Ivan -
Well said, as usual!
States are symbolic, people are real.
Explain that to any or all of the cells in your body. <cringing, waiting
for a fresh debate about "emergence">
The collective of people creates a symbolic entity (Not Real) called
the State, which may or may not represent the entire collective.
For any significant number of people in the collective, I think the
probability of representing the Entire Collective is vanishingly
small... but I agree with the spirit... it might actually represent a
true majority in some significant way. Might.
( Nevertheless, the lie was there at the very birth of the state. Now
we inheritors of the duped are going to claim to have been partners in
the experiment. Which deceit will stand "that the usurpers were
speaking for all" , or "that the duped really knew what was
happening to them")
Well said.
The state being purely symbolic has no arms legs or appetites of its
own. States have no power by themselves. Yet the creators of the state
have been transformed into mere objects enthralled enslaved by the
state.(Citizens, Voters, Clients, Soldiers, but never the creators of
the state.) Even the creators are becoming symbolic and we individuals
are demoted continually as institutions need more authority to treat
us as objects (TSA).
Doesn't stateness and its' institutions, by definition treat us as
objects? Isn't that fundamental to the concept?
We as individuals are the inheritors of the original collective
agreement not some other worldly heroes of distant pasts. At this
moment every citizen has inherited the same obligations and
commitments as the original collective. But many accept the role
assigned as an object to avoid bearing the burden of those ancient
obligations. Willful self enslavement. We still expect the Rights to
be delivered but are unwilling to act on the obligations. So we are
turning ourselves into objects and everywhere we have others helping
us metamorphose into simulacrums of real people.
Well said again...
Perhaps what has happened lately is that the state apparatus (a minor
collective of real people) has suborned the Symbol and has replaced
the original mandates with its own (Violence is not required, the
symbol remains unchanged but the meaning or contract is altered
through design).
I don't agree that this is recent... not in the case of the good ole US
of A, nor anywhere else... though I think your point, and I take it
well, is perhaps that our recent "mandate" of a president (2000-2008)
and his cronies and populist mouthpieces were particularly inclined
toward this.
Hence the need for the minor collective to preserve secrecy but
rationalized as a need of the State. The major collective is unaware
of the usurpation of the symbol for other purposes.
Were there minutes kept and published at the 1st Continental Congress
(and the subsequent ones)? Was anything elided at any point? More
importantly, was there a verbatim transcription, documenting the "out of
band" chatter? Surely not. But I suspect there were many side-room
conversations which benefited from their privacy along the way... some
were overheard and perhaps widely reported, and *that* was part of the
process as well.
Therefore democracy as with justice has become purely symbolic and no
amount of revolution in the symbolic realm can change the real
structure behind the symbols. Which is protected by secrecy. All the
provisions within the original collective agreement have evolved away
from reality into symbolic states. Money for instance. ( It has
benefits but also detrimental affects as in the case of Health Care or
Justice)
I'll concede that these symbols have become more abstract, but not that
they were ever "reality". Though this may be semantics.
This seems to be what some have called the Post Political era. The
consequence of PoMo which annihilated the distinguishing features of
symbolism and reality.
Yes, PoPo seems about right... which is odd since the consequence seems
to be that everything has become "politicised"... but I think you mean
that what passes for Politics is really something else, a thin veneer
covering for the real power and decision processes?
Populism is a reaction to the hollowing out of the contract, however
anger is not a plan. Rage does not build schools.
Rather than play in a symbolic sandbox called democracy we need to
find a means to renegotiate our collective agreements and stop
accepting empty rhetoric as substance.
I can get behind that statement, it is very persuasive<grin>!
Seriously... I'm interested in what you might be thinking of when you
say "renegotiate our collective agreements" because it has a ring to it
that I like and I'd like to ground it out in specifics.
We need a real democracy not a symbolic fabrication. It has been years
since I have seen a legitimate election; Haitiand Ivory Coastare
farces. No wonder many in the developing world mock the American
initiative to support symbolic democracy.
