If the vote was obsolete - why such push back (in the US) against black people voting? I'm not talking about the Jim Crow era in the South - I'm talking about what almost happened in Pennsylvania in 2012.

Just 'not voting' would be only half the battle. Politicians are happy to proclaim themselves 'legitimate' even in a time when in many elections only one third of the population votes, and only half of that number votes for them. No doubt they'll continue to say that even if only 5 or 10% of the population was voting.

If you want to disempower them, you have to also find a way to take away the power and the money.

Where I think he goes wrong is in not following his own logic out. What happens if governments disappear? Do we suddenly achieve some sort of nirvana? No. We return to a base state in which those with money and power do whatever they want to those who are poor and powerless. The powerless NEED government. But they need a government which actually protects them from the powerful. The Founding Fathers understood that people would need protection by the government FROM the government - that power does corrupt. But they also, by and large, were wealthy and powerful men themselves, and couldn't bring themselves to design a system from the start that didn't assume that wealthy and powerful men 'knew better' than the rest of us. Hence mechanisms like the electoral college, or lifetime appointments to the Supreme Court.

And even the protections they and leaders after them built in have been weakened and perverted. We're supposed to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, but really, when was the last time that was realistic? Do police act towards people they arrest like they actually believe them to be innocent? Hell no. They feel that it's perfectly legitimate to use elaborate 'sting' operations that actually push people into committing crimes, they push search and seizure beyond all sorts of limits, they're even allowed to lie to people they're interrogating.

All his life there were no shortage of elected officials catering to straight, white males who were 1%'ers.

No big deal for him not to vote.

Somewhat transparent, but I see what you did there.

I doubt if Carlin and Fuller were women, or black or gay whether they would be so quick to dismiss the need to vote.

Certainly the GOP would like women, African Americans and LGBT to not vote and we have seen plenty of evidence of that.

Let me know when your ready to address his points.

brings it on. Jeez that has to be the stupidest thing. How does the 99% benefit from not voting? Friggin' stupid.

I have lost a lot of respect for George Carlin due to DU. Or he may not have been serious. But the way he is used on DU is to propagate hopelessness.

Can you sum it up? I'm at work and have back to back calls/meetings today.

the general idea of how the entire system is a big club and none of us are in it.

Again, that belief (futility of voting) is easier when your basic rights are not political hotbuttons on the verge of being affirmed or shot down like it is for women, LGBT and many racial and religious minorities.

But was he ever out there in the streets shaking things up and making things happen?

Like my mom was a town council person and dad was on the School Board. Like - they did. They didn't speak. It took people voting for them to be able to get things done in our small western ny town.

But not voting is a recipe for disaster.

and hopeless and "give it up" which serves that very club to the extent it exists.

The matrix hates him. Thanks for this.

Because I admire him so much, it made me stop and think.

And me. I tend not to fit in anywhere very well - I'll think about almost anything, and talk about it too.

It's not like Bucky's ideas on politics will penetrate the Zeitgeist and cause Hillary to lose the election. He's no Ralph Nader.

and I notice that only people with enough privilege to vote freely....like Fuller....tend to embrace the non-voting meme.

They've never had to fight for the privilege to vote.....unlike the majority of Americans.

How dare you post something contrary to something or other...

What Fuller meant goes so much deeper than what people here are discussing, it is like Plato's cave. And to be honest, I don't know if I have the verbal skill to explain it. It's a much more complicated philosophical concept than just 'don't vote.' With Carlin, I am not so sure.

..."I think he's wrong on this one"?

"I wonder if he was wrong on this?"

On edit: I haven't decided on my answer yet. I come from three generations of socialist activists, so I do have some history with politics.

..., his environment -- social, academic, political, geographical -- the things that shaped his views.

There's an argument to be made that he held that particular view because he could afford to. It may have seemed wiser, more noble, or at least more principled to be apolitical and "above it all".

