When words stop meaning anything, when people can just make up anything, democracy doesn't work

[arranfan]

Obama: "When words stop meaning anything, when people can just make up anything, democracy doesn't work. Society can't work. If you can just say anything, and there are no consequences... how are we going to have any kind of accountability?"

Applies to so many areas at present. Obama raises the issue that we've all become accustomed to it - individuals and media.

There are no consequences for promoting and speaking untruths.

Courtesy of that thread, I came across the phrase stochastic terrorism and I don't recall seeing it previously tho' I understand the concept:

The use of mass, public communication, usually against a particular individual or group, which incites or inspires acts of terrorism which are statistically probable but happen seemingly at random.

Interesting discussion about it in the context of US politics and hostile political discourse.

In recent years, America has experienced a “dramatic increase in attacks by disaffected people, and people searching for some sense of accomplishment,” Cohen said. They connect with a “cause”...and then “use for a motive of committing a violent attack,” spurred on by what they’re seeing on social media and the internet. The people most easily swayed by hateful rhetoric are often “looking for legitimacy and a sense of validation for their violent tendencies,” Cohen said.

qz.com/1436267/trump-stochastic-terror-and-the-hate-that-ends-in-violence/

Oh yes, we need a common understanding of reality in order to have any communication at all. And then a common understanding of how society functions, and of rule of law. Without agreed or enforced rule of law, all we have is a bunch of strangers jockeying for survival or advantage attacking each other with various justifications: with our unprecedented demographic levels now it would be an equally unprecedented blood bath. We seem more willing now to try to justify our bad behaviours too, in an ideologically-driven age.

To put it more simply, if you don't have rule by informed consent and negotiated agreement, all you have left is force.

Didn't Obama redefine sex to mean gender in Article IX?

Exactly that, lass.

Obama is accountable for dismantling the meaning of sex.

This is pure hypocrisy. And there is a great deal to admire about the man. But he is intelligent enough to understand the can of worms he opened, and he did it using exactly the technique he is now criticising.

Also, I just agreed with you. I'm off to lie down

Hope this helps !

I agree with the OP. Once you factor in the heavy-handed control used to enforce the 'anything' that's been made up it's clear that some sort of reaction (in favour of free speech rather than violence I hasten to add) was both necessary and inevitable.

The use of mass, public communication, usually against a particular individual or group, which incites or inspires acts of terrorism which are statistically probable but happen seemingly at random.

The problem with that idea is that it makes people accountable for more than what they say. It makes them accountable for other people's choices.

Trump is despicable. He lies as often as he breathes and he says incredibly dumb, irresponsible things. He certainly contributes to these problems. The accountability for that is supposed to be the electorate.

He is not responsible for someone else's crimes.

Part of the reason for the rise of people like Trump is the perception that there are things we can't say anymore- that widely held minority viewpoints are subject to censorship because they happen to be unfashionable.

When freedom of speech breaks down then politics stops working as it should. It's a really hard line to defend the right to free speech of those we find abominable, but if we don't then eventually we all suffer.

Naomi Klein's "Shock Doctrine: The rise of disaster capitalism" argued that fear is a great way to keep a population under control. Chaos and mistrust are useful for maintaining fear Although propaganda has been around for centuries, getting people to hate each other and manipulate thinking, the techniques have been honed in the age of mass public's and mass media.

Lying, distortion and dichotomy (you are either with us or you are against us) would undermine democracy if such a thing existed. Currently the news cycle just does it's best to keep us mis-informed (BBC take a bow) It is actually difficult to pick a time/country when there has ever been true democracy, the Greeks who developed their working model of democracy did so by excluding women and slaves from their small city state politics (but a big cheer for inspirational Iceland who certainly lead the way in terms of people power)

As in the UK we are all still considered subjects of the Queen, I'd argue we've never had more than a combination of theocracy/monarchy, plutocracy/oligarchy in the UK. The rich make/rig the rules, using smoke and mirrors to fob us off so we just stay out of their way if we can't be useful to them.

Thank goddess for gin cheers

NB. It is not illegal for MPs to lie in the UK Parliament, Select Committee recommendations are routinely ignored, the House of Lords are unelected, there is no power of Recall, the press completely ignored the Leveson recommendations and people are encouraged to be consumers rather than citizens...we are a million miles away from having accountable politics....

Yes, Obama has overseen the undermining of important words in Title IX. It would be useful if he were to pause and reflect on what he's set in motion and then comment on it in a clear way. Maybe have a very public conversation about it if that's compatible with what former presidents are able to do in the US.).

For me the stochastic terrorism is a way of explaining that there are people who are just looking for any flimsy validation as a cloak to give their violent actions some respectability. They don't even need to believe a cause or know much about it, they just want the rhetorical cover.

Years ago I read something that said the horrendous aspects of how quickly torture and atrocities arise is that you realise you've been living next-door to people with this level of anger and hatred, waiting for a legitimising context to express that.

Yes to Shock Doctrine.

Democratic Audit will shortly have a book available for free download, The UK’s Changing Democracy: The 2018 Democratic Audit

www.democraticaudit.com/the-uks-changing-democracy-the-2018-democratic-audit/

And, wrt, to the comments about how our HoC, HoL work - there's a piece I haven't finished reading that looks interesting: How effective are the Commons’ two committee systems at scrutinising government policy-making?

parliamentsandlegislatures.wordpress.com/2018/10/24/effective-commons-committees/