Hi all, thought I'd share something and see if anyone else has had anything like the same experience.
I used to class myself as an 'anarchist'. I believed in direction action, that government was essentialy a bad thing and that people should be allowed more or less to govern themselves.
About a year back I changed my mind. After being involved a great deal in grassroots movements, I began to be disillusioned. Everyone around me seemed to be into the whole sloganeering thing, and doing things that they thought were making a difference but in reality weren't achieving very much at all. On top of that, most of the people around me seemed to be very much into it for how they thought it made them look.
I got out of it, read a lot of political theory, did a lot of thinking and reassessing of the world and my own ideals. I'm now more or less at the opposite end of the spectrum - I believe in small, democraticaly elected government by the people for the people: essentially, republicanism a la Thomas Paine or Thomas Jefferson. I think that a lot of smaller 'anarchist' movements do a lot of damage to themselves through some of the stuff described above, while being at the same time difficult for a large portion of the public to relate to (even though I still agree with some of their principles) and unable to take into account or consider opposite views - basically, close minded.
Anyone else had any experiences like this, entire turn-arounds of their own viewpoints? How and why, and what do you believe now?
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Anonymous2011-12-10 11:50
I used to be what I guess was a type of socialist. Most of my views were liberal, but I agreed with the republicans when it came to militarism. I supported a strong centralized government that promoted equality and multiculturalism. I didn't think that illegal immigration was a bad thing because illegals do work that Americans don't want too. I also thought that jihadists were out to destroy America because they mistakenly think we're a morally corrupt society and they want us to stop drinking alcohol and cover womens faces.
My positions changed durastically over the years after working various jobs with different kinds of Americans and immigrants, spending time in the military, and going to college. I still support socialistic policies as safety nets and to help the poor, but I think that they need to be distributed in a manor that keeps people from being dependent on and abusing them. I no longer support multiculturalism. I DO support legal immigrants who want to learn english, either are educated or want to get an education at an American university, and want to work here. There are lots of very smart students in American universities from Asia, Europe, and Africa and we need them to stay here and contribute to the US after they graduate. Illegal immigrants that don't want to assimilate at all are not good though. I think we need a strong military, but do not need to be involved in the middle east. I blame our support of Israel for our problems in that region. I don't believe in an international Jewish conspiracy or any of that stuff though. I am willing to pay fairly high taxes if the government uses the funds for the right things and doesn't just spend it on buying off useless allies, supporting people who don't intend to ever work, propping up hospitals that are being financially hit by providing healthcare to poor uninsured illegal immigrants, and bailing out businesses that have already demonstrated their incompetance.
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Anonymous2011-12-10 12:08
>>2
That's cool, good to see someone who didn't start working with immigrants, get too soft, and end up saying 'fuck it, we should just let in everyone in and let 'em do what they want'.
Also agree with the strong military principal (as opposed to before, where I thought it was unnecessary) but I think that it should be used purely for defence, to protect the interests and security of the citizen. Diplomatic solutions should take priority (and economic sanctions if necessary), whereas before I'd have said any form of conflict is wrong, and countries should be allowed to do what they want short of invade each other.
I used to work at a place where I met Mexicans who'd lived in the US for 10 years and still couldn't speak English. They lived in Spanish speaking neighbourhoods and shopped at stores where the clerks spoke Spanish. Most of them were basically communists and thought that they should all get raises whenever someone else did, even if that person got the raise for working harder than anyone else. They would even check everyone elses time cards on a regular basis just to make sure no one was getting more hours than them or getting away with working less hours. They also listened to terrible Mexican music.
I'm not a racist because I know enough about genetics to know that people are rediculously similar to one another. I've also met many black Americans, Koreans, and Salvadorans that I respect a lot and plenty of whites that I couldn't stand. That being said, the idea of immigrants like the ones mentioned above taking over is not a pleasant thought at all. I think the national guard needs to be militarizing the boarder. They should arrest and deport anyone trying to cross the border and should kill cartel members caught smuggling drugs and weapons across. Aside from that, the military doesn't need to be nearly as active as its been for the last 10 years.
