The mud throwing is not a consequence of incompetence primary, but of ruling-party/opposition-party dynamics. They see parlement as an arena wherein they fight for the favour of the crowd... and election cycles and the principle of democracy gives them the incentive to see it that way. And so I think if you don't change that incentive, that dynamic won't really go away. — ChatteringMonkey

If you change the praxis of debate, if you demand unbiased arguments without fallacies and factual errors, there's no need for mud throws. You can argue for the people who voted on you, but in a much higher quality than just populistic rants.

A politician is no isolated island that relies solely on his or her abilities. Usually they have a personal staff of various experts they can rely on, and more importantly they are part of parties that certainly have teams of experts in every domain. — ChatteringMonkey

That won't go away. I'm just proposing to increase the quality of politicians in parliament. If they aren't experts in an area, they need to be experts on how to handle information and debate a topic. It's a different field of expertise to be a politician, that right now in our current system we have no such demand for expertise. Epistemic democracy force politicians to not just be representatives, but experts in being representatives. That's the key difference.

and what happens then in parliament is not a matter of dialectics anymore, but of rethorics. — ChatteringMonkey

Which is the change to parliament I also propose here. The debates taking place is there to reach a voting conclusion. So increasing their quality would increase the quality of those votes.

Essentially I want to move away from experts who give their expertise to amateurs who then debate and decide. I want to have experts who give expertise to dialectic experts who decide closer to facts than popularity.

Suggesting that a philosophy degree is the best way to derive great economic policy is like suggesting someone learn Latin if they plan to move to Spain. Yes, you'll learn lots about some of the underpinnings, but you'll not have expertise, and most of what you'll learn will be irrelevant. Would you accept a heart transplant from a biologist? — Kenosha Kid

What is the difference between a parliamentary politician in representative democracies today and someone in an epistemic democracy? Based on the educational foundation I proposed. Are current representative politicians experts in economy? The education behind the political license isn't meant to make them experts, it's meant to make them educated in how to review complex things in society, the broad spectrum, to see all moving parts, not just one. The education is meant for them to be prepared to debate such complexities without biases and fallacies to increase the quality of parliamentary praxis.

I think you misunderstand the reason of having the education. It's not meant to make them experts in economy or history, it's meant to make them experts in political duties. Right now we have politics in parliament who might not even have a basic high degree in anything. How is that better?

You've proposed a 3-4 year degree split into several large topics, you have to be realistic about how deep they're getting into those topics. People from this course are not going to be on the level of career philosophers and psychologists or experts on history as a result of this course. How can a 3-4 year course on so many topics be advanced in these topics? — Judaka

3-4 year minimum. We could figure out the necessary length of education. Maybe because a politician with power over the people is a high-risk job as my example with a doctor's medical degree and license, it needs to be longer, just like for complex jobs like being a doctor. 5-6 years?
The education does not need to spearhead the knowledge like for example the topic of history wouldn't lead you to a master's degree in history. All the topics and courses are tailored around the requirements of a politician.

Like for instance, what is the most important part of philosophy for a politician to have if we prioritize? Aside from the basics in philosophy, ethics and political philosophy are probably the most important parts. Moral philosophy, justice, political theory, and economy. While knowledge in dialectic debates is a preparation for the actual praxis of parliament.

I could write a book surrounding getting all the details down about epistemic democracy but needed to keep things short here.

So what you're giving these politicians is just an introduction to topics which don't really have anything to do with being a politician. — Judaka

You are right in that these things don't have anything to do with being a politician within the current form of government or parliament of representative democracies. But this is a new system of democracy aimed at having all members of parliament educated in areas which relate to how we reach truth and rational conclusions about different topics.

The knowledge required to be a part of parliament or government helps to reduce or get rid of politicians not able to dialectically balance complex issues in society before making proposals. While the nature of parliamentary debates is changed into a more philosophical dialectic with much higher standards of arguments than they have now. In order to lead a country, make decisions or vote in parliament on complex subjects the education prepares the necessary tools of practice while the methods of debate prepare for how parliamentary procedures.

Why are you acting like people coming out of this degree are going to be experts in these topics? — Judaka

They are not going to be experts or have master's degrees in those topics, they will have a political license. A doctor working in a hospital is for instance not educated to do medical research, they are trained in medicine in terms of repetition of practices. If a master's degree in philosophy is what you get for studying philosophy specifically and then be able to philosophical research in academia, getting a political license is closer to the doctors medical license than the researcher of medicine or biology.
They are two different things involving the same areas of knowledge.

Not only are they not going to be remotely competent but I don't think they're even slightly better off than before they began this course. — Judaka

How so? If a politician comes from no education and becomes a parliamentary politician or even minister with power over society, how is that [i"]the same"[/i] as someone coming from this type of education? You also have a changed parliamentary practice that requires knowledge in philosophical debate. An uneducated person in that place wouldn't be able to propose anything in parliament or debate anything they want to pursue as a proposal since they would be unable to hold the level of praxis needed in such debates. It's a new system, not just the education part.

Demagogues would still exist as politicians still need to get voted in and they aren't suddenly experts on all topics related to the economy, industries, infrastructure, history, geopolitics, budgets, taxation, foreign nations, policing and any other topic they might speak on or be responsible for. — Judaka

Is that what I'm proposing here? That they will be experts? No, I propose a level of education to minimize the number of demagogues and incompetent politicians. You can still have incompetent doctors, so should we then just get rid of educations for becoming a doctor? No, we have educations for doctors because it's a high-risk job that can risk people's lives if done by an amateur. Why wouldn't parliamentary and government practice be any different in this regard?

Proposing a system that improves upon the standards of representative democracy we have now, is not equal to creating a utopian democratic system. I think that you are making a fallacy with the idea that "because epistemic doesn't make experts of politicians it is not better than the status quo." Are you certain that epistemic democracy would have no improvement on governments and parliamentary practices?

I'm also unconvinced by the fact-checker and the main reason why is that I'm not sure that this fact-checker wouldn't just get into arguments. Alternatively, this person has absolute authority and just sin bins people. — Judaka

Doesn't the current speaker of the house has the same kind of power initially? The fact-checkers job is to review data mentioned in arguments and make sure that the correct data is used while being an expert on biases and fallacies so that if someone makes arguments without the required philosophical scrutiny, they need to rephrase their argument. If you listen to politicians in parliament debate about issues today, they are rarely doing even close to an adequate job if the intention is to reach a truth the parliament can vote on.

Epistemic democracy demands much higher quality in parliamentary debates, which require politicians in those debates to have education on such philosophical scrutiny while being reviewed by someone who's specific job is to review the quality of arguments used. While this sounds like taking up more time than the system right now, just think of Brexit and check the debates that went on about that and how long that took. It won't take up more time, it will focus the arguments and reduce the time before parliamentary voting on a subject. And since all in parliament have the same required education, they are educated in how to analyze the arguments presented in order to form a voting decision better.

Epistemic democracy puts a higher demand on the quality of praxis within parliament, it puts a higher demand on the decision making being based on rational arguments rather than being a "popularity contest".

