Morning.
Thanks to those who tuned in for the recording of Horizon Scan yesterday, always good to have people in the audience. I think there was a bit of disappointment that we started getting into democracy and its alternatives right at the end, which is a deep topic. I’m sure it’ll turn up again though. Without going too deeply into it, what I found interesting (and for a change I’m not taking the piss out of Hugh here) was his assumption, which I think is based on a linear progression of improvement, that what we have now must be better than what came before it, because that does happen in most cases, particularly tech, which is his area. So when I suggest that perhaps democracy is not the best system, or even that I’m willing to entertain that it isn’t, you can see the disbelief in his face and his instinctive reaction - as would most people in the modern west - is to defend it or suggest it just needs to be refined for the modern day, which of course may be correct. Much of what I’ve been reading and listening to recently makes good arguments in my view that this may not be true. I’ll stress that I haven’t fully formed my opinion on it yet, I’m stronger on the problems with democracy than I am on the replacement, but I think that replacement really depends on what kind of a world you want and your values.
This is top fifty best posts I’ve ever seen. You’ve probably seen Narinda if you still watch the news and legacy talking head programs, she gets wheeled out often when there’s a race and culture angle - which seems to encompass everything now. If you’re not aware of her then I can make this really simple, read the second line of her post - If a white British person repeated that but replaced India with Britain or England, she would call them a racist and would deny any such ‘tribe or people’ exist, and has done on many occasions. You must watch out for this and other examples of hypocrisy like it, wherever they are. Be wary of those who would have circumstances enforced on you, they would not tolerate for themselves.
A man who held a sign up that called most the institutions of the UK corrupt and shouted at the police at a protest is now dead. This guy who tortured a kid and broadcast, it is out on the streets as of yesterday. You really must wake up to what is happening in the the UK, come to terms with it and decide what you’re going to do about it. None of this is an error, this is not incompetence, this is a deliberate move to create a new client group, grateful to those who released them. This isn’t a practice without precedent. In communist Russia under Stalin prisoners were often released to help further the party’s plans and help keep the populace in a state of fear and suspicion, often acting as deniable enforcers or spies against those deemed political enemies of the state. I want you to ask yourself again what you see happening. I see people (and I’m not saying they didn’t break the law) who are very obviously opposed to the current regime, treated harshly to discourage similar dissent. I also see those who belong to client groups treated leniently and released early in order to signal what the State is capable of for those useful to it.