Political Ramblings of an Idiot

[Prufrock]

A warning before i start, i am a student who has no idea what i want to do when i graduate. at the moment my ambitions are gravitating towards being a writer. my interests are music, football, philosophy and politics, probably in that order. this is an article about my political views and is quite long. i dont expect everyone to be bothered to read through it, but if anyone is bored, interested or has too much time on their hands, opinions on the article itself, and the subject would be appreciated, although grammar bullies can F off as that would be an editor's job

Responsibility

I am 19 years old, and as such, my first oppurtunity to vote came in the recent mayoral elections in London where i am a student. I am a Libertarian and a communist ( and i mean that in terms of 'to each according to his needs. from each according to his means', not, install dictatorship and secret police, then run riot for 70 years. as the mayoral elections approached, i received a pamphlette containing all the manifesto of each candidate. some were frankly ridiculous, for instance the BNP who had a girl born and bred in Dublin quoted as supporting them, saying she beleived that Britain should be preserved for the indigenous people of Britain. that's right, the BRITISH national party. however, what struck me the most was i didnt find a party i actually felt represented me. call me young and idealistic but i dont want to compromise when it comes to having my say in who runs the country. the nearest i could find was a party called the Left List. they said everything i wanted to hear regarding equality, wealth distribution and public services however they, like most left wing parties wanted to pull the troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan, a policy which to me is irresponsible

If you had asked me before the Iraq war whether i thought we should have gone, you would have got a resounding NO (well in fact you would have got a yes, but i was still at school, a public school, and my views were coloured by the inherant consertatism therein). it was a war waged on the pretext that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. turns out there were none, and there was no proof. the iraqi government was dodgy to say the least but to invade on those grounds you need UN backing and why should we, as George Bush's lapdog need any more approval than his?

However my point regarding responsibility is this; now we have gone there, overthrown Saddam and imposed democracy, how can we just walk away with the country in turmoil. in my view it is wholly socially irresponsible. none of the parties offered left wing idea[l]s, but with a sense of responsibility. in my own utopia we would live in a world with no nations, no barriers, where everybody is born equal and people are offered the rudimentary rights of choice i beleive all should have. there would be few laws, only those which upheld the mantra of do as you please as long as it does not prevent others from doing as they please. religion would be allowed but there would be no indoctrination allowed. a child cannot be christian or muslim or a member or any other religion, and should have the oppurtunity to decide for itself. the main two ideals would be freedom and equality. i for instance do not beleive, that a child born in poverty abroad, in Africa, or rural Asia for instance should have to stay poor, and live a life based purely on survival, just so a relatively wealthy western man can get paid ten pounds an hour to do a job that child could do, to help pay for his 42" plasma TV even he can't really afford.

All very easy to say for a privately educated white male whose father has never really struggled to work you might think. but with fortunate, wealth and power come responsibilty, the responsibilty to help the unfortunate, the poor, and the weak. i would not dare to suggest that this man on ten pounds an hour is selfish. costs are high in this country, he possibly has a familly to support, but i do think we are as a nation selfish; nor am i suggesting that the utopia i described above is realistically possible, three obvious barriers are custom, language and religion, but i beleive it is our responsibilty to work to getting as near to the ideals of freedom and equality as possible.

This is my main point about responsibilty. even the majority of the extreme left wing parties in britain thing far too much in terms of britain. a piece of land divided by imaginery borders. i have been accused before of being disrespectful to the people who fought and died in world wars to save britain, but my point is they didnt fight to save a piece of land in between John O'Groats and Land's End, but these ideals of freedom and equality. beofre each of us were born
we were not given a choice of who we would be, where we would be born and to what parents, yet in life we are too busy in the minutiae of our own western worlds to consider the rest, man as a species and the world at large.


Discutez et merci for having read!

[TANGODANCER]

Ah, the sheer idealism of youth. Morning Prufrock. Absolutely beautiful morning, in fact one where it's particularly good to be alive.

Thoughtful, if more than somewhat idealistic, post and one in serious danger of closing down the TW Banter section all on its own. Unfortunately, politics, and particualrly religion, are topics that just are not capable of being debated sensibly here. But have a nice day anyway.

