Hacker News Reader

Comment by kergonath | Hacker News Reader

> How is this different than refusing to tell where you've buried the bodies?

They can get away with it because it’s on a computer. The voters don’t care, and the MPs by and large don’t understand. Those who do would love the same principle to apply to the body case as well.

View on HN

That's because the memory of truly oppressive governments in Western Europe has faded. People who don't remember history, are doomed to repeat it.

I wonder if Berlin's society is already atrophying in this department.

Germans are actually the most inoculated against that type of virus, they will be the last to fall. They are at the forefront of anti-authoritarian efforts in technology, for example.

US/UK/France, on the other hand...

Wasn't Germany actively supporting Russia despite US warnings before the Ukraine war?

https://elamerican.com/germany-mocked-trump-dependence-on-ru...

They were supporting Russia economically by purchasing energy (gas mainly) from them. They basically had the crazy idea that economically intertwining themselves with Russia and making themselves dependent on Russia would magically turn Russia into a modern, democratic European nation, basically "if we bring them into our club, they'll come around to our way of thinking". It didn't work, just like economically integrating with China hasn't turned China into a western-like nation either, it's only enabled the authoritarians.

The fuck are you basing this on.

I do wonder if the masses always end up voting in fascists every 50 years or so simply because they forgot that there were some things worth fighting for. Does it feel like to anyone else we are on the precipice of extremely big changes that might not be good for anyone?

I think this is a big part of it.

I remember growing up reading Harrison Bergeron (in school) and always thinking there's no way such a system would ever come about by the will of the people... yet SF proves people are all too happy to implement such a system (tearing down gifted students for the perceived benefit of everyone else). SSDD.

Of all the insane, repressive and straight-up authoritarian systems in the United States today, you picked... A failed pilot for middle-school algebra in SF?

It wasn't just a failed pilot: It was a pilot which prevented advanced students from taking algebra. Lines up with Harrison Bergeron perfectly.

And on top of it they claimed it was a success as failure rates went down. The failure rate went down because nobody was being tested.

https://www.joannejacobs.com/post/algebra-for-none-fails-in-...

> The district had bragged that algebra failure rates had dropped. Families for San Francisco, a parent group, analyzed the data: Failure rates dropped after the district dropped the end-of-course exam.

I don't think it's forgetting that some things are worth fighting for.

I think it's that, after a fascist government is ousted via violence, people spend so much time and effort to demonize them, that Joe Blow on the street doesn't see them as 'Us' anymore.

We would never make decisions like They made, so We don't have to worry if Our leader is a fascist. Our leader is nothing like Their leader was, other than in absolute power. Our leader has our best interests in mind. Their leader was just a power hungry madman.

When we remove the humanity from the monsters, we fail to remember that we could be monsters, too.

As social creatures, humans tend to defer to authority and go with the flow. Both of these make for disastrous outcomes, depending on the authority deferred to and the direction of the flow.

Why did so many turn a blind eye to the Holocaust? Why did so many ignore the Holodomor? Why did no one stand against great evil?

Presently, there is debate about whether there is true Evil, as well as some absolute Truth. And if there's no foundation on which to build a case of "this is evil", then why would anyone act? Couple that with the fact that -- at least in the United States -- it is legal for the government to propagandize (re lie) the American peoples, and you have a perfect storm of stress and lies that leads to "I'm alone and there's nothing I can do in face of all that is terrible".

What is one man to do?

The one man at Tianeman Square became an emblem of standing up to tyranny. What if there had been another with him? Or ten more?

Solzhenitsyn claims that a little resistance would have completely disabled the Russian Communists.

> The one man at Tianeman Square became an emblem of standing up to tyranny.

And was never seen again. :/

This is the big deterrent. People have families they need to worry about. My SO was telling me to be careful about the things I talk about because it could cost me my job.

I'm not sure where the line in the sand is.

> Solzhenitsyn claims that a little resistance would have completely disabled the Russian Communists.

The Russian civil war lasted six years, was a bit more than 'a little resistance', killed ten million people, and it didn't quite achieve the desired effect.

If anything, it grew and encouraged the winners' paranoia, and put them on a permanent war footing.

Unlike other autocracies who I find tend to be pretty chill?

Inter-war Russia was its own insane level of purges and paranoia, that put most run-of-the-mill autocrats to shame.

Primo Levi had a strong argument along those lines. We must not deny their humanity or call them or their actions inhuman. First, that would be doing them what they did to a lot of people (Jews, but not only). Then, it is in a way providing them excuses by holding three to a different standard. Finally, it would make it seem like regular, normal people are incapable of doing the same thing. Historical evidence shows that yes, normal people can do this.

> When we remove the humanity from the monsters, we fail to remember that we could be monsters, too.

I could not agree more.

Can't forget things they never experienced. Most of the voters weren't alive 50 years ago or more like 78 years ago if you're looking to the end of ww2.

Knowledge can be transmitted, if it doesn't happen (or significant distortions happen) is because we have societal failures.

Strauss–Howe generational theory holds that upheaval or major crisis (like a world war) occurs every 80-100 years

If that holds true the next fews years are going to be interesting

It will definitely be interesting times.

It usually starts with lack of representation, then coercion and then compulsion. I'd say its probably closer to 60 years, all you really need is one bad large generational cohort to get the snowball rolling, and then it becomes almost impossible to reverse, 2 generations down; with the standard generational time period being 20 years.