You say biases and fallacies aren't allowed but I don't know, I'm sceptical. Aren't you at all scared by the fact-checker? If they aren't satisfied with your argument then you're just sent out of parliament or not allowed to speak? — Judaka

No, you are not sent out. As I said, you get a request to rephrase your argument. In essence, if you present the wrong data or if you present an argument where you jump to conclusions and don't back it up in any rational way, the fact-checker can speak up and point these things out, give you 5-10 minutes to re-phrase the argument correctly or the choice to postpone until next time if you need more time to change the argument. This doesn't mean you are silenced or that the debate is over and the other side won because of it, because the higher quality of praxis is about reaching closer to truth instead of just having winner or losers in debates. As mentioned, getting away from the popularity contest and put an effort into increasing the quality of rational arguments.

Imagine if there was such a person on this forum when doing more serious philosophical discourse. Someone who will mark your argument where you make biases and fallacies, who would point out that you might need to rephrase your argument if you have logical holes in them or facts that are wrong. I would argue that such a person is helpful, not a hindrance. Especially if we are talking about facts. Sometimes there can be a discussion going on for pages and pages based on someone's faulty facts and the entire discussion rendered meaningless because of it. Which is often what happens in parliamentary debates if someone presents faulty facts.

I don't really have any faith in what is essentially less than an undergraduate philosophy student, I don't expect an increase in how informed they are on things or that they'll be impressively logical or even good debaters. I have no idea where your self-assurance on this is coming from. The licence is just a waste of peoples' time, not really making things worse or better. — Judaka

Is a medical license a waste of time? Is driving licenses a waste of time? You can be a doctor without knowing a thing about medical research and biology, you can drive a car without ever being a racing pro. I think you are making a black/white fallacy out of this, in which you are unable to see the middle ground of it. Will epistemic democracy be a utopia? No. Will it be the solution to all political problems? No. Will it improve the quality of parliament and government praxis? In all logical sense, yes.

I understand your skepticism, but to say that a political license out of education for it won't matter at all and that a new standard of praxis in parliament won't change anything from how it's done right now isn't very true is it?

Yes, but these are a philosopher's ideas of what's most important which, unsurprisingly, bend toward philosophy more than pragmatic skills of governance. — Kenosha Kid

Is approaching subjects philosophically biased or unbiased? You speak of philosophy as a form of biased ideal and politics in government as being neutrally pragmatic?

Isn't the neutral approach the philosophical approach? You can't have philosophical praxis without the demand of an undbiased dialectic approach.

I don't think that the demagogues you're talking about would be changed by this course, I don't think that the already educated people who wanted to get into politics would need the course. I don't think any of the things you listed to be studied would actually help somebody getting into politics. — Judaka

1) Demagogues won't bother with education as much as people invested in politics for reasons beyond themselves. If it takes effort to handle the praxis of politics and the praxis of parliament demands philosophical scrutiny, you can definitely filter out some of the bad apples in this regard. Not all, but most. Most notably, more than the current system.
2) Educated people doesn't mean they are educated in the subjects needed for politics. Being "Educated" doesn't mean anything outside of what the education is about. I proposed a foundation of education that is connected to what it means to govern and handle politics. Other lines of education does not focus on the nature of politics in the same way.
3) Do you study to get into something or do you study for the knowledge applied towards the job you do? I think you view education in a different way if you frame it as a hurdle to get a job and not a requirement for the praxis of the job. It is needed not only for the job as a politician but for being able to handle the praxis of parliamentary discussions. If you don't have that education you won't be able to handle the interpellation debates in parliament, so how can you be a politician if you don't know those things within this system?

the morons who got elected are still going to get elected and they're still going to be morons. — Judaka

Not in an epistemic democracy. You are talking about the status quo, I'm talking about a fundamental change in the democratic system. So the morons can't be elected if that is changed.

I don't know what kind of fact-checker you're talking about, someone with complete authority to tell people to stfu if they say something wrong? — Judaka

Socratic dialectic praxis. They will have the ability to fact check information proposed in arguments in real-time during debates and if someone uses false facts they are dismissed from the argument for 5-10 minutes re-working their argument before continuing. These fact-checkers are also trained in spotting biases and fallacies and can stop an argument if it doesn't hold up to philosophical scrutiny.

This is why you can't really smurf yourself into parliament without the necessary education to handle these debates.

I'm not sure how it's different from normal fact-checkers. — Judaka

What normal fact-checkers? There are none in parliament. The debates taking place, as of now, happens sometimes between politicians who aren't even close to educated and with no fact-checkers in the room whatsoever. There's never a praxis of rational thought conducted in parliaments today.

The thing is that with the Trump debates, for example, not only was it broadly criticised that he made stuff up but also that he changed his opinions and that his answers to questions were vague and nobody knew what his actual policies were or how he planned to do what he said he'd do. Not only did it not matter but they ended up giving him so much coverage that it ended up just helping him become more popular. — Judaka

Don't see the relevance to the topic here really. He is a narcissistic demagogue sure, and he gets popular because of populism. Epistemic democracy would make it impossible for someone like him to reach his position.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez gets by because basically as far as the left is concerned the intentions justify the means. She has no clue what she's talking about but it simply doesn't matter to people. All of this is already out in the open and I don't know what you're planning to differently, it seems like you just want to strongarm voters. — Judaka

What does this have to do with epistemic democracy?

I don't share your respect for philosophy either, I don't assume practitioners of philosophy are rational, intelligent thinkers. — Judaka

People educated in philosophical methods have better understanding of rational argumentation and with a fact-checker in parliament, you get debates more focused on rational thought and facts rather than the clusterfuck of current political debates.

Discussions on this forum are filled with fallacies and few here have any fucking clue about the facts. In my experience, philosophers are the worst when it comes to facts because they think complex questions can be answered with baseless theories and morality. — Judaka

Are the people on this forum academic philosophers? If you base your opinion on your experiences on this forum, then you really don't know what philosophical praxis is about. This forum is a mash between schooled philosophers, auto-didactic philosophers and uneducated attention-seekers who have no knowledge at all.

Would you agree that philosophical praxis of dialectic debates and discussions are better than just uneducated arguments between two opposing sides without any form of guidance in method? I would strongly argue that having philosophical praxis of dialectic debates is light years better than what we see in politics today. As per Plato's argument against democracy.

So what I don't really understand is how epistemic democracy is different from media fact-checking. Are you proposing that someone is tasked with telling politicians in parilament how to speak, how to argue, to shut up when they're wrong and correct them etc? — Judaka

Media can be corrupted. Media right now is working towards their financers, not towards truth. While I defend media in terms of being better at fact-checking than the common citizen, they are so far from being unbiased and properly fact-checking. The people also need to interpret media correctly and accept their fact-checking, which they today don't do.

What I'm proposing is politicians schooled to be politicians, available to all, free of charge, but demanding of them to make an effort in philosophical scrutiny, both during education, but also in play during work within the parliament.

The philosophical praxis of debate and dialectics is not "someone telling them how to argue", it is method. How to propose decisions in informed, rational matters that need to be proposed with an argument that holds against biases and fallacies. The fact-checker checks if politicians in parliaments have or don't have proper arguments for their proposals. If they don't, they have to adjust them.

