Political Philosophies

[4588686]

I'd also recommend reading Marx.  Although I'd stay away from self-avowed Marxists, who tend to be painfully dogmatic and tedious.  

[4588686]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYa5y8IkUMk

[Aloysius]

while I support Ron Paul in many ways and of course was a delegate to the Republican National Convention for him, I am definitely a distributist in a way that wholly conflicts with economic libertarian purism.  I take from libertarianism a good starting principle that state intervention is inherently a form of violence, even when it's building a library it's doing it by violence (taxes are enforced by the threat of violently imprisoning you if you don't pay them, for instance), and generally therefore move towards a more voluntarist society in which we can find any and all ways possible to do these things without violence.  however, I go much further than simply "fraud" and "stealing" as the only economic evils/injustices that need the violence of the state to intervene to correct... as one could see in my battles on the living wage thread (where both sides got in some good points).  

 

I think eventually with technological advancements we will be able to do away with state violence to a greater extent than we do today, but ultimately state violence is justified in enforcing justice... not just stopping murders, but also when the economic systems that have been artificially constructed by humanity in our society end up violating basic natural law, like the universal destination of the resources of the earth, for instance.  I believe there are forms of violence people sometimes do with economics even when they're disguised as supposedly free contracts, and those forms of violence do need the state to intervene with the symbolic violence of the state (actual violence if it needs to send people to jail)

 

as far as drug laws go, they should not be directed at forbidding drugs from being purchased and/or consumed, but at forbidding the kinds of anti-social behaviors that can result from those drugs being consumed.  when people burden society with their drug habits, then they should be able to be forcibly put into detox or rehab.  companies that sell drugs that result in people doing bad things in society should be liable for huge lawsuits... which means you'd see some companies spring up to allow people to do drugs in supervised places where they're separated from society like some of those medical clinics that pop up to try to help junkies not be in such dangerous situations... generally for hard drugs, though, you couldn't sell outright them because you'll end up sued for the hospital bills of all the people overdosing and such.  the current criminalization approach just makes everything that much worse, and comes from a generally wrong idea about government IMO.

[4588686]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iq7pfFoV6OY

[PadrePioOfPietrelcino]

I don't have a whole lot of time at the moment so I would just like to point to you how welfare can happen absent government involvement. I would submit evidence by example of the Catholic Church. Created Hospitals, Started Public Education, Orphanages and Adoption Agencies were started by them, The Largest non-profit in the State of Kansas is a Catholic group who work with the poor to the tune of almost 300,000 people below the poverty line where they are able to pair them up with supporters and patrons to help them through rough times and sponsor them. I know a good number of Doctors who provided free care often for those who could just flat out not afford it otherwise. In Topeka each year Dentist get together to offer free dental care to those who need it. There are loads of charities who do great work and when people build real relationships with each other they become aware of these issues and the community responds. When Government takes over charitable donations tend to decrease to these groups making them dependent on Government funds and the issues become more hidden to the general public.

[arfink]

I tend to take what I would call the adapting/defeatist attitude. I know my opinions lie so far outside the norms of the GOP and DFL that it is essentially moot, and so I must give up on changing politics and instead seek to adapt myself to the reality of living in a country which is very polarized and uninterested in the things I am interested in. 

[Basilisa Marie]

http://www.politicalcompass.org/test

[NotreDame]

I would disagree with Hasan's idea of reading blogs as a way to inform yourself because until you get a better foundation in the underlying principles - no matter how much you think you get from the blogs - you won't really understand the content.  You need to get a foundation and build on that first. 

I'd go as far back as you could and start there.  Read some books on political philosophy, maybe something about the enlightenment philosophers or the history of political philosophy.  I'm not sure if I'd recommend the original texts outside of a classroom environment, though.  It would also be good to review America's founding, maybe the federalist papers and perhaps something that compares the US revolution with the French.

 

There is a ton out there on economics, but I think that would be putting the cart ahead of the horse.  when you read economics it helps to have some historical perspective to process it.

[PhuturePriest]

I would disagree with Hasan's idea of reading blogs as a way to inform yourself because until you get a better foundation in the underlying principles - no matter how much you think you get from the blogs - you won't really understand the content.  You need to get a foundation and build on that first. 

I'd go as far back as you could and start there.  Read some books on political philosophy, maybe something about the enlightenment philosophers or the history of political philosophy.  I'm not sure if I'd recommend the original texts outside of a classroom environment, though.  It would also be good to review America's founding, maybe the federalist papers and perhaps something that compares the US revolution with the French.

 

There is a ton out there on economics, but I think that would be putting the cart ahead of the horse.  when you read economics it helps to have some historical perspective to process it.