Lucky me that I am set to retire (15-20 years from now) about the time this will all kick off on the terrible side of that cycle...

unless ofcourse we get WWIII early due to Russia....

The absence of a strong constitution protecting fundamental rights is also an issue. With a 50%+1 majority, the house of commons can vote pretty much any law it wants with no counterpower.

The British system is, indeed, fundamentally insane, from a technical perspective. They nerfed aristocratic power by neutering the House of Lords, but didn't bother replacing it with some other check or balance, leaving the Commons all-powerful - and with an electoral system that disproportionately favours cohesive ideologic minorities. Ironically, this was largely done by self-declared leftists, who utterly failed to anticipate how fascism could easily manifest through such a system.

> Ironically, this was largely done by self-declared leftists

Eh, the Parliament Act 1911 was passed by a Liberal Government.

> who utterly failed to anticipate how fascism could easily manifest through such a system.

The Liberal Party, and its successor the Liberal Democrats, has long been in favour of electoral reform.

and the RIP Act was passed by a Labour government

(and the Terrorism Act)

From what I've heard, the UK Labour party does absolutely nothing for labor. They're turning into the US democrats

It's not that "they're turning", it already happened. Tony Blair and Bill Clinton shared political platforms almost precisely.

A recent effort to go "back to their roots" (the Corbyn years) ended with a stalinesque purge of such leader. Sadly this leaves free reign for upstart neonazi and neonazi-adjacent parties (BNP, UKIP, Brexit Party/Reform UK...) to rip through traditional Lab heartlands.

> Tony Blair and Bill Clinton shared political platforms almost precisely.

I think this needs justification. There is no evidence that Clinton has ever been in favour of socialized healthcare for example, investment in which was a major tenet of the Blair platform.

They literally declared to belong to the same area, the "Third Way": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Way . They both loved Anthony Giddens' works, believed in triangulation and private-public partnerships as essential, morality-based foreign policy, etc etc.

On healthcare, the difference was due to the starting points in the two countries. What eventually turned into "Obamacare" was a push started under Clinton to address the obvious shortcomings of insurance-based healthcare in the US, providing an approximation of European universal-healthcare principles that could actually be applicable to the US context. Hillary Clinton was a massive supporter of that effort, effectively the link between the two Democratic presidencies. It just so happened that, because of the specific peculiarities of the US system (i.e. massive lobbying and astroturfing from insurance and healthcare giants), the actual law eventually morphed into what Obama enacted.

Yes, but we were discussing the supremacy of the House of Commons.

I think most of us agree that lack of enough aristocratic rule isn't the source of UK's problems.

> Parliament Act 1911 was passed by a Liberal Government

... sustained by Labour MPs, and mostly in order to bust a ironclad Tory majority in the Lords that was effectively "ruining" every progressive bill.

It was then further strengthened in 1949 (Lab) and 1999 (Lab).

I mean, there is no shame in this: it was a worthy and progressive cause to drag a XVIII-century model (kicking and screaming) into modernity. It's just a shame that the execution was fairly poor, particularly in 1999 - when there was a unique chance to build something more theoretically sound, and (unlike 1911) there was a lot of history to learn from.

This is useful context, however I wanted to make clear it was the 1911 Act that made the supremacy of the Commons; as you say it was further strengthened in 1949, by shortening the veto timescales.

Labour's position changing from 'abolish the house of lords' originally, to 'get rid of some hereditary peers' in 1999 was incredibly poor, as you say.

> Ironically, this was largely done by self-declared leftists

And they now want a similar thing in the US:

https://www.vox.com/mischiefs-of-faction/2019/4/9/18300749/s...

> The British system is, indeed, fundamentally insane, from a technical perspective.

The best is the unwritten rules. Which are ironclad and “part of the constitution of this country”, except when they aren’t and get just ignored because it’s convenient. But hey, every couple of years journalists can play fun what-if games tracking down ancient customs and speculate whether a 300 years old precedent could be used to behead the PM or some other nonsense.

While in theory you are correct the reality is somewhat different. Individual mps are beholden to their local party and would hesitate to vote on anything that may endanger their position. Backbenchers have brought down 3 successive governments. There also exists an upper chamber and a high court to appeal to. It's mostly a pretty stable system.

Individual MPs are not selected by local parties anymore, that ship sailed 30 years ago. Parachuting chums in safe seats it's been the accepted norm since (at least) Blair. Backbenchers do what they do because they're fighting among themselves, organized in gangs (sorry, "think-tanks" or "research groups") to bolster their own career opportunities.

There is no upper chamber that I know of (the Lords is legislatively dead, a strong government can simply ignore it), and the powers of the High Court, already diminished by recent reforms, are likely to be further curtailed very soon (read the tea leaves: the debate on "abusing judicial procedures to make law", once the remit of right-wing Americans, was the subject for an entire Reith Lecture cycle only a couple of years ago; after the Brexit saga, Tories will take an axe to the HC as soon as they can afford to do so).

Ah! Not to worry, those who do remember history are doomed to watch others repeat it, so I think it's a bit of a wash in the end.

The voters don't know. It has received very little coverage. From what I can see, only Guardian and BBC have covered it, and neither show it on the front page (for me) right now.

Of cases they consider more important are the late Aaron Carter's drug use, a mystery spiral in Alaskan skies, Russian ships accused of spying in Norway, how to combine Ramadan fasting with fitness, potholes in Uganda to name a few.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com