I honestly believe our rise of cities and industrial everything has made everyone lazy, physically,intellectually and spiritually. I don't think its coincidence but rather a product. Almost everyone 100+ years ago knew how to raise crops and livestock. This seems moot to most people but being self sufficient changes your whole perception of reality.
I have been thinking about that for the last year and came to the same conclusion. This was a problem even before the industrial revolution - back when America was founded, hence the electoral college. Jefferson hated cities and if he had his way every state would have gotten 1 elector, period.
So in my opinion we should come up with some system that lowers representation of cities. Like electoral colleges within the states. Or gerrymandering that slices cities up like a pie and combines each district with a large rural district outside the city. Basically your level of electoral power should be inversely proportional to the population density where you live. (the opposite of how it is now where big cities control the whole state) But I haven't worked out anything beyond that.
Your pie idea is really interesting! I’ve been thinking about this lately too, and I wonder if forcing cities to become their own states by way of rural secession would work (it would be easiest to do when the city already lies near the coast or state border.)
For instance, I live in Pa and Philly really messes everything up. Well they’ll never split with Pa on their own because they’re not the ones being screwed over while paying exorbitant taxes to dictator Wolf. It would be imperative on the rest of the state to say enough is enough.
I’m not sure how the electoral vote issue would work in this idea- maybe split the original vote total between the new states?
I just feel like if Democrats want to eventually add states anyway, then we may as well beat them to it and create new conservative states with strict state constitutions that would shut down leftist policies leaking in (like build universal concealed carry into the state constitution so it’s much more difficult for someone to eventually try to impose gun control).
Districts are already geographically nightmarish; trying to add rural swaths to urban districts would make things even more contrived (and IMO give lie to the whole system). I don't necessarily have a better answer, except perhaps several layers of mass disenfranchisement based on government dependency and/or negative societal contribution, which would largely nullify urban centers anyway.
Almost everyone 100+ years ago knew how to raise crops and livestock.
"Modernity" takes many forms--and always has--but writ large I might describe it as vertical systematic complexity, with each higher tier of technological ascendency relying on that below, and participants on said higher levels being, as a function of human intellectual limitations, incapable of participating in any tier but their own.
That's a exceptionally windbag way of saying, that's not true. 100, 1000, and even 10,000 years ago there were plenty of people specializing. Whether you were the Animal Skin Guy, the Marble Carving Guy, or the Industrial Machine Guy, you were not self-sufficient.
That said, you point as a trend stands. While there may certainly have been those living in Rome that wouldn't know which part of a plow went in which part of a field, people today take dependency--on many things, but overall on a world in which they are utterly insulated from scarcity or the deprivations of war--to a whole new level.
I honestly believe our rise of cities and industrial everything has made everyone lazy, physically,intellectually and spiritually. I don't think its coincidence but rather a product. Almost everyone 100+ years ago knew how to raise crops and livestock. This seems moot to most people but being self sufficient changes your whole perception of reality.
I have been thinking about that for the last year and came to the same conclusion. This was a problem even before the industrial revolution - back when America was founded, hence the electoral college. Jefferson hated cities and if he had his way every state would have gotten 1 elector, period.
So in my opinion we should come up with some system that lowers representation of cities. Like electoral colleges within the states. Or gerrymandering that slices cities up like a pie and combines each district with a large rural district outside the city. Basically your level of electoral power should be inversely proportional to the population density where you live. (the opposite of how it is now where big cities control the whole state) But I haven't worked out anything beyond that.
Your pie idea is really interesting! I’ve been thinking about this lately too, and I wonder if forcing cities to become their own states by way of rural secession would work (it would be easiest to do when the city already lies near the coast or state border.) For instance, I live in Pa and Philly really messes everything up. Well they’ll never split with Pa on their own because they’re not the ones being screwed over while paying exorbitant taxes to dictator Wolf. It would be imperative on the rest of the state to say enough is enough. I’m not sure how the electoral vote issue would work in this idea- maybe split the original vote total between the new states? I just feel like if Democrats want to eventually add states anyway, then we may as well beat them to it and create new conservative states with strict state constitutions that would shut down leftist policies leaking in (like build universal concealed carry into the state constitution so it’s much more difficult for someone to eventually try to impose gun control).
Districts are already geographically nightmarish; trying to add rural swaths to urban districts would make things even more contrived (and IMO give lie to the whole system). I don't necessarily have a better answer, except perhaps several layers of mass disenfranchisement based on government dependency and/or negative societal contribution, which would largely nullify urban centers anyway.
"Modernity" takes many forms--and always has--but writ large I might describe it as vertical systematic complexity, with each higher tier of technological ascendency relying on that below, and participants on said higher levels being, as a function of human intellectual limitations, incapable of participating in any tier but their own.
That's a exceptionally windbag way of saying, that's not true. 100, 1000, and even 10,000 years ago there were plenty of people specializing. Whether you were the Animal Skin Guy, the Marble Carving Guy, or the Industrial Machine Guy, you were not self-sufficient.
That said, you point as a trend stands. While there may certainly have been those living in Rome that wouldn't know which part of a plow went in which part of a field, people today take dependency--on many things, but overall on a world in which they are utterly insulated from scarcity or the deprivations of war--to a whole new level.
well said pede
Wherever accountability is lacking, entitlement thrives.