 

I haven't particularly read blogs or books about all the political philosophies, but I love history, and so have read an extensive amount on America's founding and the principals behind it. I highly disagree with the Founding Fathers on many of their ideas, as well as the philosophies that came from the French Revolution.

[arfink]

I haven't particularly read blogs or books about all the political philosophies, but I love history, and so have read an extensive amount on America's founding and the principals behind it. I highly disagree with the Founding Fathers on many of their ideas, as well as the philosophies that came from the French Revolution.

 

I've never really liked the French Revolution or the ideas that fueled it. Whether the ideas were fundamentally sound or not, it justified a kind of violence and almost mindless brutality that I don't believe can be justified.
 

[NotreDame]

I don't have a whole lot of time at the moment so I would just like to point to you how welfare can happen absent government involvement. I would submit evidence by example of the Catholic Church. Created Hospitals, Started Public Education, Orphanages and Adoption Agencies were started by them, The Largest non-profit in the State of Kansas is a Catholic group who work with the poor to the tune of almost 300,000 people below the poverty line where they are able to pair them up with supporters and patrons to help them through rough times and sponsor them. I know a good number of Doctors who provided free care often for those who could just flat out not afford it otherwise. In Topeka each year Dentist get together to offer free dental care to those who need it. There are loads of charities who do great work and when people build real relationships with each other they become aware of these issues and the community responds. When Government takes over charitable donations tend to decrease to these groups making them dependent on Government funds and the issues become more hidden to the general public.

This is where an understanding of history is helpful alongside economics and philosophy. 

 

Originally nearly all welfare and education were private, the majority coming from churches.  Slowly the government crowded out these charities - not always with the best motives. 

 

For example, the motive for centralized public education was not to benefit the poor, but to reduce the power and influence of the Church among immigrants (especially Catholics, but Lutherans as well) by ensuring proper indoctrination.  This was inspired in part I believe by a similar movement in germany called "kulturkampf."  Horace Mann usually gets credit for this in the USA, but it's not terribly well documented.

[arfink]

This is where an understanding of history is helpful alongside economics and philosophy. 

 

Originally nearly all welfare and education were private, the majority coming from churches.  Slowly the government crowded out these charities - not always with the best motives. 

 

For example, the motive for centralized public education was not to benefit the poor, but to reduce the power and influence of the Church among immigrants (especially Catholics, but Lutherans as well) by ensuring proper indoctrination.  This was inspired in part I believe by a similar movement in germany called "kulturkampf."  Horace Mann usually gets credit for this in the USA, but it's not terribly well documented.

 

I have also often heard the theory that Prussian educational ideas were foundational in the systems instituted in the United States. These ideas were to produce a minimally-educated workforce at low cost that would have the necessary reading, writing, and basic math skills to be able to work factory shifts with very minimal additional training. I've never found fantastic sources for this though, so I'm a little dubious. You heard this before?

Edited February 25, 2014 by arfink

[NotreDame]

I've never really liked the French Revolution or the ideas that fueled it. Whether the ideas were fundamentally sound or not, it justified a kind of violence and almost mindless brutality that I don't believe can be justified.
 

I don't like it either, but I think it's especially important to understand the ideas you don't like.  The revolution didn't happen in a vacuum.  It was supported by Rosseau's idea of a social contract and "sovereign" as well as various anti-catholic motives that were pervasive during the earlier reformation.
 

[arfink]

I don't like it either, but I think it's especially important to understand the ideas you don't like.  The revolution didn't happen in a vacuum.  It was supported by Rosseau's idea of a social contract and "sovereign" as well as various anti-catholic motives that were pervasive during the earlier reformation.
 

 

That's true. Although, in as much as I have studied any philosophy, I am more of a student of epistemology and metaphysics than political philosophy. I just seems more important to me, because you can derive most of the rest from that point.

[NotreDame]

I have also often heard the theory that Prussian educational ideas were foundational in the systems instituted in the United States. These ideas were to produce a minimally-educated workforce at low cost that would have the necessary reading, writing, and basic math skills to be able to work factory shifts with very minimal additional training. I've never found fantastic sources for this though, so I'm a little dubious. You heard this before?

 

Interesting.  I haven't heard it put quite that way.   Protestant German schools led academia for a long time (I think up until WWII) so if they were the ones doing most of the writing I'm not sure they'd attribute that as a motive even if it was the case.  The next best sources of scholarship were Britain and the US.  19th century Germany did however have a big influence on non-marxist socialist thought and Germany implemented many non-marxist socialist ideas that lasted up until WWI. 

 

Honestly, good catholic scholars have had their hands full the last 100 years, so not surprising they didn't get around to this.

 

There's this write-up on kulturkampf I found and maybe it has some of the answers:

 

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08703b.htm