Being Wishy-Washy

[kent_allard_jr]

I admit I can't resist bashing Bush. (Hey, attacking Republicans is my job, OK?) That's why I quoted Michael Kinsley in my last post. But... I must say I'm not convinced, one way or another, on the whole War-in-Iraq thing. Just in case you were wondering.

Comments

Re:

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

Of course your opinions count. Individual opinions always count; that is how they are translated into masses. I watched, as, I suspect, did you, a huge group of unarmed civilians march on an armed palace in Romania, tell the soldiers, "You don't want to do this, you want to help us," and force a dictator to step down on the basis of their word alone.

The private citizen has responsibility on every subject to run through a series of questions: "Does this matter to me enough to hold a serious opinion?" "What are the facts I need in order to form a serious opinion?" "What *is* my opinion?" "Do I care about it enough to try to take action on my opinion?" "What action should I take?" "How will this action interrelate with other opinions I hold?" "If they conflict, which one should I follow?"

The fact that most of these questions usually end up with the result of doing nothing doesn't mean they need not be asked, at least nonverbally, if only for the sake of needing to identify the few cases where action *is* necessary. And I don't restrict that to the citizens of a democracy, either -- the Romanians weren't. It's both right and duty of anyone with the wits to grasp that there has *never* been a government which could exist without the consent of the governed, for some sufficiently valiant definition of 'nonconsent'.

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

Yes, but... I'm not willing to overthrow the government over this. :-)

Seriously, under a democracy, I feel you owe the government a certain amount of tacit support, at least in action (certainly not in words), unless it's doing something truly horrific. Otherwise there's nothing to keep the US from looking like Venezuela. So it really is a purely intellectual issue for me.

Re:

[pocketnaomi.livejournal.com]

I think you're probably right, although I think I am more willing to use words, or at least legal forms of actions (civil disobedience, boycotts, words designed to crush all support the government may have) than you are. At the same time, I know they can sometimes work, so I try to be careful about my reasons. I haven't decided whether "this is a bad person, but he is doing something right and we can't get it doesn as effectively without him" constitutes reason to attempt seriously to destroy his reputation and therefore his functioning capacity, or reason to shut up and let the man work. This is independent of whether I *do* think he's doing something right or not.

[avram]

Sure, under a democracy. But...

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

I knew that would come up. :-)