I think you kind of strawman my argument into something it's not. I'd recommend that you look through my OP again and ask yourself if that system is an improvement over the current system or not. Of course, I'm probably coming from another perspective and form of government than the US has, but ask yourself, how would things be if the educational requirement I proposed in my OP were applied to presidents? If a president is required to have that education in order to be available to that position, why would that be worse than how things are today?

The key thing is that you argue specifics as counter-arguments against a broad change in the democratic system. You use arguments that focus on details in which you say that "you think it wouldn't improve" instead of looking at it like "will it improve against what we have right now"?

I'm not proposing a utopia, but an improvement on the status quo of the democratic system. You have to ask yourself: is it an improvement or not? Not whether some problems will persist, but whether there will be improvements to politics. I think that everyone would agree that if politicians were better educated in philosophy, they would more likely make informed decisions compared to those without philosophical education, right? I would argue that is a pretty logical deduction of the matter.

Doctors don't just get an education, they have to pass exams that show their competency, then they need to do internships and then if they got past all that then they still need to do their job at least somewhat competently or they'll lose their licence. You can't compare what it takes to become a doctor with what it takes to complete a philosophy course. — Judaka

It's not a philosophy course, it's an education for becoming a politician. It's a new field that doesn't exist outside the concept of epistemic democracy and therefore you can't judge the level of demand that education has on itself. What I meant was that if you apply the level of demands that a doctor have on their education based on their responsibility the job implies, onto the job of a politician, then you understand the level of needed responsibility put upon politicians.

As I also listed, philosophy is one part of the education for politicians.

I mean it's just silliness to begin with to say that a philosophy or history course will even help being a politician in the first place. One can't really compare that with studying medicine to practice medicine. — Judaka

Why not? Why would philosophy, history, economy, psychology not be crucial areas to learn in order to be an educated politician? If you would name the fields of competence that a politician needs to have in order to be an unbiased political person in government, what would those be? Right now, politicians have no requirements at all, is that better than a baseline of education for the job?

How is it really different educating yourself for a job like a politician that can affect millions of people compared to a doctor who's competence handles a few dozen lives? I would argue that a politician has enormous power over people in society, so having that responsibility needs the knowledge to govern in an unbiased way.

Anyway, yes I am pretty certain that none of your suggestions will help, I think most of them already exist. Trump is fact-checked all the time by the media and his supporters don't care, why does putting a fact-checker in parliament make any difference. — Judaka

Having a fact-checker in parliament means that if you present something in parliament that wouldn't get past that person, you can't propose it in parliament. It makes a huge difference. If you can't argue in a rational matter with facts backing it up, you can't pull through a decision you want to make.

I guess that this makes more sense in more parliament driven nations than nations like the US where a president has more power. But try adjusting the form to the US system and see how it would act out.

The politician licence is a waste of time, none of those classes you suggested are likely to help a politician do their jobs better and I don't think that the problem with democracy is lack of education for politicians in the first place. — Judaka

You don't agree that democracies are filled with demagogues and that none of them can pull through any philosophical scrutiny for the decisions they try to vote through? Don't you agree that there are plenty of politicians who are not competent for their job?

Politicians already debate issues in parliament, they debate on the media, they debate in elections, how much more debating do we need. — Judaka

Debating through philosophical scrutiny, fact-checked, unbiased and without fallacies, is not at all close to what we see at the moment. The level of debates at the moment is a mud-throwing spectacle, not proper debate. I think that people have normalized political debate into the mud-throwing spectacle and forgot that debates should lead to some informed place of knowledge. If we had philosophical rules of conduct to these debates, they would look very very different.

I hope you get what I mean here? Philosophical dialectics aren't the type of spectacle debates we see in media today, it's aimed at figuring out the truth of a subject, not what's popular.

Your suggestions are either redundant or superfluous and really I think you've failed to address real problems in representative democracy in the first place. I think mandatory voting alone would probably stop many of the totally unqualified people who are getting elected recently. — Judaka

I think that you haven't really taken a step back and looked at what I'm really proposing with epistemic democracy. I do agree with you fully that mandatory voting is positive for democracy, but I think that my idea about epistemic democracy handles issues more related to the praxis of government between elections rather than elections themselves.

Earlier you said you don't need to be educated to be a politician, only to be elected, so the election appeared to be the crucial point, not the career move. The fact that the degree might be funded by the politician's party also suggests that. — Kenosha Kid

Not sure what you mean here? The education to become a politician is supposed to be free for all. In some countries without free education, that might mean funding from the political party itself.

Point being that anyone will be able to get the education, not a rich elite.

But I guess you mean that if a politician wishes to stand for election, he or she cannot do so without the requisite education level. In other words, they are disqualified. — Kenosha Kid

Yes, in order to be elected in a democratic election, you need a political license that proves a certain level of competence for the job. Point being that anyone can get that education, but you need it for the job as a representative.

What your idea (putting aside things like limiting the degree to philosophy and such) really does, in addition, is to provide a framework for politicians to get free degrees if they're ambitious. I'd rather they get them because that field is what they're driven by. — Kenosha Kid

I get what you mean that they should be educated in the field they are a minister for, but as we know, most parliament politics is handled by a vote through all present in the parliament. So it doesn't really matter if you get a spear-headed education for a role in politics, everyone needs to, for example, know economics in order to vote on such things. That's why I proposed an education specifically aimed at the broad spectrum of what politicians need in order to be competent in their job.

I'd still prefer the woman specialising in law to be a specialist in law, the man specialising in economics to be a specialist in economics. Nothing against philosophy graduates, but, to follow your own analogy, I'd rather my surgeon have a medical doctorate than a two-two in philosophy. — Kenosha Kid

Your point here touches upon an important factor and that is "what does politics require in a field of education?". Philosophy, the broad spectrum of it, actually incorporate areas that are needed for political praxis. You get the knowledge in dialectics and how to form arguments in debates free of biases and fallacies. You learn the complexities of subjects that are key to political decisions. You learn important ideas that are the groundwork for political laws and legislations.

Specialized knowledge doesn't form the broad ability to debate and understand complex dynamic issues in society. You can handle specific tasks with specialized knowledge, but philosophical knowledge would mean you understand how to think outside of your own biases. This is why I think politicians need a deep understanding of philosophy and philosophical praxis and why it's important that it exists as a praxis within parliament as well.

Requiring several years of study might dissuade some people. But then the higher positions in politics tend to be taken up by older people anyways. Most people need to travel up through various local and minor posts before they reach the spotlight, and there is frequently a lot of not at all glamorous work involved. So I am not sure whether people who want power but are unwilling to put in the effort are actually all that common in politics. Sure you have populists which get catapulted up out of nowhere, but it's not clear yet whether that will be a major feature of democracies going forward. — Echarmion

First, would you agree that epistemic democracy is an improvement over representative democracy?
Second, what are your suggestions to battle the issues you brought up within the context of epistemic democracy? I'm seriously asking here, since it's important to address the issues you brought up.