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Anonymous2011-12-12 0:59
The liberals want more immigrants coming in so they can win elections. Obama will probably set up open borders and give them welfare...oh wait. Too late.
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Anonymous2011-12-12 18:05
It's logical to give up ideology completely. If this means giving up the determination and "integrity" of a fanatical zealot then maybe the challenge here is to find a suitable alternative without falling prey to self-justification and becoming a fanatical zealot once more.
>>5 The liberals want more immigrants coming in so they can win elections.
As opposed to the corporations who love to hire unskilled illegal immigrants to do simple jobs like mopping floors, off the books, in an ad hoc fashion? Yeah. I'm sure most of the higher-ups are heavy GOP supporters as well.
One of the reasons that the immigration problem is so bad is that neither party does anything about it. Obama has deported tons of illegals but overall the democrats are known for more immigrant friendly laws. The republicans on the other hand have a lot of anti-immigrant rhetoric but don't actually do much either for the reasons you just pointed out. People that hire illegals are the primary source of the problem.
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Anonymous2011-12-14 18:27
>Nation founded and built by immigrants
>WE MUST KEEP THE IMMIGRANTS OUT, THEY WILL DESTROY US!
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Anonymous2011-12-14 21:15
>>7 balance between extremes
Well there's the positive then there's the normative, extremes on a continuum represent people's priorities, not how logical those people are. A balance between extremes could be anywhere between a classical liberal federal government with social direct democratic local government or it could be a pick and mix between the policies of Mao and Mussolini.
Abandoning illogical ideological thought processes are as important as abandoning perceived extremist ideology, too many times in history has there been some revolution to overthrow an oppressive government only for the revolutionaries to form a new oppressive government.
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Anonymous2011-12-14 23:02
>>12 too many times in history has there been some revolution to overthrow an oppressive government only for the revolutionaries to form a new oppressive government.
That's why I think that revolutionary movements often end up with people setting themselves up for new rulers, who may or may not behave as ruthlessly as the previous regime. Ditto for revolutionary socialism.
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Anonymous2011-12-17 12:50
Actually, I find my views becoming a bit more authoritarian as I talk politics with people. The average American is simply idiotic. We have a massive 4-5 TRILLION dollar debt, but we can't raise taxes or cut SS, Medicare or welfare. In short, anything that might actually solve the problem is pretty much off the table. Further, I suspect that a good portion of the reason that we Americans cannot find work is that we've priced ourselves out of most labor markets between wages (we get $7.25 at minimum, and in places like India that type of coin attracts college grads) and crazy-tier regulations on working conditions and required benefits. I wish we could appoint someone to be a dictator who could do those kinds of unpopular but necessary things so we don't end up collapsing like the Weimar republic or Zimbabwe. No one can even get nominated if they say stuff like that -- the American public in general demands that their ears get tickled, not that they get reality.
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Anonymous2011-12-17 13:00
>>14
Your dictatorship idea actually did come around in 1930s Germany and Zimbabwe.
But I think it could have been better had the governments appointed someone of known quantity and with no genocidal tendencies to handle Germany. It's very hard to deny that at least in the case of Germany, having someone able to take the helm DID result in Germany going from a basket case economy with 1000% inflation to a major world player in the course of a few years. However, I think my model for action would be the Meiji restoration in Japan -- under the emperor, a medieval nation-state became an industrial superpower in a single generation, and was capable of conquering Asia and threatening the US in 50 years.
Do you really think any deomocratically elected leader is going to be able to touch our welfare state or social security in a serious way? Do you think that they'll be able to trim back the entitlements or regulations with a democratically elected leader?
There's a book titled "What Americans Want" And what they want is a reboot of reality. Low taxes, a big entitlement complex. It's impossible to run a state that way.
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Anonymous2011-12-20 12:32
>>17 Do you really think any deomocratically elected leader is going to be able to touch our welfare state or social security in a serious way?
Certainly not any "mainstream" candidate.
