the_fantastic_ms_fox (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
the_fantastic_ms_fox) wrote2006-11-18 02:05 pm
the_fantastic_ms_fox) wrote2006-11-18 02:05 pm
Entry tags:
Democracy
You know it's a productive sewing circle when you come home the next day with tooth-marks on your arms. One of the reasons that Friday was a good day. Another was that odd situations in my life prodded me into coming to important conclusions.
The first of these was Democracy, and the things that I thought were as follows:
1. Jo Average Does not Belong at the Helm of Power.
I'm growing firmer in my belief that democracy is not an abstact that has value in its own right, but a theme that operates on many scales in regards to making good decisions. It is not about the voice of Jo Average, and it certainly shouldn't be about selecting someone who embodies Jo Average, or appears to (think "George Bush Jr."), to serve in power because voting for candidates is about choosing leaders, not figurehead exemplars. An average person whose capacity for admisinistrating, motivating and forecasting that of the norm will make as good a leader as they will a brain surgeon.
2. Leadership is a skill.
It is no different from driving, cooking, childcare, or medicine, and some people learn to be good at it, and others do not. There is nothing especially admirable about leadership or the people who practice it, no moreso than other skills and the people who use them, but leadership is a skill that can do a lot of damage if misused, and, sadly, unlike driving or cooking, abusing the power that comes from leadership is part of a cycle that gives one the power to commit further abuses, and gain more power in the process.
We often equivocate power with virtue, and forget that good people are not always good leaders - in fact very few good people are good leaders, because being a good person has as much to do with being a god leader as it does with being a good bartender. I most definitely do not mean to say that bad people make good leaders. Manipulative, unscrupulous geniuses appear to be good leaders insofar as they are effective - they can get things done no matter the cost, but what they get done will usually have no tie to what actually should be done, although they will be able to convince people otherwise, and by this route, they can gain the power that convinces people that it is their rightfullly. A good leader is a good person who is skilled at leadership who can remain kind, just and so on while also enacting this skill.
3. Voting
Voting for candidates is primarily a way of turfing out awful leaders. Consider the pitiful level of knowledge that the average person posseses regarding their own political system. If a leader is so incompetent, selfish and/or malevolent that, within a few years of their taking office, even the average uninformed person knows that they need to go, then they probably needed to be kicked out in their first week in office.
4. Participation
Effective democratic participation is a product of good people who take the time out to use the political resources available to them to affect the course of political events. This starts with being informed before voting and, while it can involve sitting in office, it should also include every other form of participation - sitting in meetings, discussing with one's friends, writing representatives and so on.
1. Jo Average Does not Belong at the Helm of Power.
I'm growing firmer in my belief that democracy is not an abstact that has value in its own right, but a theme that operates on many scales in regards to making good decisions. It is not about the voice of Jo Average, and it certainly shouldn't be about selecting someone who embodies Jo Average, or appears to (think "George Bush Jr."), to serve in power because voting for candidates is about choosing leaders, not figurehead exemplars. An average person whose capacity for admisinistrating, motivating and forecasting that of the norm will make as good a leader as they will a brain surgeon.
2. Leadership is a skill.
It is no different from driving, cooking, childcare, or medicine, and some people learn to be good at it, and others do not. There is nothing especially admirable about leadership or the people who practice it, no moreso than other skills and the people who use them, but leadership is a skill that can do a lot of damage if misused, and, sadly, unlike driving or cooking, abusing the power that comes from leadership is part of a cycle that gives one the power to commit further abuses, and gain more power in the process.
We often equivocate power with virtue, and forget that good people are not always good leaders - in fact very few good people are good leaders, because being a good person has as much to do with being a god leader as it does with being a good bartender. I most definitely do not mean to say that bad people make good leaders. Manipulative, unscrupulous geniuses appear to be good leaders insofar as they are effective - they can get things done no matter the cost, but what they get done will usually have no tie to what actually should be done, although they will be able to convince people otherwise, and by this route, they can gain the power that convinces people that it is their rightfullly. A good leader is a good person who is skilled at leadership who can remain kind, just and so on while also enacting this skill.
3. Voting
Voting for candidates is primarily a way of turfing out awful leaders. Consider the pitiful level of knowledge that the average person posseses regarding their own political system. If a leader is so incompetent, selfish and/or malevolent that, within a few years of their taking office, even the average uninformed person knows that they need to go, then they probably needed to be kicked out in their first week in office.
4. Participation
Effective democratic participation is a product of good people who take the time out to use the political resources available to them to affect the course of political events. This starts with being informed before voting and, while it can involve sitting in office, it should also include every other form of participation - sitting in meetings, discussing with one's friends, writing representatives and so on.