[superjohnmcginlay]

Dont worry you'll grow out if it.

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

Dont worry you'll grow out if it.

Exactly what I was going to say; at the risk of sounding patronising, especially given that I'm only a few years your senior, I'm sure time will make a realist of you and your communist leanings will eventually fade away. No countries or boundaries and a utopia of freedom, equality and rights, but without laws? My goodness, you have got it bad! One of major reasons there is very little richer countries can do to help the impoverished child you speak of is precisely the lack of laws in so many African countries, or, more precisely, the rule of law: be careful what you wish for.

Oh, and like it or not, F.E. Smith, one of my political heroes, was right when he said "Politically, economically and philosophically the motive of self-interest not only is but must...and ought to be the mainspring of human conduct..."

Anyway, don't be deterred - political views are welcome, even if their expounder's compass is slightly skewed! Perhaps you would be well advised to add 'economics' to your list of interests...

Nobody comes up with a post like that unless they are avoiding exam revision - am I right?! What course are you studying?

[TANGODANCER]

Dont worry you'll grow out if it.

Nobody comes up with a post like that unless they are avoiding exam revision - am I right?! What course are you studying?

Note the time of the post Mummy. All the indications of a drop of the amber nectar or insomnia, one of the two or maybe a combination of both?

[Lord Kangana]

But then again, as Disraeli once said:

"In a progressive country change is constant; ...change... is inevitable."

Capitalism will not last forever, the time frame for its demise may be centuries, but a system that relies on selfish goals cannot have an infinite capacity to survive.

[Worthy4England]

Can't beat a bit of compassionate politics when weighed heavily against the politics of self-interest. At the risk of sounding patronising, I suspect more than one person may become a realist over time and realise that politics of the self doesn't work either.

I commend your view Prufrock, although it isn't going to happen anytime soon. We have two broadly centerist parties in the UK that aren't going to reduce their monopoly on power any time soon.

The thought that we can't "do better" as a Western set of democracies, to help people in less well off economies, is equally as false.

[superjohnmcginlay]

Dont worry you'll grow out if it.

Edit: Dont worry everyone except loony lefties like worthy grow out of it.

[TANGODANCER]

Politics are wonderful until you put people in the equation. There's also the sizeable proportion of humanity that take everything and contribute absolutely nothing to consider. Throw in crime, alcaholism and drug abuse and it becomes obvious that we need some serious work in getting our own house in order before we expand our horizons to the world's woes.

[Worthy4England]

Dont worry you'll grow out if it.

Edit: Dont worry everyone except loony lefties like worthy grow out of it.

I am neither loony nor lefty. My day job is entirely capitalist and focused entirely on ensuring that shareholder value is in the middle of everything I do on behalf of the huge global corporation I represent.

That said, I don't recall I've ever been critical regarding the amount of tax I pay, as some of it will reach people who aren't as fortunate as I am or genuinely unable to help themselves.

I have more than enough to get by on, and generally want for nothing important. The fact that others are dying for lack of food and water on the same planet is criminal. I accept entirely Mummy's point regarding the persuasion of many Governments in the "third world" - notice how we remove it from the same world we inhabit - and I also agree that too much aid that is destined for these countries never makes it.

Funny how we can put people in the middle of Baghdad as they happen to be an oil rich nation with and idology far removed from US foreign policy, yet we can't afford to help aid get through to some other places in the world....

[mummywhycantieatcrayons]

I have more than enough to get by on, and generally want for nothing important. The fact that others are dying for lack of food and water on the same planet is criminal. I accept entirely Mummy's point regarding the persuasion of many Governments in the "third world" - notice how we remove it from the same world we inhabit - and I also agree that too much aid that is destined for these countries never makes it.

Funny how we can put people in the middle of Baghdad as they happen to be an oil rich nation with and idology far removed from US foreign policy, yet we can't afford to help aid get through to some other places in the world....

There is the obvious point, of course, that some places on the 'same planet' of ours, diverse as it is, are far better set up to provide 'food and water' than others.