I am very sceptical of that line of thinking. It feel like it could easily go the other way, too. A form of modern aristocracy forming around these courses where people are socialised as part of an elite. There is already arguably a problem with certain prestigious universities forming networks of contacts that lift people into high places regardless of their skills. — Echarmion

Agreed, what do you think can be done to battle this? Can we make adjustments to the education in order to minimize these types of elitism? Even if people lift others regardless of their skills, can the skills be at focus so that them alone are needed for succession? How would someone be able to debate in parliament with the fact-checker without finishing the level of knowledge needed for it? Even if they finish the education, they can't form arguments with biases in parliament and they can't skew facts. Fact skewing would dismiss an argument in parliament.

I think that changes to the way that debates and policy decisions work is, in general, the right approach to the problem. The problem with any neutral element of a parliament is, of course, how it is controlled. It's easy to imagine a "fact checker" neutered by onerous requirements to establish a "fact", or debate simply avoiding concrete proposals that are subject to checking. — Echarmion

Can you form a rational argument without facts? I don't think you can. And any attempt would highlight a bias or fallacy-based argument. The "fact-checker" is also able to dismiss arguments not formed to philosophical scrutiny. Reason being that in order for you to propose something in parliament, it needs to have a logical argument attached to it. If all in there are educated in philosophy and the other areas I listed up, they would all have the tools to form proper arguments for decisions and the debates in there would be focused on the rational rather than the populistic.

maybe it's too easy to convince a politician to vote for some lobbyists proposal — Echarmion

I think that in an epistemic democracy you cannot propose something that hasn't been put through philosophical debate. Meaning that there can be lobbyists, but if there isn't a logical argument behind it, it won't be able to reach voting.


But I think you bring up good points in this, things to address. I just think that because epistemic democracy is changing very fundamental practices of how representative democracy works, we need to view these issues through that lens.

I don't see how education after election avoids the problem you ascribe to disqualification. — Kenosha Kid

Are you elected as soon as you chose to become a politician? No, you chose to be a politician and then run in elections. If you chose to become a politician in an epistemic democracy, you have to go through 3-4 years of education in order to run in an election or be part of the parliament.

And since I think that people in here are very used to a very specific form of education, i.e you need to pay for it yourself, what I'm talking about is education is free of charge that anyone can get. Just like in countries with better educational systems, but as a form of democratic responsibility, education to become a politician is always free, even in free-market systems.

Remember, it's not "just education", it's a specific education towards being a politician, just like education to become a medical doctor.

whereas a meritocracy would favour the privileged. — Kenosha Kid

But it can't if you have an educational system that is free of charge. If anyone can get the education to become a politician, it won't favor the privileged. I understand that in a country where education is usually the result of being able to independently finance it, a society with free education or a society where at least the education to become a politician is free, there are no barriers. You cannot get privileged education if it's not based on the economy of the student. If the state secure housing and education free of charge for anyone educating themselves to become a politician, then you aren't bound by privileges.

What does an elected official do, government-wise, between being elected and graduating? — Kenosha Kid

You have this in the wrong direction. You educate yourself and are available to be elected, you cannot be elected before education. Please, check the argument again. You do not get elected and then educate yourself, but you can be part of the parties outside of parliament and being a minister of something, meaning you cannot participate in voting in parliament or being a minister of something, but you can be part of pushing the party outside of it. If you want to be part of the ones actually voting in parliament, making decisions and being ministers of certain areas, you have to have a political license, which is given through passing education.

It's simple, you can be a politician, you can involve yourself in politics, but you cannot be part of decision-making without education. If you aspire to do that, you have to get your political license and it is free of charge to get, but you need to educate yourself through 3-4 years of education within the areas I proposed.

It sounds like a Noocracy, and it would be difficult to call it Democracy because it excludes people from the political process and denies them power based on their education and certification. — NOS4A2

I'm not sure if you actually read everything I wrote since I mention Plato's idea of philosopher kings and why that in itself doesn't work. Instead, I proposed a synthesis.

No one is excluded, in what way is someone excluded?

Politics would becomes a debate between elites, none of which would be representative of the general polity. — NOS4A2

Did you read the entire argument?

Personally I’d much rather vote for someone picked randomly from the phone book than to be led by some over-educated, certified politician. — NOS4A2

Did you read the entire argument?

You form a counter-argument in a way that seems to strawman what I wrote rather than actually adress it dialectically.

None of this seems directly related to education. Rather, the problem seems to be one of virtue. The people that are successful in politics aren't the people we might want as leaders. That suggests to me that we need to change the mechanism behind success in politics to be more in line with our goals. — Echarmion

I understand what you mean, education isn't a source that eradicates the people who only seek to be politicians out of the need for power alone. However, I think that the requirement of education can A) make people who have that ambition only to reach power either give up their attempts and quit or B) reprogram them into proper praxis and reduce such primary goals. I also think that because it's not only about education but how debates in parliament are handled, they wouldn't be able to survive such fact-based scrutiny. How can someone who doesn't apply their education survive debates with the fact-checker? They would be humiliated in parliament if they have attempted to bypass the praxis of parliament.

Your suggestions don't seem practical to me. I prefer making voting mandatory because I think it leads towards more moderate leaders, radicals are likely to be a greater percentage of option voting. Polling already exists and I'm not sure what's different about your proposal for it. — Judaka

I agree that mandatory voting is key to get better democratic representation of a nation's wills. But I don't see how that is an issue in epistemic democracy since both representative and epistemic democracy would benefit from mandatory voting without nullifying or changing the benefits that epistemic has over normal representative democracy?

You aren't really addressing the major flaws in democracy, we already know we're going to have incompetent politicians. They get voted in as opposed to getting in by merit and whether they keep their jobs isn't necessarily based on whether they do a good job or not. It's a complicated job on top of that, having a degree in philosophy or psychology isn't even likely to help even a little bit. — Judaka

How do you get incompetence when you have the education needed for a job? Yes, we can have incompetent doctors, but compare that to having doctors without any education.

Also, in the system I propose, politicians don't get in by merit, they are still voted in. You seem to miss that it's still a democratic system, only that the ones being elected have an education specifically addressed for political practices. The problem today is that politicians have no education in areas that broadly affect your ability to form rational conclusions in debates or lead with respect to balanced knowledge. If you have an education within the areas proposed you at least have a baseline for conducting discussion and rational thought through a method more based in unbiased thinking than someone without any such knowledge.

When you say that it's "not likely to help even a little bit", that is a seriously flawed rational conclusion. Are you really certain that through my system it won't help anything at all? I'm not sure you proposed counter-arguments to conclude this system to have no impact at all. And I don't think you really read through it all in detail since you seem to miss aspects like merit not being the reason to be elected, but being a foundation for your job if you are elected.

Yeah but competence is irrelevant if they are not fair, anti-nepotic etc... so it seems like something you'd want to tackle first. — ChatteringMonkey

You can tackle both at the same time and epistemic democracy has far better methods to tackle corruption and nepotism than regular representative democracy, so it's a start, not a solution. I'm with you that corruption is a problem, but it's a separate branch of political philosophy that is present in any political system and can be tackled intellectually independent of which is present.