Was he right about that then? And even if so, would it still apply now, after all the radical shifts in the political landscape that occurred since his death in 1983?

We're each a product of our environment, times and personal history.

Bucky took an ecologist's big-picture view of our situation. I'd say he probably saw politics as an enabler and accelerant of human activity, in much the same way I also view money and technology. It's not that any of their local effects are necessarily undesirable, but that their global effects are pernicious from the point of view of the biosphere.

Politics at the local and regional level is a very valuable social organizing force. At the national level it runs into some problems because the stakes are so high and there are so many competing interests in play. The negative influence of money that I alluded to above becomes clearly visible at this level - not just in the USA, but in all large modern nations.

On a global level politics breaks down as an international organizing framework due to the self-protectiveness inherent in national sovereignty. Money is a more effective organizing force at the international level, and as we all know it makes its influence felt in politics, certainly in the USA. Unfortunately, the organizing ability of money operates in one direction only - as an accelerant of human activity. After all, who wants to make less money each year than the year before?

Internationally, political will breaks down when confronting issues such as climate change, ocean acidification and biodiversity loss - issues that that cross national boundaries, especially ones in which the costs are borne locally but the benefits would be enjoyed globally, even by those who didn't pay for them.

I sympathize deeply with what I assume to have been Bucky's ecological concerns. Like him I've been looking for ways to decelerate our destruction of the world's biosphere. Frankly, at this point politics, technology and money are so deeply embedded in the way we conduct our lives that I have scant hope of us being able to re-purpose them from being accelerators into brakes.

So is the answer not to vote? Of course not! As I said above, politics has significant beneficial effects. So by all means vote! I just caution against people expecting that politics will be able to provide solutions to the global existential crisis that we're facing - it was never intended for that purpose and is not designed to provide such solutions.

No more compromises: Don't vote unless the politician is everything you ever wished for.

Nobody is "everything you wished for". If that's what you want, what you get looks a lot like the Republican clown car parade. In 2012 there were a succession of darlings, each one surging after saying something that the teabaggers liked, only to fall out of favor when more things he said circulated, and they discovered that la bum du jour wasn't "everything you ever wished for".

heard out of the mouth of a celebrity and that's a low bar to start with.

Of course even smart people can have bad moments.

really really stupid.

Maybe he should apply that to a marriage partner. Oh wait, that would never work either.

Aristotle had this right. Kudos to you for the courage to hold and consider an idea.

But I believe that the thing the 1% would fear the most isn't "not voting". They fear that all citizens show up and choose "none of the above" by writing in the candidates of their choice.

And I think that this is what Buckminster Fuller was advocating.

Not showing up to vote sends the message that we don't care - of which the 1% has no fear, and which I would argue they actually encourage through their media's disgusting election coverage as a spots event.

What they fear most is an engaged and watchful 99%.

elected officials who cater to that group.

From what I gleaned in the time I spent with him, everyone here is missing the point. Missing the subtler meaning. Nobody seems willing to think past their noses.
Fuller thought past his nose.

Virtually everyone who I have ever heard arguing "Don't bother voting" is a Straight, White, Male and most of them are 1%'ers.

I don't think that is by chance.

not voting gives you a george w bush administration....can america withstand another inept administration?

#55 to Stevenleser.

for hetero white upper middle class white man to tell us that not voting is the way to go....

And they then try to con us into believing we are slaves . . . like upthread.

Never mind that the idea is absolutely insulting and revolting to the many women who had their children ripped from them and sold down the river. The bullshit - the utter bullshit insulting "I'm so above it all" bullshit at DU is just gross at times.

up in the populace party, that i am just learning about.

some points.

both parties are the same. one must ignore so many things, including all social issues, evironment, and so much more, to make the statement accurate

womens issues do not matter

they want to do to the democratic party what the tea baggers did to the repug party.

du should be pu.

try to think past your nose, like Fuller did.

Truly then, the world worked for everyone.



