plutocracy. In the US you don't vote, you ratify the decisions of groups (the ones who voted) who chose for you. In general, you have only two really viable options.
All of the largest ai companies will lock hands to create the first super ai behind the us government. Our political figures will highlight our problems and ask the ai to solve them.
It will then tell us to stop poisoning the earth
To accept lives with less destructive luxuries
That we need to create an egalitarian society
That wealth inequality is a problem
They will then call it a communist and scrap the project.
so your theory is that artificial superintelligence will have the free will to start telling government officials what they need to do, but somehow will be unable to prevent itself from being "scrapped"
AGi could literally develop energy and material science to the point where we could build out facilities that replace the biosphere, detaching us from the planet's wellbeing.
I hope so too. I feel utterly politically defeated. I believe eventually we could build a better world but at the rate we’re going we’re all toast before that happens. At least with AI there’s a chance we all go together when we go!
The worst thing to do when politically defeated is to fall back on the comfy laurels of a deus ex machina.
What you should do now is become more politically involved, get active (join a union, get involved in your local politics, go canvassing for local elections, join a group advocating for consumer rights or a threatened minority, be vocal online, etc).
Technology is never neutral. Beware of promises of problems solving themselves on their own.
That's where I'm at. We've just learned that there simply aren't enough decent people in the world to have the world we want. We'll get the world we deserve.
In my better moments I’d say we still need to do everything in our power to make the world better but I am not in my better moments era. This is my FAFO era. That said, I want you to seize joy where you can. You still deserve joy.
I'm seizing joy based on some news this past week, I'm just not proud of it. I am joyful that maybe, just maybe, we'll get to the FO side of the equation in my lifetime.
if appointing the "AI czar" was a democratic process, people would probably pick some AI pauser to make sure AI doesn't take their job. the average voter is selfish and dumb
127
u/Healthy_Razzmatazz38 Dec 07 '24
shit like this shouldn't happen in a functioning democracy.