Yes, I'm curious about when that flipped... and I fear it flipped here
(US of A) a while back as well. I can't say I've ever voted for any
candidate or measure for any other than Symbolic reasons. I helped
vote Reagan in as a youth and then 30 years later helped vote Obama in
for pretty much identical reasons... based in idealism (including trying
to balance my earlier mistake)... though the ideals themselves had
changed quite a bit. And yes, the "Democracy" that Amurika! sells is
quite mockable. Both our own practice of it and probably much worse,
the practices we presumably help set up other places (e.g. Iraq).
This situation can be reversed with no need for blood shed. We only
need to re-establish our presence as real people, Human beings. We
must Our innate gullibility makes us all victims of others. They
have become so reliant on secrecy that they themselves have forgotten
the truth and that results in serious errors for everyone (2008 Crash)
We need to abandon scapegoats and symbolic realities. The entire
structure of our institutions are based on deceits going back
centuries in some cases.
I am with you on this as much as I understand it... though I'm not as
clear as you might be on how to effect this. I also suggest that our
"innate gullibility" is based in our own greed and desire to deceive in
the first place. The best way to trick someone is to figure out what
*they* are trying to get away with, and snooker them. Sting, Grift, Con...
The foundation of many states is based on some historic atrocity. The
symbolic state requires the peculiar amnesia about that crime and the
question may arise that the original secret reality is the cause of
the state's own collapse. As far as I am aware only one current state
acknowledges the crimes of the past and that is Germany. I may be
wrong here but for some reason we have never attempted using honesty
historically and the result seems to be a legacy of turmoil.
Interesting (possible) fact... Germany... hmmm... I suppose normally
Germany would have been dismembered and fed to the neighbors. I
suppose the East/West German split was almost that. Can So Africa be
offered as another example?
On another related note, Assange's charges are the most peculiar
renditions of rape I have ever heard described. A broken prophylactic
seems to be the sole supporting claim. There was consent, no violence,
no coercion, the act was agreeable to both parties and only in
retrospect was the charge of rape adopted almost as a reprisal for an
obvious accident. I was always under the impression that rape as
defined by law must be based on one party taking away the other
party's freedom of choice by some means(Drugs, threats , force,
deception?). Oh in the second case it appears that both parties were
in a state of sleep when it happened!. Additionally both women were in
communication for some period before making formal charges(Appears as
collusion or conspiracy) ( I can see why the charges were dropped the
first time, accidents, stupidity and unconsciousness are slim bases
for charges) Perhaps a charge of negligence ( or stupidity, public
mischief) could be leveled at all parties and we be done with the
matter. Heaven forbid we start filling jails with stupid people.
Please add any legal opinions on such a situation. Both women invited
Assange into their homes and later had regrets which they needed to
parade before the world as they sincerely claimed to be victims not
in any way responsible for their own decisions. I have a philosophical
problem with this scenario, as a pro-feminist, equality always implied
that responsibility was equal as well. How can two entities be equal
under the law if one is never responsible for its actions and
decisions? (Hence we accept that children are not equal to adults) ( (
Is this symbolic Justice or Greek Comedy ?)
I'm not sure it is pro-feminist as such, but it does have a punitive and
reactionary sense to it.
End the stupidity of secrecy, let us start acting like grown ups for a
change.
We (the world, humanity, western civ, the first world, US of A?) seem to
be children, never maturing. It is a tenet of animal husbandry and
making animals into good pets, that you must do various things to keep
them from maturing emotionally. It seems quite likely that in the
State's need (metaphorical need) to make us into objects, on route is to
domesticate us, and to the extent the State is under the scrutiny and
guidance of compassionate humans, it seems that we are become "Pets"
(not *just* draft animals).