Can't say I really like it, because it's a bit elitist only allowing certain diploma's. And licenses are also always reviewed by people who can be corrupted... which means you're probably just shifting the problem, while creating additional red tape. — ChatteringMonkey

The problem with corruption in the way you describe wouldn't really nullify the benefits of educated politicians. And I wouldn't call it elitists as long as the ability to educate yourself into becoming a politician is available to anyone. Just as I mentioned that different countries have different handling of education, being educated to becoming a politician needs to be (in countries with bad handling of education funding, such as the US) free and available to anyone who wants to pursue it. You can also join the party you are interested in joining, forming proposals and discussing with politicians in parliament, but you cannot be a part of that parliament voting system and be a representative that can be voted into power. So you can still be a part of the parties in power and if you want to pursue a higher position enter the educational program for that. I don't see a problem with having a higher demand of education like this. It's not really elitist, it's focusing the political praxis into effective measures while minimizing incompetence from the power positions.

It wouldn't exclude anyone from politics, it focuses politics into better praxis.

The biggest problem is not education of the politicians IMO, but corruption and nepotism. Solving that is not a question of better education, but of will, or of giving the right incentives. — ChatteringMonkey

Those are two different problems really. To educate politicians has little to do with corruption. As you mentioned, you could be corrupt and conduct nepotism in a system with education for politicians, so battling those problems are really a separate issue than what I'm fundamentally talking about here. I'm trying to focus parliamentary politics into philosophical praxis so that the incompetent mud throwing that can be witnessed in many parliaments today disappears in favor of better dialectic scrutiny.

If a system is corrupt, it is always corrupt, whatever system it is. What you say is like saying that democracy, autocracy and communism are the same because all of them can be corrupted and feature nepotism, but the truth is that some are better for the people than others and some of them are easier to corrupt than others. I would argue that it's harder to corrupt epistemic democracy than regular representative democracy. But even then, it's not really an issue that this system tries to tackle.

I think rather than educating the powers that be, would it not be simpler to disqualify uneducated people from executive posts? E.g. the chancellor must hold a doctorate in economics, etc.? — Kenosha Kid

That is a start perhaps. But disqualifying does not equal the people in power to have the necessary merits to govern the nation. I think a key difference here is that politics starts to conduct philosophical praxis of discussion rather than just having "an education". I also think that its key that the politics education, which is focused on specific parts of what it means to govern, i different from just having "a higher education".

In essence: You don't educate yourself and then chose to become a politician, you chose to become a politician and then educate yourself.

The argument I'm having with ssu (on my end at least) is regarding the historical failure of representative politics — fdrake

I didn't read this before writing my other argument for improving representative democracy but check that out if you're interested.

so show me where to look and what I should be looking for, so that I can see it too. — Harry Hindu

I have, we all have.

The fact that police shoot unarmed whites indicates that there are other possible reasons that police shoot unarmed suspects, other than racism. — Harry Hindu

The statistics of the higher likelihood of black people being killed over white people shows that there is systemic racism in play. If that is because crime rates are higher in black communities, that is not counter to that conclusion, but supporting the existence of systemic racism, since being black is not the reason for higher crime rates.

Why does it always have to be racism when it's a white vs black? — Harry Hindu

Can you just watch "The 13th Amendment" documentary and return here please. See that and then return with some counter-argument to it. It perfectly describes the underlying systemic racism at play in US society.

It's important to be skeptical, but if you don't even attempt to take part in the perspective that argues there is systemic racism in play and concludes there to not be enough evidence, you are just ignorant. You've been provided with enough.

Re-read my previous post. I edited it as you were replying. — Harry Hindu

Re-read the arguments (quoted as a reminder) about systemic racism before asking people to re-read yours.

Statistics can inform rational arguments, but you don't provide rational arguments in favor of the conclusion that there's no systemic racism. You only make statistical claims as if they were rational conclusions. That's a fallacy.

What are you talking about? I was asking what percentages of cops are racist. Is that not asking for observable facts — Harry Hindu

No, because such statistics is impossible to verify and quantify. We can use statistics of acts, we can look at laws and legislations, we can look at socio-economic issues, history, we can look at the prison system (13th amendment on Netflix) etc. in order to spot systemic racism.

like how police treat blacks vs some other group and that the causes are actually racist and not something else, like blacks committing crimes at a higher rate than other groups? — Harry Hindu

It doesn't matter if there's something else, that's the point about systemic racism. It's integrated in the system to such a degree that a single person can individually be non-racist but enforce a racist act as an agent of the state.

No, that is what you are doing. — Harry Hindu

So you didn't ignore the entire post and just answered on the first part, essentially just red herring everything past it? Need a reminder?

How many cops and how many whites in the United States are racist. Give me an exact number or at least a percentage. What is it?
— Harry Hindu

That is a fallacious statistical request. You should look at the statistics of how cops act towards black people.

You keep making these accusations that blacks are legitimately scared of whites, but forget that far more blacks die at the hands of other blacks, and they are legitimately scared at their own race.
— Harry Hindu

They are scared of state police violence. They aren't scared of white or black people, they are scared about being killed based solely on the color of their skin by the violence monopoly of the state. In the worst neighborhoods, you could fend off violence with defensive violence, but you are not allowed to defend against the violence of the state. That's why no one can step in and save someone like George as he is slowly dying under the police officer's knee. If that had been done by someone else in the street, the people would have been able to save him.
"Black people were 24% of those killed despite being only 13% of the population."
https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/

If you want to point the statistics that blacks are killed by cops and a higher percentage relative to their population, then you should also acknowledge that blacks commit crimes at a higher rate relative to their population.
— Harry Hindu

The differences in crime rates in terms of race is not an excuse for police killings. It's also ignoring the reasons for high crime rates within those communities. You seem to think that police violence is a detached form of systemic racism from the rest of society, but the very nature of systemic racism is that it exists throughout society. It's the systemic racism over the course of decades or hundreds of years that keep the segregation going, even though direct racist laws were abandoned decades ago.

You are arguing out of a notion of free will, when the deterministic nature of society is a proven fact. You cannot act or be acted upon in society without a deterministic causality link throughout history.

If the wealth built up in slavery is distributed among a majority of white people; if places like Tulsa, the "black wall street" gets destroyed, people killed in a massacre and their wealth stolen into the possession of white people: if housing laws segregated black people into parts of cities where the lack of wealth never increase the quality of life and no industries want to have shops... and so on, you will have a society that is built upon systemic racism since the system itself is governing how people "should" act within it.

A police officer is able to not be racist, but still enforce a racist practice of handling the job, because of the underlying systems.

To just claim that because crime is higher in black communities and because of that it's more common that black people get killed and that this is somehow a proof of there not being any systemic racism... is an extremely fallacious argument that ignores so many complex aspects of what systemic racism is about.

Your writing reflects a lot of what other people write, the surface level analysis of this issue. But in here, on this forum, I think there should be a demand for much better scrutiny of these questions than how the surface level Facebook-debates usually goes.

