Democracy, freedom, education

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!	magz wrote:
	split from viewtopic.php?f=20&t=417989&start=64#p9418482

Okay, I'll re-ask the question in its entirety
The premise of the discussion is that everyone can discuss everything
Other premise is that you are willing to discuss how to make America better.
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Now that some people in the United States are backward in their thinking, there is a chance that it will lead to the regression of democracy, how can we avoid it?
I have my answer: education, but all imaginable means of education are denied "freedom", and I guess there is some contradiction between democracy and freedom.
So I want to ask you people living in liberal democracies how you feel about this contradiction, or is there any way to educate them without hindering freedom.
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Of course, you have the right not to discuss，cause u not care

So for a Chinese person, you must recognize two things:

East Asian societies are consensus based. Things happen publicly in the West that would only happen behind closed doors in China. Our decision making process in the West is, and always has been, fundamentally different from yours.

Chinese history in particular includes a period of Western influence, when Western imperialists tried to establish a foothold in China. The history of Hong Kong is entirely due to this period. In the West, we have no complementary experience. The result is that Hong Kong is now "Westernized". Chinese people have a difficulty dealing with that situation. Of course, Westerners have a positive view of Hong Kong because, ironically, they are Western. Westerners don't understand how Chinese think about Hong Kong. Westerners also don't understand how Chinese think about Taiwan. They consider Taiwan to be Westernized (perhaps foolishly) so they don't want Taiwan reunited with the rest of China.

These concerns can cause a great deal of misunderstanding. It's certain to cause confusion in a discussion like this one.

No, what I say here does not directly address the topic of the thread.

Got it

Thank you for not arguing. My usual expectation on this site is argument.

If anything I say angers you, or you want an explanation, please PM me. However, I can't guarantee that I'll have good answers for you.

I'm not so sure it can be avoided by anything except for the pro-democracy side winning the next election and the one after that and the one after that etc until eventually maybe they've won so many in a row the those that would like to see their system of government fall and make way for a dictator all start to naturally die off. They might even begin to change their minds if they see improvement in their country and economy. One big event that could see the beginning of the end of their thinking is if trump dies - sure, he's not the Only person that's spoken out against government systems and corruption (ironically he's also the Most corrupt) but he IS, for all intents and purposes, the leader of a cult of personality.. and when he's dead and gone, his cult member followers will weep but then perhaps they'll break free from his strangely captivating charisma and wake up to reality again. Thankfully he's old and out of shape so won't live forever and none of his kids seem to be able to cast the same "spell," over stupid people as he's been able to.

Education - yes.. in the long run. If the education system in the USA were equal nation wide then people would have the same base level of knowledge. But it isn't and they don't. People in poor areas have dramatically under funded schools. There are still places in the USA with quite low literacy and graduation rates. On the topic of education, a major factor has been misinformation coming from trump himself as well as the top few propaganda news media companies broadcasting BS. They say words and his cult members believe them. They say the economy was amazing under trump, and it's terrible under Biden.. so, his cult members eat up that BS like candy - even though in reality the opposite is true and all one has to do is look at the numbers. But these knuckleheads believe what they want to believe from who they want to believe is telling them the truth and don't believe what the other guy says, facts and reality be damned. Fox News lost over $700M in court for lying about the voting machine companies, but all of these so-called "news," companies need to be sued out of existence for lying and bullshitting about everything.

You can't educate people about things they've closed their minds to entirely, unfortunately. They've already decided they won't believe anything from the opposing side. In the short run, trump needs to croak so the lackeys in his political party can stop bowing down to him Because they want the votes of his cult followers And so that his cult followers can break from from his weird spell of enchantment over them. In the long run, people need to be educated from the time they are young to think critically and seek information, not to simply believe extremely biased propaganda. Then maybe more people will vote in their own self interest vs. vote against some other candidate they're taught to hate, even when it means screwing themselves over with worse tax policies, healthcare and other social benefits.

I don't have any complete answer, but I reckon it might help if schools stopped teaching kids what to think and started teaching them how to think. OTOH the weakness of the idea is that good critical thinking skills might not lead to the kind of public-spirited behaviour a community needs to make things just and fair. A lot of people might just use their education to grab more of the pie for themselves. Even so, they might have a harder time succeeding if brainwashing people ceased to be possible. They'd have to do it through honest bullying.

The idea of Trump dying sounds like it may be helpful, but he does have a son.

He has 3 sons and at least 2 daughters, but not a single one of them seems to have the enchanting charisma of their cult leader bean father. So, it's likely that trumplestiltskin's reign over maga psyches Mostly dies with him.

This isn't the image of charisma?

They look like the zombies from "Night of the Comet".

I just hope Trump's evil hasn't transferred over to his youngest, Barron.

No, counterfeit Beavis & Butthead are Not the image of charisma. At all.

barron trump scares me, he is at least trilingual and from an early age, thus he likely has a gifted-level iq, he is also very tall for his age [well over 6 feet] and athletically talented. barron and father donald both have similar personalities. he admires his father. i believe he will follow his father into public life at the very least, if not politics.

I don't think there's enough public knowledge of the youngest trump to make that assessment - at least nothing I've seen.

Maybe he'll be smarter and just take whatever money he and Melania can hold onto and stay out of public life entirely - whether business, show business, or politics.

Otherwise he'll be ridiculed to no end and possibly end up truly following in his father's footsteps.. multiple bankruptcies on the way to a career ending stint in federal prison.

Personally, if I were him, I'd just live a quiet life of privilege w/o having to work and earn an income and steer clear of anything that could see me following my father's lead.

I get the feeling Beavis has more sense than DJTJ, Eric or Butthead — combined.

Beavis, a potato, pocket lint etc etc all have more sense than any number of trump's combined.

Knowing my rotten luck, his fans will have to converge around somebody, and one of his offspring would find it easy to carry the Trump dynasty forward and fill the void. He's not a hard act to copy. Just a matter of getting drunk and blurting out the first right-wing drivel that springs to mind. No need for coherent argument or truth, just a list of meaningless emotive words and phrases. I could do it myself if they'd let me. Seriously though, I'm not sure what will happen when we finally get shut of the bastard.