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Majority vs. Minority


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#1 Fire Blazer

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Posted 31 December 2012 - 08:17 AM

This has been a debate going on for ages--simply put, who should rule? The majority, or the minority?

More specifically, let's take a quick example, such as the U.S. Government. We have politicians or "people that control the U.S."--government officials, etc... let's just say the "people who decide how the U.S. works and what it does", simply put. These are a minority. Is it better that the majority of people leave it up to them to make the right decisions, or is it better that the minority simply works to serve the majority, because there are more minds, and well, "two brains are better than one"--and thus more minds are more likely to make the right choice than less minds.

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#2 kirant

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Posted 31 December 2012 - 09:06 AM

One key to remember I think is efficiency. It would be interesting to see things done purely by referendum, but it's highly impractical. The cost of everything would be astronomical. The other to remember is that the fewer people who run things, the more issues and representation of the citizenry gets compromised by having to overburden the politician with so many issues that they can't possibly accurately represent their large riding without arguing with themselves. In that case, it's more of a theoretical activity than anything really practical.

The key in this system is to have so many politicians that the entire population isn't extremely marginalized, while having so few that anything gets done. It's a dangerous balance and I'm not convinced any government has this right.

Ultimately, I'm happy with the way things are done for elections in the developed world.

It is the CITIZEN who votes in the politician. That's the key tenant of our system. The average person has to decide who best fits them and it is within their duty to tell their constituent when they don't agree, whether it be by e-mail, vote or talk. It is the duty of everyone to contact the politician and get them the information they need to make the decision based on what they're being told (I'm actually quite jealous of the US in this one aspect - Canada has a "vote by party lines" unwritten rule, so our politicians will often vote against what they feel is right because their party superiors tell them to). Therefore, it is up to the citizen to vote in the correct politician during elections and find the correct candidate. In situations of no agreement with any candidate, it's a void in which one would find opportunity to get elected and run on a better fitting platform. It is also up to the politician to get details, concerns, and the general baseline from their constituents and weighing the decision instead of just making their own arbitrary decision.

In the US, the main issue I see is low votership, resulting in poorly reflecting politicians. Some politicians step in and lose all connection with their majority constituents. Yet they keep getting electing year in, year out. It's because of two issues: one, that the politician isn't getting the message. They see themselves getting elected from the few who actually bother getting off their ass and voting, and think "gee, I'm doing great!". Second, the majority aren't actually getting their say because they throw away their ballot. I'm a huge fan of the theory that "if you don't vote, you don't get a right to complain". Your vote was firmly placed in the category of "I can't be bothered to care". I say it's still important to vote for the candidate that you think best represents you, even if that candidate has no hope in hell of getting elected.

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#3 Mercurius

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Posted 31 December 2012 - 03:04 PM

I believe that the competent minority controlling the majority is better.

''Competent'' being a very important word. (Being competent but at the same time not being willing to bother doesn't count.)

The extreme of this is monarchy, which I think is pretty cool, if it wasn't for how it is mandatory to have a human as that monarch, and all humans happen to be flawed enough to not pull that off well (even assuming that only default flaws, such as "vulnerability to death" are the only ones present)

The reason why majority thinking is worse is because much of it is also much more likely to be uninformed or manipulated or they just don't actually care about people's welfare and want to go all trolololo. (Not that the minorities ruling over majorites now don't go trolololo at people, but more people = higher chance of there being more of those.)

The reason why I think that the two brains > one brain logic isn't valid in this case is because that is assuming that all brains are equally competent in the relevant subject.

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#4 Fire Blazer

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Posted 31 December 2012 - 09:19 PM

Both good points... I do like how in the U.S., both groups have their ways of kind of "overruling" the other group. The thing I don't like is that it's a bit difficult and unpractical--the minority can get away with doing a lot of bullshit before the majority of people can actually protest and make a difference in what they do.

At least, that's how I feel...

Kirant brings up a very good point with efficiency as well... It's not like everyone's minds can be read and their thoughts/decisions on various subjects, if they've even formulated any, can instantly be sent to some processing center where a single decision based off of those millions of decisions is then made.

Wonder if technology will ever get that crazy to support such a thing, though XP

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#5 Mercurius

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Posted 31 December 2012 - 11:10 PM

While it is true that such a system is impractical and inefficient, that is a status that it has mostly outside of the Majority vs. Minority thing. The most relevance that it would have is that the minority getting away with a lot of bullshit is significantly preferable to the majority getting away with a lot of bullshit (particularly since more people = higher chance of more bullshitters)

Technology hasn't advanced very far when it comes to how human brains work (...or at least, as far as I know it hasn't, due to research difficulties) but at the same time we're also doing crazy shit like nanotechnology so I can barely even guess how far away or how close they might be.

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#6 Lancer

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Posted 07 January 2013 - 07:41 AM

Majority dawg. Communism's cool.

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#7 Golden Warrior

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Posted 07 January 2013 - 07:44 PM

Majority makes more people happy... Minority makes more sad, but usually has the better ideas. Looking here, it depends on the views. If more want to be happy, majority, if people want overall better/best, minority.

That's usually, though, sometimes it's the other way around and majority has the better idea.

So, in my case, undecided, and probably won't be for a good while. XD

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#8 Germanicus

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Posted 12 January 2013 - 02:10 AM

Majority rule, Minority Right.

Bout my position in a few words. That's how things are supposed to be done in a democracy. Course, a lot of things are 'supposed to be done' in a Democracy.




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