So first, are you a determinist or believer of free will? Do you think society acts separately from history and that history has no effect on the present events? Do you think that laws and regulations are the only forms of guidelines on which society behaves? Do you think that socioeconomic factors over long spans of time affect the conditions in which society acts and exists?

I see no such dive into these issues, only attempts at proving a point with biases and fallacious ideas. I think the discussion should get back into philosophical praxis, instead of these surface-level outbursts. — Christoffer

So, can you please conduct philosophical praxis or are you unable to do so?

But you are still just red herring the entire thing. You do not involve yourself with the arguments and conduct proper philosophical praxis to it. That is my point here. You are just blasting a biased opinion and ignore everything that doesn't fit that narrative.

Arguments have already been written down, if you ignore them, you haven't proven anything or given any conclusion to the contrary.

. If percentages are psuedo-statistics, then why did you provide a link with percentages? — Harry Hindu

What are you talking about? I said that statistics that can be used are those that are quantifiable and verifiable.

What is the difference between asking what percentage of cops are racist and asking what the statistics are of cops being racist? Stop trying to avoid the question. If you, or someone else has provided the statistics/percentage, then post a link. It is very difficult to find valid information in this thread, as it is mostly trolling and racist rants against whites and cops. — Harry Hindu

Because that is not real statistics, it is speculative statistics that can never be achieved, hence pseudo-statistics. Statistics of police killings on the other hand is quantifiable and verifiable.
https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/
It also ignores everything about what systemic racism is, which is not about which cops are racists, but a deeper issue.

And "avoiding the question" after you avoid to tackle a long post of arguments is quite an ironic statement point.

and he did not die while he was in a neck hold. — ernestm

He lost consciousness because of the knee and later died. Or do you mean that if someone is shot and then they die later at the hospital because of an infection in the gun wound, the shooter isn't liable for killing that person?

He might have died at exactly the same time, and been out of breath at exactly the same time, even if he had not been in a neck hold. — ernestm

This is grasping at straws. It's like saying that if someone dies of a heart attack after being shot, the shooting had nothing to do with it. How can you rule out that the acts of the police weren't a catalyst for his medical condition? The act of putting the knee is banned by several police forces specifically because it can be lethal.

https://en.as.com/en/2020/06/06/other_sports/1591442963_890018.html

To argue that he "might have dropped dead anyway" and it's a coincidence that he died right there and then is extremely weak as an argument. You could free any manslaughter case based on this reasoning.

As I said, the other stuff is ancillary, but when courts are on such public display as this one will be, they will not want the fact that murder can't be proven be the first bad fact about Floyd that the public has to confront. — ernestm

You are making a bad argument against their guilt and conclude that "it will only be public pressure that would judge the cops guilty." You have false premises to back up a speculative conclusion that would be speculative even if the premises were true.

Where's your philosophical scrutiny?

Of the people who said they'd shoot a child, all of them said they were entitled to do so, so it was the right thing to do — ernestm

Yes, a perfect analogy of the reasoning behind systemic racism. If the system allows something to be divided out of race and there's nothing that guides morality outside the regulations, the people of power in that system can act as racists without even knowing it. Just like people in Nazi-Germany were conditioned to accept violence against jews.

If there's a system that entitles people to act in a certain way, it will normalize behavior through cognitive dissonance.

Now it seems to me people have already decided they are entitled to judge policeman, usually based on 10 seconds of videotape, as racist murderers. — ernestm

Systemic racism is more than a 10-second videotape, and there are more cases than just those 10 seconds of videotape. You also use an example that could be an analogy for systemic racism, in order to argue that people who stand up against police violence are the "entitled" ones who can't be reasoned with... do you see how ironic and ill-conceived that kind of argument is?

I would recommend you to view "The 13th amendment" on netflix in order to see the broader perspective in this issue. It's very good at showing that side of the argument.

Its the same as what people say when they say obviously police should be disbanded. When I say that would cause alot more deaths and crime, they say crime and murder would not go up because they say so. — ernestm

That is a strawman argument. They aren't saying this, they are saying that the police has more funding combined than all organizations that work to improve life in areas where crime rises due to socioeconomic issues. If you put money into building better lives for people, crime will go down. Crime doesn't happen in a vacuum, that's an illusion often perpetrated by right-wing politics to justify police brutality. And thinking crime happens in a vacuum is also a low-quality argument in terms of philosophy.

the law says, Floyd could have died anyway — ernestm

The law doesn't say that.

Floyd--of course he could be on the verge of death when he was arrested as a result of his own behavior, but according to current opinion, that no longer matters. — ernestm

The acts of the police is still wrong. You cannot argue against that with his medical condition and a speculative idea that he "would have died anyway". There's no legal validity to that argument and there's nothing that change the fact that the police acted out wrongfully. Here's a quote from the earlier link:

In Minneapolis, law enforcement officers were permitted to employ two types of neck hold (carotid neck restraints) on a potential suspect, according to the department’s Policy and Procedure manual, but only officers who have received specific training in how to correctly carry them out are permitted to do so.

However, former police officer and co-founder of the Police Policy Studies Council Tom Aveni, who has been involved in training law enforcement officers since 1983, told USA Today: "I have not seen anyone teach the use of a knee to the neck.”

So because it's not taught and because the police officer used a chokehold not sanctioned and because the result is someone losing consciousness and then dying, it has nothing to do with public pressure if the police officers are found guilty.

There is enough evidence to argue them guilty. Previous criminal history is irrelevant and a speculative conclusion that Floyd would have died "anyway" is not conclusive enough to warrant a dismissal of guilt.

You have to first prove that "he would have died anyway" before using such a conclusion for dismissal of the police officer's guilt in the matter.

The issue is, if the policeman pleads not guilty, that he cannot be proven beyond doubt to have been responsible for the death. — ernestm

If the autopsy finds that even though the medical condition is part of the cause of death, it is still initiated by the act of the police. The fact that he wasn't dying before the police arrived and then he was dead is quite clearly pointing to the fact that the police is responsible for the killing. Otherwise, what evidence is showing that he would have died anyway?

With the facts that the police used praxis that isn't allowed (the knee) and didn't help when he pleaded for help, they can still be found guilty, whatever substance he had.

His prior arrest history has also not been reported in national news — ernestm

But that is a fallacious argument. It doesn't matter which history he had. Time served is time served. It doesn't warrant killing him in the street. Or should we accept police killings as long as people the people killed have a record? Sounds more like a "let them die" argument than anything related to facts.

If a trial found the cops not guilty because George had substance in his system and that he had a previous criminal record, then that is not based in law or in law praxis.

I wasn't talking about Antifa specifically. Antifa activism is in some respects a special case, and I understand the arguments around why, say, pacifism is not viable when confronted with facism. I don't want to argue that certain tactics are off limits. The broader context of my position is one of effectiveness. — Echarmion

But since leftist activism is acting against fascist developments, it will always be Antifa, since Antifa isn't an organization, but a movement under the idea of anti-fascism. So all activism from this political realm of thinking will be Antifa activism. It is also effective. Media and right-wing politics often label Antifa based on the ones doing violence during riots, but everyone who opposes fascism is being part of Antifa whether they like it or not. Infiltrating white supremacy movements, sabotaging alt-right propaganda channels etc. is as much part of Antifa as anything else. I think there's a big misconception about what Antifa is and the right-wing is taking advantage of that lack in knowledge people have.

