David Goldfarb <goldfarb@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> I think it's no more possible to speak of "government" as a
> monolithic entity than it is "humanity".
There are many governments, but they all have certain things in common.
> "Is humanity good?" is a question without an answer. "Government is
> our enemy" proceeds from the same sort of misplaced reification.
I disagree. "Government" is a specific type of organization. "Arson
is bad" is a very different sort of statement than "fire is bad."
> I certainly am deeply skeptical that the people I see around me
> could ever make the kind of society you favor work better than the
> one we have.
I suspect you've been unusually lucky in your dealings with
governments. But just as it's no defense for an accused robber to
point out that there are millions of people he *didn't* rob, it's no
defense for government that there were millions of people it didn't
falsely imprison, torture, rob, enslave, or kill.
The vast majority of people are basically decent. But, just as street
gangs can consist almost entirely of good kids who fell in with a bad
crowd, so can governments.
>> I don't recall whether you're religious.
> Then you haven't been paying attention.
I'll admit it. I'm not much interested in religion, so I don't pay
much attention to who here is religious and who isn't, unless they
make a big thing about it, as Harry and Karl do. Similarly, you
probably aren't keeping track, in the thread next door, of who
pronounces which vowel sounds in which ways, unless that's a
particular interest of yours.
> I don't feel that I worship government so much as simply recognize
> it as a necessary evil -- with emphasis here on the word "necessary".
Maybe "worship" isn't quite the right word, but anyone for whom no
amount of evidence can ever convince them that a government is bad
is putting it in a very special category, one usually reserved for
religious faith.
For the record, it *is* possible to convince me that a government is
good: If, for a span of 30 years, a government were to falsely convict
nobody, draft nobody, involuntarily tax nobody, not engage in any war
except in self-defense, torture nobody, slander and libel nobody, and
not coerce anyone in any way, I would be convinced.
Note that that's more than government is willing to grants *me*. Even
though my false conviction is more than 30 years ago, I am, in their
eyes, still permanently and irredeemably evil. If I were to use the
same standard on them, then the governments of Virginia and of the US
would forever stand condemned for their past actions, regardless of
anything they do in the future.
--
Keith F. Lynch - http://keithlynch.net/
Please see http://keithlynch.net/email.html
before emailing me.
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