[Stryke 9]

What is politics in general good for, anyway? Does it have a direct effect on your life which President gets elected? Or if an unenforceable bill making it illegal to hum your favorite song's tune gets passed? Why make such a big deal about something that affects us, as a demographic group, at all maybe 1% of the time?

Face it, political news, etc. is entertainment. If you didn't read the newspaper or get news flashes from righteously angry politicoes, you'd never know about any of this stuff. So why treat it like it's a real, important thing?

[Carl]

it is very important. it effects your life directly in many ways. if Gore had become the president, then we'd all be dead by now.

[Knight Templar]

riiiight....


although that is partially true, what about the more important  politics like wars and stuff liek that. i don't really know the specifics of what i am talking about (heheh) but i guess its just important to a lot of eople. and if we didn't need to or want to worry but any of that **** we could do ourselves the trouble of worriing and have a dictatorship. Maybe what we hear is just a part of democracy. w/e, hopefully that made some sense.

[Stryke 9]

When was the last time you went to a war? Actually personally experienced war?

[Knight Templar]

well there was that ruber band gun war back in 97'.


those girls wouldn't stop teasing me .... i had to do something

[beatspete]

Originally posted by Knight Templar
well there was that ruber band gun war back in 97'.


those girls wouldn't stop teasing me .... i had to do something

My class had a rubber band war back in '99, we found a load of them in science.


People think that the news has quite an effect upon them, although have you ever lived for a long time without much knoledge of the outside world?
Next time you go on holiday for a while, if its somewhere out of the way and away from modern distractions, just think, after the 2 or 3 weeks, was you life much worse without knowing what happened in the Bloomberg 100 on tuesday?
Politics only really affects us in the extreme, ie when your country is at war or taken over by new goverment for instance.  Otherwise, most changes a goverment makes are rarely noticable in every day life.
The weather has more impact on your life than politics.

[Knight Templar]

thats kinda what i meant... basically

i know what you mean though, when i went to Canada...... i hadn't seen the news in 2 - 3 weeks... but it was kinda interesting to see it again......... i kinda felt liek i was missing something without it, maybe just subliminally i felt ignorant .....

[Stryke 9]

...And, in essence, it wouldn't even make much of a difference if this WAS a dictatorship. It certainly isn't a democracy now, where people get to determine their own laws- that WOULD be different, if only somewhat so because you'd have to go and vote more often. Dictatorships aren't really effectively any different from any other government- they've had a tendency to be a bit more repressive on average than, say, a parlaimentary system, but they certainly aren't necessarily so.

[Alikchi]

It's a republic. We go and vote arbitrarily for people we don't know anything about except for their "principles" (which they ignore immediately after taking office) and then they go do whatever the hell they want.

[Stryke 9]

*ahem* Can we not derail this until it at least reaches second page? Sorry, but general criticisms have been covered before, I don't know that this has.

[Knight Templar]

?????

you wanted a discussion on politics... right?

[Stryke 9]

Politics itself, not governmental systems. Like I said, that's been done, and this is only the thread's eighth-or-so post, so...

[Knight Templar]

My Bad

 i apologise ..... for me and everyone else.

[IceFire]

Politics is important because Governments are important.  Governments are important because, like it or not, they try to organize people and achieve great and not so great things.  Why does that matter?  Because government ultimately let us do things like public water systems, TV, radio, the newspaper, probably had some influence on how your house was built (building codes).  And we all care how our houses are built because we live in them...or try.  So...yes.  Important...even if you don't care, even if you don't think it impinges on your day to day activities...its there....it was and it will be.

[Ace]

Originally posted by Carl
it is very important. it effects your life directly in many ways. if Gore had become the president, then we'd all be dead by now.

Please explain your opinion to all of us about the man who won the popular vote.

[Mr. Vega]

Originally posted by beatspete

The weather has more impact on your life than politics.

Say that when your countrie's capital gets hit by a nuke.(What country are you from anyway?)

[Blue Lion]

Originally posted by Mr. Vega


Say that when your countrie's capital gets hit by a nuke.(What country are you from anyway?)

If, not when. And perhaps if he had said "daily life"?

[Mr. Vega]

I didn't mean what you thought what I meant!:sigh:

[Stryke 9]

Wait a minute, hold on here. You're all being ridiculous. Dictatorial coups? Nuclear attacks? These things would, yes, create a direct and personal involvement in politics. Except for one thing: They don't happen. Never will to ANY of you, in any of your lifetimes. The fact that you have access to and money enough to purchase FreeSpace, a computer, internet access, and generally at least one modeling program says that we're all from fairly wealthy countries, where the government is stable and hard rain will fall immediately after hell freezes over. Be realistic- you're acting like little children on an issue that requires you to think seriously- something that politics doesn't really prepare you for. Stop being silly, or post in the sex thread.

[Kellan]

Originally posted by IceFire
Politics is important because Governments are important.  Governments are important because, like it or not, they try to organize people and achieve great and not so great things.  Why does that matter?  Because government ultimately let us do things like public water systems, TV, radio, the newspaper, probably had some influence on how your house was built (building codes).  And we all care how our houses are built because we live in them...or try.  So...yes.  Important...even if you don't care, even if you don't think it impinges on your day to day activities...its there....it was and it will be.

Hold on a second. Before we attribute all these things to the nebulous 'politics' and 'government' terms, shouldn't we check that only those terms accurately describe who can carry out these activities? The information that I was reading following the collapse in Argentina was fascinating because it seemed to suggest public utilities and governmental roles such as the provision of food rations were baing carried out by extra-governmental forces - groups of citizens; communes, if you will. I'm not sure what happened to them because I haven't checked back in a while - but my question is this:

Does a group of people become some kind of 'government structure' through the provision of such services, or regardless of what they do for their people? Disregarding ideology, surely a nominal government that doesn't provide for it's people is a government only in name - because it doesn't govern for the people.

Sorry if that's a little messed up; I'm trying to think of a better way to phrase it.

Now, moving onto the stuff which is related to currently existing governments, like building codes. They may exist, but why should we care? The simple fact of the matter is that the influence of the public on such planning decisions is virtually nil. The same could be said about many other aspects of government, so why is it reported, and why do people get worked up about it?