Perhaps I should have chosen a different word, but I did say "unnecessarily confrontational". I don't mean to apply confrontation is never warranted. I don't even ascribe to the position that violence never is. It's more to do with messaging. — Echarmion

Agreed, but how do you define confrontation? If a society's status quo is mainly liberal right-wing, how can any voice of the left, not be confrontational?

If the slogan you chant needs a 30 minute explanation video to be properly understood, that's a problem. — Echarmion

But it's not though. By saying: "Black Lives Matter refers to how the police act as if "Black Lives don't matter", that would be enough for "all lives matter" people, but it isn't. Somehow, 30 minutes is needed to explain something that rationally should be quite logical and crystal clear.

The problem is empathy and normalization. People today don't seem to have empathy like before. Because communication is held online and in text form more than eye to eye, people lose the empathic connection you have when you speak to someone right in front of you. https://liberalarts.oregonstate.edu/sites/liberalarts.oregonstate.edu/files/psychology/research/okdie_guadagno_bernieri_geers_mclarney-vesotski_2011.pdf
Since racism has become more normalized through people like Trump and it's less taboo to speak racist thoughts, while interactions is held mostly online and people don't have as much empathy against the opposing side of the argument, then the side that is less status quo in society will be looked upon as "unnecessarily confrontational".

This is why I argue for unbiased arguments without fallacies. Because the only way to debate two sides of something without it becoming that brawl and lack of empathy online is to stick to facts outside of your own biased opinions.

Meth and fentanyl are a deadly combination by themselves, even without a pre-existing heart condition. — ernestm

Are you a medical doctor? Can you conclude this amount and combination to be the cause of death? How can you rule out the cops actions being the reason for his death based on this? He wasn't unconscious before he put his knee on him, so if that were a lethal dose and combination, wouldn't he already be dead?

You sure you are making an unbiased approach to this thing? Because reading the whole thing, it is not really the conclusion being made.

Russia seems to be doing much better. — ernestm

You think they are doing better because they have a better system? Like Putin slowly changing the forms of government into dictatorship-like power systems and opponents are snuffed out?

I agree that there's too much of mud throwing praxises in politics today, but I rarely see proper arguments even from the so-called intellectuals. Sometimes I would just wish for Plato's philosopher-kings to just take over.

https://heavy.com/news/2020/05/george-floyd-cause-of-death-autopsy/ — ernestm

I see nothing in this that concludes a cause of death being anything other than the acts of the police or the combination of health issues and the act of the police. It seems rather clear that the act of the police, since the way of putting the knee on the back as he did isn't allowed as police praxis, and that the fact they didn't intervene when he clearly wanted help, concludes that they are responsible for his death.

If you make your own personal conclusions based solely on the fact of drug substances present, without regard to any other factors, then you are making a biased conclusion.

When Aristotle confronted this problem, he said all had to be given equal rights of speech, regardless eduction, and history has shown that is necessary for democracies to function. It remains a question whether democracies should continue to function. One of the founders, I forget which, said the USA should be disbanded after a hundred years. — ernestm

Freedom of speech in the way that everyone has the ability to participate in saying their opinion, yes. However, for a democracy to work, you also need to channel the collective knowledge into debates and arguments that actually moves things forward. The only way to have a dialectic or an argument between two opposing ideas, that will not just end up in a biased stalemate, is to have rational arguments done properly.

Arguments that minimize biases and fallacies is the only way to do it if the truth is what matters. So while all can say their opinion, the fact that not all know how to argue without biases and fallacies means that not all are capable of discussions that furthers knowledge that informs good decisions.

Just like anyone can voice opinions on medical issues, only doctors can voice educated conclusions.

Philosophical discussions need a method thinking and without method, you will only have opinion, not truth.

When the autopsy report is read in the trial, showing the dead guy could have died of an overdose of meth and fentanyl — ernestm

You mean this autopsy?
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/06/01/us/george-floyd-independent-autopsy/index.html

Or what are you referring to?

even in the philosophy forums here, that many people are incapable of accepting the basic facts of reality — ernestm

Maybe because many people think they are doing philosophy without having the knowledge of the actual praxis of what philosophy is. A forum like this invites people who like to think about stuff, but only a handful are actually philosophically educated in how to argue rationally.

It's the biggest problem with open forums like these, educated philosophers and biased nutcases doing dialectics, what could go wrong?

left-wing activism seems to have a problem of being unnecessarily confrontational. — Echarmion

If you are speaking about activism specifically, then yes, antifa is a confrontational movement of activism. It reacts to fascist movements and development and act against those developments in a confrontational way. Doesn't have to be violence though, they infiltrate alt-right movements, lobby governments to restrict white supremacy meetings etc.

There's nothing outside of being confrontational since an anti-movement can only act upon the existence of what they are anti about.

If you, however, are talking about leftist politics in general, then the confrontational notion might come from the fact that the world's status quo right now is global neo-liberalism. Any politics that question the status quo will be confrontational.

So, be very careful to label political movements as "confrontational" just because they oppose the status quo. Anyone in Nazi-Germany who had different political views than the Nazis were looked upon as "confrontational".

It doesn't mean anything more than questioning the status quo, but can easily be made into a fallacious argument against leftist politics.

For example, I noted earlier how "defund the police" is a really poor slogan to use for what an overhaul of policing. Very easy to use to evoke fears of the lawless anarchists. — Echarmion

Defund in this case has to do with the balance between funds for things that help people in the community which the police are governing. If the police have more funding than all combined active organizations that try to help the poor, trying to increase the quality of life and get people out of unemployment, you know, helping people to actually end the socio-economic conditions that will eventually breed crime, then that funding is unbalanced and not based on rational reasons.

Much of the funding also has to do with how the prison system works. You should check out "The 13th Amendment" on Netflix if you want a deep dive into the problems.

Also, who are the lawless anarchists? Anarchy is a political ideology and I don't seem to recall any of that in this.

You're asking the same question. What percentage of cops are racist? — Harry Hindu

No, asking for actual statistics is one thing, asking for pseudo-statistics that is argued in a form of fallacy is another. Did you even check the statistics given? Or are you just going by this in a biased form without even knowing it? For you are either biased and not knowing about the fallacies you're making or you know about it and are actively trying to hide it through nonsense arguments. I did a full argument for which you replied only a short replay of the same things you already said.

So, if you want to be taken seriously, stop acting like an alt-right appeaser if you aren't one and start doing unbiased arguments.

How many cops and how many whites in the United States are racist. Give me an exact number or at least a percentage. What is it? — Harry Hindu

That is a fallacious statistical request. You should look at the statistics of how cops act towards black people.