That aside, the importance of the lack of democratic institutions in third world countries cannot be overstated - too often well meaning people in the developed world see the problem entirely through the wrong end of the telescope. Aid really is useless without regime change in a lot of places, in some it simply exacerbates the problem, but then how we effect (encourage?) that regime change, and whether we have the responsibility, authority or will to do so are questions that have long been struggled with without an answer.

Whatever our problems, we're all bloody lucky to live where we do!

[Athers]

mummy is right about a strong legal system being required in order to raise standards of living with international help, be that through aid or through foreign direct investment. FDI is the key to aiding development.

Anyway I can't bore you with my "economics of development, transition and reform" module material as I've got a dissertation due in tomorrow.

Capitalism will not last forever, the time frame for its demise may be centuries, but a system that relies on selfish goals cannot have an infinite capacity to survive.

Perhaps the same is true of a species eventually, although I suspect humans tend to have a strong altruistic tendencies compared to other species we may well go down the 'destroying ourselves' route one day.

[Lord Kangana]

I have more than enough to get by on, and generally want for nothing important. The fact that others are dying for lack of food and water on the same planet is criminal. I accept entirely Mummy's point regarding the persuasion of many Governments in the "third world" - notice how we remove it from the same world we inhabit - and I also agree that too much aid that is destined for these countries never makes it.

Funny how we can put people in the middle of Baghdad as they happen to be an oil rich nation with and idology far removed from US foreign policy, yet we can't afford to help aid get through to some other places in the world....

There is the obvious point, of course, that some places on the 'same planet' of ours, diverse as it is, are far better set up to provide 'food and water' than others.

That aside, the importance of the lack of democratic institutions in third world countries cannot be overstated - too often well meaning people in the developed world see the problem entirely through the wrong end of the telescope. Aid really is useless without regime change in a lot of places, in some it simply exacerbates the problem, but then how we effect (encourage?) that regime change, and whether we have the responsibility, authority or will to do so are questions that have long been struggled with without an answer.

Whatever our problems, we're all bloody lucky to live where we do!

It would perhaps be a slight help if the "west" stopped sponsoring tin-pot dictators and supplying them with vast amounts of arms to subjugate their own people.

It might be the wrong end of the telescope, but its still one telescope.

[Prufrock]

Dont worry you'll grow out if it.

Nobody comes up with a post like that unless they are avoiding exam revision - am I right?! What course are you studying?

Note the time of the post Mummy. All the indications of a drop of the amber nectar or insomnia, one of the two or maybe a combination of both?

how did you guess mummy, and tango you are half right. classics is my degree, and i don't sleep well, or i dont sleep well at night should i say. i happen to think i was half coherent, which would NOOOOOT have been the case if the amber nectar had come into play

i should have stressed more i think tat i realsie a lot of what i said is conjecture, and that i think we must try to move at least in the general direction of the world i described, even though in reality it isunlikely we will ever get there. I talked a lot about this in my french oral the day before yesterday which was about the Front National and the BNP a d how they gained a lot of support in the early part of this decade. i think a large part of it in both countries was voter apathy, and the reason for this is the big parties are now nothing more than PR machines, spewing out the same policies, stealing off each other and trying to make out that the other is worse than they are not they are better. New Labour are as right wing as Labour have ever been, and David Cameron as left as the Tories have ever been, well in recent history. People feel that it doesnt matter who they vote for, nothing will change. As a result of this some people don't vote, others make a protest vote. this on the face of it should be a good thing, if enough people changed from tory or labour, whilst it would still always be them in power, they might realise they had to actually have some policies to stay in power.

however this raises a problem, as a leftie, not only do you have the lib dems (which isnt really a protest vote as they have a chance in all elections bar general, plus they again suffer from the same PR machine problem, if to a lesser extent) but you have the Greens, the Left List, the Socialists, COmmunists all these movements who are so diverse and so small that the vote gets spread. if you are a right winger wishing to make a protest vote, you have UKIP and the BNP, and so if people keep getting dissillusioned about centrist politis, the like of the BNP get more and more seats on councils etc which is VERY worrying.

