06-02-2021, 08:16 PM
(06-02-2021, 11:47 AM)hollodero Wrote: Well, for one, when it's about my own opinion then I decide that. And whether I see such a move as warranted or not is always following subjective criteria, as is everything really. My subjective stance would also be that attacking Canada is bad; and if a democratic minority would use every measure (including ones they wanted to get rid of before) to prevent something like that is fine by me. I'd not call them hypocrites, or inconsistent.
Now sure, Texas republicans did not propose something quite that severe, but they proposed some measures that are imho shocking and blatantly anti-democratic, in both senses of this word. On the other hand, senate republicans used a measure akin to walking out to stop investigating an insurrection attempt. Because they think it might be bad for them politically, if the guy mainly responsible still is the party's monarch and only himself or someone with his full endorsement can ever get nominated for president or for almost any other elected office.
These two situations are so vastly different in their motivations (that assumption is not really subjective anymore), and in my (subjective) sense of morality, that lack of consistency on the democrat's part doesn't seem like a good argument to me.
If you're comparing just those two situations, then sure. However, and this won't be the last time I point this out in this post, what you're really objecting to here is the motivation behind the action and not the action itself.
(06-02-2021, 12:55 PM)Dill Wrote: Now is a good time to remember that all value judgments are "subjective."
But that doesn't make them all equally irrational or expressions of personal preference
or equally untethered from factual grounding.
Sure, but, again, it does shine a light on the fact that the objection to "minority rule" has more to do with what that minority is doing, or protecting, than the concept itself.
Quote:Collective value judgments take objective social form in institutions and laws, so that determining whether such are democratic or not is not "merely subjective" but a matter of correlating collectively established definitions and values to observable behavior.
I agree it is not clearly "inconsistent" or hypocritical to blow up a democratic vote to prevent one party from passing anti-democratic laws to preserve its own power.
It might even be consistent in the sense that (following Bpat) in decrying a filibuster against civil rights because it hurts democracy and then walking out of session to prevent legislation to curtail others right to vote, one is expressing a consistent ethical stance in each case, though in the latter one is breaking rules to which one supposedly subscribes.
But can one allow such exceptions to one's own side without allowing them to the other?
The only way out that I can see is on the analogy to civil disobedience, which honors rule of law in the violation.
One might also be inconsistent with the ethical stance to which one supposedly subscribes if one advances legislation to "secure the vote" as a sacred democratic right while refusing to explain or even address the question of whether that legislation will actually do more to limit that sacred right.
It's interesting that you mention civil disobedience, as it's a great example of what I'm saying above. A certain lawyer, who doesn't know the law, called me an extremist for pointing out that many otherwise lawful gun owners will outright ignore gun laws such as registering their "assault weapon". This isn't an academic question either, it's been definitively shown in New York and other states with "assault weapons" registration/bans. The compliance right is abysmally low. This is civil disobedience. However, it receives rather less support than the "civil disobedience" we saw over the past twelve months. Herein lies the danger in such subjective opinion. Even morality, in some instances, is hardly a universally agreed upon concept. Take abortion. Millions of people legitimately believe that abortion is murdering a child, do you support "civil disobedience" in trying to stop abortion? What could be more moral than trying to prevent children from being murdered?
(06-02-2021, 01:19 PM)hollodero Wrote: Oh boy, they sound just like the Dutch. If they indeed are, then yeah I should reconsider. All efforts to play nice with them should be filibustered.
But yeah, they will get away with it... yet again; courtesy of all those "oh my, humanism, peace, they are human beings as well, blabla" snowflakes.
Hey, my father's family emigrated here from Schoonhoven in the early 1800's!
(06-02-2021, 01:30 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: I didn't touch this, earlier, but I feel like I need to comment, here. The legislation objectively limited democracy. There is no subjectivity to that statement. The subjectivity lies in what level of limitation to democracy do you find acceptable. The subjectivity lies in whether it will be interpreted to be unconstitutional. There is no subjectivity, however, in whether or not the legislation in this instance limited, and thus damaged, democracy.
Agreed. However, not allowing foreign residents or illegal aliens to vote is also limiting democracy. Not allowing people in prison to vote is limiting, or "damaging", democracy. I realize you're essentially acknowledging these types of differences in your post, but they should be spelled out for those less inclined to subtlety. Whether the proposed legislation was egregious in ways that the above are not is, I suppose, up for debate.