And when exactly has a non-mainstream candidate even gotten the nomination? It's a nonstarter to suggest that some non-mainstream candidate (including Ron Paul, who I think should be our leader) is going to get close enough to the nomination to even worry the establishment. If it were up to me, I'd make Ron Paul a dictator so that he could enact his plans and end the recession and put America back on track. However unless he get appointed and we can stop Congress from running around like idiots and blocking necessary reforms at every turn, it's a zero. Nothing would happen even IF Ron Paul could win the vote, which given the condition of the two major parties and the mainstream media is impossible in the first place.
So what we have is a Democracy in which we can't reform the system because the oligarchy has fixed the game in favor of establishment candidates who are vetted to make sure that they won't do anything even if they win.
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Anonymous2011-12-22 13:25
>If it were up to me, I'd make Ron Paul a dictator
>I'd make Ron Paul a dictator
>Ron Paul the libertarian
>libertarian dictator
Well, how else are we going to rein in our rediculous regulatory and welfare regimes? No one who can get annointed by our oligarchs will be able to touch the EPA or welfare state, to name but two. So either we do nothing and let our country turn into Zimbabwe or we take over put someone in charge with good ideas, and watch as the collapse of the regulatory and welfare regimes means more growth and prosperity for actual productive Americans rather than people who have gotten good at playing the game of kissing up to the bearucrats who actually run our system. If you have the right checklist and follow it, you don't even have to have a job. You get money for doing all kinds of non-productive things and outright punished for doing productive things.
For example, if you never save any money, you can get a free ride to college, however, taking a job means that rather than free college as the nonproductive get, you get to pay for it. If you never save money for a time when your industry might decline, and never get any job skills, the government will let you live on welfare for as long as you want. You'll get food stamps, and you can eat lobster and organic vegetables while the people working at the stores that sell such "staples" generally live on cheaper canned veggies and ramen noodles. At every turn in this welfareocracy you get PUNISHED for producing, innovating, and generally not being brain dead.
So unless you have an actual solution to stopping the persecution of productive people, I think Ron Paul is about the only option we have left.
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Anonymous2011-12-23 20:57
>>21
You don't see the irony of forcing "freedom" on people? Oh and I also like how your example is just a bunch of made up exaggerated bullshit.
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Anonymous2011-12-24 0:06
>>19 If it were up to me, I'd make Ron Paul a dictator so that he could enact his plans and end the recession and put America back on track.
That would just make him the American version of Pinochet, and anyone reasonable enough knows how well that turned out. Also, I think the problems also stem from the US not having a proper multi-party system, so under the current system, Libertarian Party members don't get a say, Green Party members don't have a say, actual Socialist members don't have a say, Social Democrats don't have a say, etc. The brokenness of the political system is so evident and the caprices of having a two-party system are pretty obvious at this point, even to the politically apathetic.
The reason that it must be forced is that there are a large number of people who know no other way of life besides the life of a government slave. They don't know how to survive without the nanny-state "protecting them" or feeding and clothing them. If you don't have some sort of martial law during the transition, you'll end up with mass rioting as people must for the first time (in some cases, the first time in generations) fend for themselves. They won't know that drugs, alcohol, and teen pregnancy are bad things. Either we put something in place to prevent the rioting or we call the whole thing off.
I think a dictarship is a bad idea, but if there were to be any such major transition in our government then martial law would be necessary. Look at what happened in Greece when the gravy train went bankrupt.
Ours is not far behind theirs. We get 40% of our budget in loans from China, and at least according to some reports, China is losing faith in the dollar. When China cuts up our credit card, we're toast.
I'm not a hard core survivalist, but this is why I've recently been saving up on some of the basic necessities and is the only reason at all that I own a gun.
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Anonymous2011-12-28 23:52
>>1
I used to be a liberal when I was young. It took me a while to grow out of that. I liked the idea of a small government that stayed out of my life. I am responsible for myself, I don't need a nanny state. I dislike the crony capitalism I've seen under Bush and Obama alike. I'm watching out rights and liberty die while the nation goes bankrupt.