its controversial to say it among extremists on both poles but there are no people in the world who are naturally complacent, pliant, and amenable to authoritarianism. democracy benefits everyone.

@georgia this certainly seems far less true for non-whites.

Democracy implies wanting a say in how your country is run.

Most people don't care about that unless it impacts how their household is run.

As such authoritarianism is more favoured in areas like Africa and some Asian countries because all the plebs have to do is pay taxes or tribute and everything else is cared for.

@Prodigal compare hong Kong to mainland China. British occupation for all its flaws inculcated an entitlement towards basic liberties. likewise with the denazificiation of Germany. almost all "white countries" were once authoritarian. I'm saying passivity in the face of authoritarianism is socialized.

@georgia it may be socialized, but its acceptance arises from perceived convenience.

Full liberty looks more like the American Wild West.

It's exciting and you can make lots of money, but you are also brutally aware of things like no property insurance, less law and order, high-risk inter-settlement travel.

But the advantages are you mostly do what you want, heck you can duel the sheriff and be the next sheriff.

@Prodigal I'm not talking about anarchy, I'm talking about democracy. equating the two is authoritarian shit.

@georgia not really equating the two, just saying the desire of democracy is a symptom of ppl being dissatisfied with authoritarian govt.

I am arguing that a good authoritarian govt is tolerated as long as people don't feel they or their household is negatively affected.

I mean that's probably why many Germans didn't come to the aid of Jews in Nazi Germany, for the German with perceived defects, life was really freaking good under that regime.

@Prodigal it was really freaking good compared to the Weimar era, and only till the bombs started falling. is benevolent authoritarianism better than malevolent democracy? yes, but the former rarely remains that way, being subject the caprices of individual dictat, especially in direct democracies, usually balance themselves out.

@georgia curious, Do you believe in "first past the post" voting?

@Prodigal I don't know what that means

@georgia


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-post_voting

@Prodigal yes but I prefer the Westminster system to the two party system

@georgia in Australia they have ranked voting, this is way better than 1st past the post.

Canada has 4 feder parties (more, but only 4 matter).

We have like 336 seats or so and the first leader whose part gets past something like 138 forms govt.

That's right, and there is no requirement that his/her party has > 50% of the votes.

So FPTP is hardly representative of the public's sentiment.

With ranked voting at least, you ensure that the winner has to overall highest vote of confidence.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting#Australia

@Prodigal @georgia RCV isn't actually that much better than FPTP. There are cases where voting honestly gets you a worse outcome than not voting at all which will never happen under FPTP.

@mewmew @georgia

Agreed, but which one gives a crappier result more often and which one is more representative.

@Prodigal @georgia they both give tons of bad results. use range

@mewmew @georgia not familiar bthatbform of voting

@Prodigal @georgia everyone ranks each candidate 0-99

highest average wins

@mewmew @georgia

Let me get this straight.


We have 100 voters.

Mewmew has
30 votes for 100,
10 votes for 50 and
60 votes for 0.
Avg =(3,000+500+0)/100 = 3.5

Georgia has
30 votes for 50,
10 votes for 100
60 votes for 0
Avg = (1500+1000+0)/100 = 2.5

Prodigal has:

60 for 50,
10 for 100 and
30 for 0
Avg = 4000/100 = 4

Ok so I win, now let me just try one other thing.

Total for Prod: 4000 vote points (60*50+10*100)

Total against Prod = 6000 vote points (mewmew + Georgia)

Max total vote points is 100*100 = 10000

So, of all the nonzero vote scores cast, Prod gets the highest average but 60% of the vote points don't favour him.

Seems representation is not being upheld.

Please correct me if I understood you or made a math error

@Prodigal @georgia needing a majority of "vote points" doesn't make sense

people, on average, like you more than me, and they like you more than georgia. therefore, you should win.

@mewmew @georgia that's still an fptp-like problem though.

Even without vote points, you and Georgia have 60% of vote (3.5 and 2.5).

That 60% who DONT want me in power.

Ranks system says:

If 1st place person doesn't have majority of votes, discard are redistribute and see if 2nd place does...keep going down until you have someone who appeals to more than half (orore correctly, pisses off less than half)

@Prodigal @georgia no it's not. Let's say there are five candidates and I rank them each 100. That doesn't means there are 80% of the votes against a candidate.

You don't vote against people in range, you give everyone a ranking. It's more expressive.

@mewmew @georgia I see how the score implements rank, even subjectively, but I don't see how this eliminates the *most popular person does not have majority support problem".

@Prodigal @georgia because with more than two candidates, you can't guarantee a winner will have a majority of support. otherwise plurality would work.

range makes the most people happy with the result. that's what an election system should do.

@mewmew @georgia

Might be cultural, because Australia is happy with ranked and Canada has been trying to get rid of fptp.