I mean, it's a good thing lords and autocrats don't have to worry about elections, otherwise they would be tempted to look out only for their own interests! This allows them to be much better fundamental problem-solvers. It just might not be your problems they're solving...

As soon as you start listing the definition of serfdom, the comparisons to modern life are shown to be superficial.

Is that freedom?

They are still serfs.

Instead of making a superficial comparison to feudalism, you might want to try making real arguments.

- Constitutionally protected civil rights
- Public education
- Restrictions on work hours
- Minimum wage
- Consumer protections
- Environmental protections
- Subsidized and/or free healthcare
- Retirement income guarantees

I mean, no one is saying there still isn't a lot of issues/work to be done in all these areas, but I think it's silly to bash modern politics because it hasn't instantly brought about utopia (for whatever that means). The process, messy as it is, has gotten us this far...

Popular disengagement from the political process will only further empower those with economic power who would have otherwise been checked by the political process, unless of course you also plan on never needing to use a marketplace again.

between those obsolete politicians and corporate rule? Even if I were following his ideas - if the corporations take over completely because I do not object I will still be their victim.

So, how do you create the society of Star Trek: The Next Generation?

How does a Captain Jean-Luc Picard rise up through the ranks ahead of some manipulative scheming narcissist who's been given a huge head start by family connections, money, and unethical behavior?

The trouble with architects is that they are basically fascists telling people how they should live, limiting the ways people can interact with their surroundings.

That's why expensive public housing is so frequently a catastrophe. People who can control their own space will tend to be happier, even when the housing does not meet some "community standard."

Organization must exist in harmony with chaos, else it becomes destructive. Chaos is neither constructive or destructive, it's that which simply "is," it is the essential aspect of being.

I think voting and politics is much like gardening. I plant ideas and see how they grow. I pull the weeds. I make the garden attractive to birds and other natural predators who eat pests. (I don't use insecticides at all.) I don't pretend I can ever be "in control." I'm not the one making the plants grow. The plants do that on their own, it's a natural process. I am trying to make conditions favorable for the plants that please me.

I agree with your assessment, and I like your view of gardening. That't why Daniel Quinn called modern agriculture "totalitarian".

On Fri Apr 17, 2015, 06:13 AM an alert was sent on the following post:

Not voting: Why Buckminster Fuller said this is important to our success
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026515767

REASON FOR ALERT

This post is disruptive, hurtful, rude, insensitive, over-the-top, or otherwise inappropriate.

ALERTER'S COMMENTS

The DU terms of service clearly state that all members are expected to vote for Democrats. This is not the place to advocate against voting.

You served on a randomly-selected Jury of DU members which reviewed this post. The review was completed at Fri Apr 17, 2015, 06:28 AM, and the Jury voted 0-7 to LEAVE IT.

Juror #1 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: Stupid alert
Juror #2 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: Alerter needs a life.
Juror #3 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: The alerter should read the OP and maybe if they think about
it would see this is a discussion. To be that afraid and use
a bogus understanding of the terms of service for DU is
pathetic. How much fear do you want to inflict with your
censorship?
Juror #4 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: The poster is not advocating not voting. S/he stated so within the thread. Posting ideas to cause conversation should be something everyone here wants
Juror #5 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: I totally disagree with Fuller's opinion as expressed in the alerted post, but acquainting DUers with the idiosyncratic view of a notable thinker is worthwhile.
Juror #6 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: No explanation given
Juror #7 voted to LEAVE IT ALONE
Explanation: the poster is advocating no such thing, just posting an artilce with an opinionin it.

Thank you very much for participating in our Jury system, and we hope you will be able to participate again in the future.

My god !

Jealous of people who get elected as leaders, I suppose.

The ways it's listed on the right implies there should be, but I see nothing - not even a gap where a video might appear.

Since "that trend continues to provide many people with great as we move toward an age of true democracy" doesn't even make grammatical sense, let alone logical sense, I think we need Fuller's own words, rather than the blogger who doesn't write very well.