It seems conclusive to me that most conspiracy theories can be
attributed to Gross Stupidity and the Secrecy imparts an air of
reasoning where none exists. ( We refuse to believe some affairs are
complete and utter nonsense, hence all the sightings of Jesus in
concrete stains. Our brains impart patterns where none exists) How
much effort is expended to reveal that some agency was incompetent or
stupid (Air India, Lockerbie Bombing). The agents within our states
depend upon the delusion that we believe they are smarter than us
(They are professionals we are the helots).
I'm pretty sure there are agents of the state who *are* smarter than
me... but not a lot of them and not a lot smarter... but maybe more
important than being smarter than me (sometimes), they are dedicated to
their cause, I am not. I spend a few seconds every day trying to figure
out how I do/should/might relate to the state... those agents spend *all
day* and in some cases, most of the night trying to figure out how to
leverage their power over me into more power over me... even if I was
much smarter than *all* of them, they might yet have an advantage!
Until their power over me gets close to the imbalance say between the
Coyote and the Cottontail, I'm likely to be careless in the extreme...
all fat and happy munching on the blades of green in the field. This
advantage reverses when it is the difference between *having a meal* and
*becoming a meal*... which is why various "resistance" movements area
always so powerful, hard to crush.
Let us begin by cleaning the house. Most men would prefer to dispense
with all the nonsense given a choice.
Housecleaning as a populist revolutionary political movement just
requires some PR work. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the
states but the unelected rats have to controlled.
I agree with starting with simple housecleaning... it is always more
attractive to sell and move or burn it down than to give it the very
same level of cleaning it is going to get anyway when the smoke clears
or the transaction is made... Ironic, no?
But it is hard to do... we have a lot of bad habits... we are lazy...
and we don't even (collectively) understand the need for it... most of
the junk we need to throw out is somebody's memorabilia, someone's
favorite tchochke... something we are *sure* we will need later.
Thanks for a great (as usual) commentary.
- Steve
**Vladimyr Ivan Burachynsky**
**Ph.D.(Civil Eng.), M.Sc.(Mech.Eng.), M.Sc.(Biology)**
**120-1053 Beaverhill Blvd.**
**Winnipeg, Manitoba**
**CANADA R2J 3R2**
**(204) 2548321 Phone/Fax**
*[email protected]* <mailto:[email protected]>
-----Original Message-----
*From:* [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]
*On Behalf Of *James Steiner
*Sent:* December 7, 2010 8:21 PM
*To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
*Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Privacy, Individual vs. Collective
It's my belief that individual privacy is entirely NOT the same as
government classification (as secret, top secret, etc) of information.
Governments do NOT have a "right of privacy". Our government is
supposed to be "by, of, and for" the people. It's use of secrecy is
appropriate (and should be protected) when that secrecy serves to
protect those people, not when it serves to protect the individuals
who do the classifying (or those they serve) from embarrassment or
legal prosecution.
Such uses are (and I'm pretty sure this is not just my opinion), illegal.
We all kind of "knew" that classification has been used this way. We
all hear or see or read anecdotes. Well, the Irag war papers proved
it. As have all the subsequent leaks.
I think that until the government and all its agents demonstrate that
they can use the tool of keeping secrets correctly, that they should
not be allowed to keep secrets.
Wikileaks has done the American People a great service. Now I hope
that they (we) are smart enough, and outraged enough, to move to fix
what's broken. (IMHO, that's congress / campaign finance / influence
peddling).
~~James
www.turtlezero.com <http://www.turtlezero.com>
On Tue, Dec 7, 2010 at 4:41 PM, Jochen Fromm <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
In the age of social media and social networks
privacy has become an issue of intense debate.
Privacy means an individual has the right to be secure from
unauthorized disclosure of information about oneself.
Now if a state has "state secrets", is this fundamentally
different from privacy issues for
the individual (only for the state)? Should
a state in a democracy have any real secrets
at all? And if the state has the right to prevent invasion of
privacy, shouldn't the individual have the same right, too?
It is clearly evil what Wikileaks has done recently,
they went to far this time. But too much censorship
and secrecy is not a good idea, either (as the "top secret
america" investigation from the Washington Post showed). What do
you think?
-J.
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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
