Reverend Wrote:Why didnt she understand "Authoritarian", yet speak of Stalin in the same post? Methinks she is trying to test me.
Don't worry, I'm not nearly sneaky enough to pull that sort of thing off
My view on what is 'authoritarian' is broader than most peoples (as my view on what is liberal is much more narrow). I agree that authoritarianism as most people mean the term is in reference to a strongly concentrated dictatorship. When I suggest that authoritarianism is inescapable for any government, i am stating this because the moment one establishes they they can make a law (and defend their law): they have become authoritarian (in at least a minor respect) 
Granted... I am also attempting to test both your beliefs and mine
Reverend Wrote:Authoritarianism is a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority. It is opposed to individualism and democracy. In politics, an authoritarian government is one in which political power is concentrated in a leader or leaders, typically unelected by the people, who possess exclusive, unaccountable, and arbitrary power. Authoritarianism differs from totalitarianism in that social and economic institutions exist that are not under the government's control
Interesting, I appear to be an authoritarian (not totalitarian) socialist.
Quote:Authoritarianism is characterized by highly concentrated, and centralized power maintained by political repression and the exclusion of potential challengers. It uses political parties and mass organizations to mobilize people around the goals of the state.[3]
It is a mistake to think it is necessarily characterized as so. It often begins without a ton of political repression and exclusion of potential challengers... but at some point the ruler realizes that he/she cannot maintain their power base when people won't perform according to their orders.
Quote:Authoritarianism emphases the rule of man over the rule of law, it includes election rigging, political decisions being made by a select group of unelected officials behind closed doors, a bureaucracy that operates independently of rules, which does not properly supervise elected officials, and fails to serve the concerns of the constituencies they purportedly serve. Authoritarianism also embraces the informal and unregulated exercise of political power, a leadership that is "self-appointed and even if elected cannot be displaced by citizens' free choice among competitors," the arbitrary deprivation of civil liberties, and little tolerance for meaningful opposition
The problem i have with laws is that they are made poorly. Murder *can* be an adequate response, as can theft, and any number of things not called rape or torture (I still cannot find a use for it, believe me: I've tried hard to think of something beneficial that can come of it that outright torture doesn't do better in every category, and the people have no excuse to torture unless they are working for the government in the first place). Instead of outright banning things in their entirety, ban what is actually 'broken'.
I would be less favoring of an authoritarian government if people understood how to write and handle law in the first place
Please give me a home where cloud buffalo roam
Where the dear and the strangers can play
Where sometimes is heard a discouraging word
But the skies are not stormy all day
