I don't know sports. But I dont think they are decided by voting, are they? The people arguing that Trump will win because its Biden instead of Trump are arguing that Biden is less popular, but that was literally proven untrue. They need to adjust their argument. Otherwise I am going to not take them seriously.
The definitions are outdated and are misused. That is what I am saying.
I never said we had a need for borders and I didn't say that nations were natural, I said they developed naturally. Actually you could argue that they are natural since various species mark their own territory that they then defend from others of their own species. A nation could just be a more advanced form of that.
Odd. While I'm named, you click the up arrow and it takes you to a post of mine unrelated to what you posted. Not me! Doesn't mean it isn't all good food for thought.
I already said that your conception of the ontology of nations is ideologically loaded - its a form of social grouping sure, but it's not natural because animals do not conceive of legal systems to designate who gets to stay in the forest based on their legality as an entity, and if you think competition over resources is one such reason then I implore you to investigate symbiotic and mutually beneficial social structures in animals, such as with crows. A nation is not the natural outcome of a set of social formations, it is an arbitary grouping that developed historically based on contingencies. The Germans penned it, as did the Dutch for the concept of a free-city - another social grouping that works on the opposite end of free entry to anyone provided that they seek to trade and obey the rules. Both are equally as arbitary. For a third example we also have medieval commons, which worked based on cooperative collective ownership and were relatively open to newcomers, not bound by kinship relations. Again, another social formation that developed along a social grouping, again, arbitrarily when there other possibilities available.
jacobinmag.com
I like how you say that my concept is ideologically loaded then you immediately load your concept of nations with ideology.
Of course its an arbitrary grouping, pretty much all groupings are.
It doesn't matter if resources will be exploited if not fenced off, it matters if people think they will be exploited if not fenced off.
Indeed, Success or failure in one does not guarantee success or failure in another, though the path for any presidential candidate in the US system still runs through the primary, so we've never had a situation where a loser in the primary also won the general since the modern primary system came into being after 1968.
I think in a vacuum, the Democratic Party would be strictly better off if Joe Biden were magically replaced with any other candidate slapped on his platform right now. I think even the pragmatists that would take him as progress despite his character would agree on that at this moment. The issue is, of course, that you can't magically replace one candidate with another. You'd have to find a practical way to make it happen without turning off every person that voted for him.
I would have rather had pretty much any other candidate on that stage, but he won. So that's who I'm voting for, because I realize that for any flaws he has, trump has at least 10 times worse.
Then we are in agreement - they are arbitrary forms, and if arbitrary, they have no claim to being natural. Since we both also admit that it's what people think will be the cause for social persecution that determines the shape and not the material reality in its fullest extent - hence false relative to the material realities. In contrast to the variety of social formations available which are more closely related to material relaties (in terms of scarcity of materials - whilst the nation-state may have at some brief point served such a purpose (which is debatable again - the origins going back to Germany, in which case it was not for material security but for political reasons and to expand territory in order to challenge other political entities), it is no longer the case) I called it ideological, because everything is ideological to an extent, but the problem is where ideology is concealed rather than out in the open. Nations being the natural result of social grouping ignores the other possibilities we could have had, and indeed, did have (free cities, communes, etc.) and how it is ultimately not a natural result per se, but the result of a variety of decisions, circumstances, cultures and ideologies - unpredictably so. Their development is both an accident and tied up in some kernel of organisation, but the end result is not a fully natural development, any more than any social development is natural in how it addresses human needs.
This is really jargon-heavy. I can parse what it all means (just about), but you must be able to see it's not very helpful or communicative.
The definitions fulfil their purpose if they reflect how the vast majority of people use the terms, which they do.
It's something I feel strongly about, and something I've read quite a bit about. Back to the point - exactly, it is all to do with the government, and something that is a relatively recent phenomenon (much like the nation-state). I don't think they're real because they're constructs relating to a particular system. And my goal isn't to simplify politics neither, but to work towards a deeper understanding overall. This is after all a forum, not a chapter in a book I'd be writing, or an essay. But it is something that I think is worthwhile to pursue, and the end goal is that left/right are not terms that will outlast this current polical system if it is to be surpassed.
Not really because all groupings are arbitrary. They are just someone noticing certain things and grouping things together by that thing. What matters is if we get any utility from said groupings.
No, it really doesn't, those groups certainly existed and have benefits etc, but they don't have strength, so you really only see them existing in places that nations don't care about, either because of lack of resources or because of difficulty taking them. A nation is an organizational unit and its a very powerful one that can pretty easily take the territory of less powerful groups and nations.
That's fine, but it is ultimately a doomed ideology because alone you are weak, together you are strong. The only way you can be alone is if everyone agrees to leave you alone so you better hope you don't have something someone else wants.
Listen man, you were the one saying they developed naturally. That point has been abandoned. As to whether a nation-state is powerful or not, forgive me if I don't want to be part of a social grouping whose whole reason to exist is because it exists in a domination relation with those it can abuse. I'd prefer to live cooperatively and communally, and I think historically it's been proven that people achieve more when they cooperate freely rather than under artificial duress. Forcing someone to work vs. letting them work by themselves is a night and day difference in terms of efficiency. Consequently coercion between states leads to international turmoil, domination and exploitation. I think when the ultimate cost is systematic suffering, it isn't particularly powerful, but rather impotent in its demands for borders and atomising society into ethnic groups.
Just because its arbitrary doesn't mean there is no natural component, a family unit is arbitrary.
Then you better hope your not someplace that has something a better organized society wants.
a) Was that point abandoned? Or are you just saying that.
A family unit is simultaneously a type in itself, subservient to other social groupings, and a category that has other types under it - this is not the same as the concept of a social gathering. And I don't live off of hope, I live on activism, education and labour. Fascism is better organised than liberal capitalism, yet it is almost universally opposed, even by capitalists (ideologically speaking at least, on the public stage).
I refer you to my previous posts about the suspicion of the other. If you want to live by that neo-Hobbesian fantasy then go ahead. I meanwhile am interested in building bridges without desperately needing a patriarchal mechanism to hide under because I imagine bad people to take my way of life away. I've had enough of that shit from nationalists in Baku about Nagorno Karabakh.