You keep making these accusations that blacks are legitimately scared of whites, but forget that far more blacks die at the hands of other blacks, and they are legitimately scared at their own race. — Harry Hindu

They are scared of state police violence. They aren't scared of white or black people, they are scared about being killed based solely on the color of their skin by the violence monopoly of the state. In the worst neighborhoods, you could fend off violence with defensive violence, but you are not allowed to defend against the violence of the state. That's why no one can step in and save someone like George as he is slowly dying under the police officer's knee. If that had been done by someone else in the street, the people would have been able to save him.
"Black people were 24% of those killed despite being only 13% of the population."
https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/

If you want to point the statistics that blacks are killed by cops and a higher percentage relative to their population, then you should also acknowledge that blacks commit crimes at a higher rate relative to their population. — Harry Hindu

The differences in crime rates in terms of race is not an excuse for police killings. It's also ignoring the reasons for high crime rates within those communities. You seem to think that police violence is a detached form of systemic racism from the rest of society, but the very nature of systemic racism is that it exists throughout society. It's the systemic racism over the course of decades or hundreds of years that keep the segregation going, even though direct racist laws were abandoned decades ago.

You are arguing out of a notion of free will, when the deterministic nature of society is a proven fact. You cannot act or be acted upon in society without a deterministic causality link throughout history.

If the wealth built up in slavery is distributed among a majority of white people; if places like Tulsa, the "black wall street" gets destroyed, people killed in a massacre and their wealth stolen into the possession of white people: if housing laws segregated black people into parts of cities where the lack of wealth never increase the quality of life and no industries want to have shops... and so on, you will have a society that is built upon systemic racism since the system itself is governing how people "should" act within it.

A police officer is able to not be racist, but still enforce a racist practice of handling the job, because of the underlying systems.

To just claim that because crime is higher in black communities and because of that it's more common that black people get killed and that this is somehow a proof of there not being any systemic racism... is an extremely fallacious argument that ignores so many complex aspects of what systemic racism is about.

Your writing reflects a lot of what other people write, the surface level analysis of this issue. But in here, on this forum, I think there should be a demand for much better scrutiny of these questions than how the surface level Facebook-debates usually goes.

So first, are you a determinist or believer of free will? Do you think society acts separately from history and that history has no effect on the present events? Do you think that laws and regulations are the only forms of guidelines on which society behaves? Do you think that socioeconomic factors over long spans of time affect the conditions in which society acts and exists?

I see no such dive into these issues, only attempts at proving a point with biases and fallacious ideas. I think the discussion should get back into philosophical praxis, instead of these surface-level outbursts.

Probably the only way some folks here will understand what systemic racism is is if we make their group slaves for 400 years then when we have everything and they have fuck all, tell them they're free, offer them jobs in Target, with the other major option being prison, and if they complain, tell them the system is stacked in their favour. (And maybe we'll throw in 100 years of apartheid just for fun). — Baden

If people cannot understand the deterministic consequences of 400 years of racist legislations and behaviors, they aren't really doing philosophy but liberal ideological evangelism.

Kathryn's analogy of monopoly in the video Benkei posted shows pretty clear why things are bad. I recently also saw the movie "The 13th amendment", which is a seriously dark mirror into an almost Lovecraftian overview of the racist systems in place.

Even if hardcore individualism and agency was a thing, you can still have systemic racism as an ermee property of the whole. — Benkei

E-X-A-C-T-L-Y

As I already have stated, we have a system that favors blacks — Harry Hindu

The amount of ignorance and lack of education in this comment is too low quality for me. Maybe you should be educated by someone who actually knows her shit about all of this, and look at the video with Kimberly Latrice Jones above that Benkei posted.

Better question for this thread is, is questioning the existence of systemic racism in the US, an act of racism itself? — Benkei

I would say it's a form of appeasement of it. I also think that many people will defend against the idea of systemic racism because acknowledging it would mean that their world view of individualistic free-will has problems. They do not defend their view with facts, but out of the necessity to deny any form of systemic or structure since their ideology cannot exist if such systems and structures exist.

For them, the very notion of a structure and systemic thing is an attack against their worldview, that's why they abandon facts and knowledge in favor of empty phrases and low-quality arguments.

Believers in free-will will often dismiss the notion of systemic racism since they are biased towards looking at the world through the lens of liberal free will and agency of the individual.

However, the more commonly proved determinism demands that systemic racism exists in our timeline of history. All the events against black people and communities for over 400 years has a deterministic line of causality that cannot break free from the consequences we see today.

Free will is an illusion and so is the idea that because black people and communities now have total free will agency in society, they will just break free of the deterministic consequences of what has happened before.

Believers in free-will and many liberals advocate for this line of thinking, but that thinking is rationally just plain illogical. So the conclusion is that systemic racism does exist and anyone who says otherwise needs to actually prove the consequences of determinism to be wrong.

(9) Mandatory education in psychology and conflict de-escalation tactics.
(10) Mandatory meetups with community members of the districts they patrol within.

These points would A) have the police using de-escalating tactics rather than force in situations where unnecessary violence usually occurs while being able to assess a person's state of mind rather than just viewing them as hostile and B) Create a dialogue between the police officers and the members of the community they patrol in, in order to let them hear the voice of the people and humanize the ones they have a duty to protect.

The human factor to de-escalate conflict and binary divisions between police and the people would dramatically reduce the conflicts and violence. So far, all decisions made today are to enforce more conflict, not less. While psychologists know the mechanics of how to build bridges between people in conflict, there are no practical applications applied to actually do this.

But what's to do when "fascism, alt-right and white supremacy" are in power? 'Fight the power' seems like an idea... — unenlightened

Power is set there by the people, the people are informed by other people with power and influence outside the government. If you can't change how the government works, who's in office etc. you can change which movements that put certain people in government power positions.

So, who are the ones that drive public opinion and push certain ideologies into government power? Social media platforms only act when their PR is damaged. Exposing white supremacists, alt-right, racists and fascist groups, channels and posts together with linking them to the platform they are on will push bad PR for these companies. Twitter finally fact-checked Trump after years of people giving them the bad PR of being a channel for his opinions. If the largest social media platforms are forced into taking actions against racist movements and propaganda, it would choke a large part of that spread and force these people into creating their own places for expressing opinions. This, in turn, puts them into an echo chamber where their opinions doesn't spread as well as it has.

Since capitalists and neoliberals behind these platforms usually want the most users and don't ideologically care to silence racists, they will need to be pointed out in supporting racism, which would force them in another direction. If these people were indeed not of these ideologies, they would either already have put into action anti-racist decisions or are forced to do so in order to protect capitalist interests.

One way would be to actually use the Karl Popper frame of reference in the critique against the platforms. To ask them how they view his tolerence paradox and why they cannot enforce restrictions of their platforms around that philosophy. If they don't have an opinion on it, a question can be asked whether they actively support racists or just have apathy against such issues.

Someone who's philosophically educated could through the support of the people mount an offense against the social media platforms to silence out all of these racist movements that create public opinion voting politicians like Trump into office.

Cleaning up the social media platforms from the unrestricted (and uneducated) idea about freedom of speech and through that all the racist, white supremacist, alt-right, fascist propaganda... is a first step at least.