also we live in a world of mass media where people are more interested in sensationalism than facts, where everyone can vote but so many people, especially in my generation who are now getting the ability to vote, are really undereducated. part of the reason i moved to london is because i was sick of the racial tension back home, unfounded and from both sides. in this environment, god help our country, never mind the rest

to whoever mentioned corruption in africa, a very good point, but not a reason to stop trying surely? the lyrics under my messages (is it called my signature?) pretty much sum up my feelings on left wingpolitics at the moment

[Prufrock]

[quote='Prufrock']the lyrics under my messages (is it called my signature?) pretty much sum up my feelings on left wingpolitics at the moment[/quote]

the next line is 'so i hung up my banner in disgust and i head for the door' but it wouldnt fit. People complain and whine but nobody actually does anything

[Worthy4England]

I have more than enough to get by on, and generally want for nothing important. The fact that others are dying for lack of food and water on the same planet is criminal. I accept entirely Mummy's point regarding the persuasion of many Governments in the "third world" - notice how we remove it from the same world we inhabit - and I also agree that too much aid that is destined for these countries never makes it.

Funny how we can put people in the middle of Baghdad as they happen to be an oil rich nation with and idology far removed from US foreign policy, yet we can't afford to help aid get through to some other places in the world....

There is the obvious point, of course, that some places on the 'same planet' of ours, diverse as it is, are far better set up to provide 'food and water' than others.

That aside, the importance of the lack of democratic institutions in third world countries cannot be overstated - too often well meaning people in the developed world see the problem entirely through the wrong end of the telescope. Aid really is useless without regime change in a lot of places, in some it simply exacerbates the problem, but then how we effect (encourage?) that regime change, and whether we have the responsibility, authority or will to do so are questions that have long been struggled with without an answer.

Whatever our problems, we're all bloody lucky to live where we do!

Agreed The point is I guess that the poor nameless sod dying of thirst doesn't actually care which end of what telescope people in more developed nations are looking through, I notice too that you point to lack of democratic institutions as being important. Again, I would argue that whether institutions are democratic or not is probably a moot point to the person dying. I suspect they'd happily accept military junta, communism, Martian invasion as being equally as good if they got sustainable food and water....

Where that leaves us is in a position where we try to provide some aid, a) on terms that our good for us and b) often in the knowledge that it may support military regimes.

The responsibility and authority part is indeed the most thorny of questions, and one that I personally have a tough time coming to a conclusion upon. I can see the positives of going in all guns blazing, but can equally see how that translates into Foreign Policy arrogance. There is also the economic realities of the world. Many Western businesses are taking "advantage" of rebuilding Iraq, so the "cost of war" will translate into a lower bill that is currently being discussed in the longer term - a bit like lease-lend. Where countries aren't resource rich, that's a much tougher model to make a case for.

Either way we still end up with an economic model for most, where they're dying because no-one can make the business case for them not to and politically because there isn't much mileage in taking positive action. From an apolitical standpoint that makes many of the world's population just not important enough to be saved.

We start weighing up life or death against whether we can afford egg n chips or steak n chips and the like and think we're hard done by, which I guess is all a bit relative.

I await with interest Pru's next study period - we've already had a Megson and a politics...

[Prufrock]

agreed Worthy. i personally think it was immensely arrogant of ourselves and America to just decide they were having democracy, it sounds like an Oscar Wilde-ism ' the Iraqi people are having democracy whether they like it or not!'. now whilst, again in an ideal world, everywhere would be democratic, in my view the right to democracy comes after the right to food and water and essentially life. Whilst the old Iraqi regime was a terrible one, they are countries in the world with worse regimes, or at least with more people dying, which i supoose is the main empirical way of measuring how bad a dictatorship is, but these countries, dare i say it, have fewer resources, and would be more expensive to try to help. if we invaded every country in the world that wasnt run as we'd like , we'd have about two soldiers in each, if that, and be fighting on god knows how many fronts.

we know aid given to corrupt governments doesnt work so in my mind we have to put more funding into the likes of the Red Cross and help people who are in dire need of it, pay more people to go and build schools and hospitals, and when you have an educated, healthy people then you can introduce the idea of democracy. if Iraq has proved anything, it is that charging in all guns blazing then going, here have democracy, can we sod off now, doesnt work.

I have more than enough to get by on, and generally want for nothing important. The fact that others are dying for lack of food and water on the same planet is criminal. I accept entirely Mummy's point regarding the persuasion of many Governments in the "third world" - notice how we remove it from the same world we inhabit - and I also agree that too much aid that is destined for these countries never makes it.

Funny how we can put people in the middle of Baghdad as they happen to be an oil rich nation with and idology far removed from US foreign policy, yet we can't afford to help aid get through to some other places in the world....

There is the obvious point, of course, that some places on the 'same planet' of ours, diverse as it is, are far better set up to provide 'food and water' than others.

That aside, the importance of the lack of democratic institutions in third world countries cannot be overstated - too often well meaning people in the developed world see the problem entirely through the wrong end of the telescope. Aid really is useless without regime change in a lot of places, in some it simply exacerbates the problem, but then how we effect (encourage?) that regime change, and whether we have the responsibility, authority or will to do so are questions that have long been struggled with without an answer.

Whatever our problems, we're all bloody lucky to live where we do!

Agreed The point is I guess that the poor nameless sod dying of thirst doesn't actually care which end of what telescope people in more developed nations are looking through, I notice too that you point to lack of democratic institutions as being important. Again, I would argue that whether institutions are democratic or not is probably a moot point to the person dying. I suspect they'd happily accept military junta, communism, Martian invasion as being equally as good if they got sustainable food and water....

Where that leaves us is in a position where we try to provide some aid, a) on terms that our good for us and b) often in the knowledge that it may support military regimes.

The responsibility and authority part is indeed the most thorny of questions, and one that I personally have a tough time coming to a conclusion upon. I can see the positives of going in all guns blazing, but can equally see how that translates into Foreign Policy arrogance. There is also the economic realities of the world. Many Western businesses are taking "advantage" of rebuilding Iraq, so the "cost of war" will translate into a lower bill that is currently being discussed in the longer term - a bit like lease-lend. Where countries aren't resource rich, that's a much tougher model to make a case for.

Either way we still end up with an economic model for most, where they're dying because no-one can make the business case for them not to and politically because there isn't much mileage in taking positive action. From an apolitical standpoint that makes many of the world's population just not important enough to be saved.

We start weighing up life or death against whether we can afford egg n chips or steak n chips and the like and think we're hard done by, which I guess is all a bit relative.

I await with interest Pru's next study period - we've already had a Megson and a politics...

next up music, but cant be bothered just yet, although hopefully that might put the banter back in general banter since all i've done so far is talk about serious things....which is never good

[Montreal Wanderer]

Well, I'm not sure of the merits of most of this debate (I'm a social democrat and very far from a libertarian) but I think Prufrock is spot on about the Iraq war and the lack of UN sanction was the reason Canada stayed out (got us into much trouble with Bush as a result). However, the UN did sanction Afghanistan and so we are there under the NATO banner - 81 of our servicemen have died in another war we probably cannot win. We wonder if we should bother with a country on the other side of the world, but as members of the international community we have an obligation to support international law and the protection of all humans. there was no such rationale in the Iraq invasion - just lies about weapons of mass destruction and greed over oil interests.

[fatshaft]

some were frankly ridiculous, for instance the BNP who had a girl born and bred in Dublin quoted as supporting them, saying she beleived that Britain should be preserved for the indigenous people of Britain. that's right, the BRITISH national party.

I'm not really sure what your point is there pru? I presume you're saying that someone from Ireland should disagree with their policy because they aren't British?

I'm a Scots nationalist, and always have been from my ealry teens, my best mate was English and hated all the nationalist stuff, his father (english obviously) was however a highly active member and councillor for the SNP. You can imagine the hours of fun I had with that!

Point is, nationalist doesn't have to mean racist/xenophobic, although I accept that may not be strictly true with the BNP.

[fatshaft]

i have been accused before of being disrespectful to the people who fought and died in world wars to save britain, but my point is they didnt fight to save a piece of land in between John O'Groats and Land's End, but these ideals of freedom and equality.

You're probably well wide of the mark there. If you asked most of those said soldiers, very few would probably answer freedon or equality, most would say they'd fought for their country.