Why good people have bad politics

“Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have researched the records for years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.” – H.L. Mencken, Notes on Democracy

In a previous post I said most people make little effort towards an informed opinion. I will expand a little on that.
When it comes to actually knowing politics and economics, some people will point out they are busy doing various things and have little time for studying these things.
Hey, aren't you busy? I've got shit to do ... Be that as it may, this is important

Serious, honest people, who are generally quite competent at what they do, find it a waste of their valuable time to spend it on politics, so they convince themselves they just know how it is. Or it does not matter and they can't change anything. These are the two default states.

They double down on this with what I call the “Hey, I’m doing my job!" misconception.
That's a trap of thinking that if they do their job right and if everyone else did theirs, including or maybe especially politicians, things will go great. This is of course hardly a guarantee, but sounds right, so they default to this logic.

The fact of the matter is that many people won’t just do their job right, quite the opposite. In fact the exact people who don’t to a good job in a useful field are the ones who use the time not spent doing something productive in order to climb through the ranks of organisations, both private and public. That's just the way the world works, it's not the skillful but the shrewd that gets to the top.

..yet if you don't, it's gonna be worse

That is how a country ends up led by a bunch of politicians no one would trust with running and average business. It is how good engineers in corporations end up with incompetent middle managers – because the good engineers spend their time innovating, while the bad ones spend their time becoming managers. The system often rewards people with the skills that are required to be a good hierarchy climber, often opposite to competence at a clear job. You mind your business, but do others mind theirs? It is how the incompetent yet highly ambitious manage to obtain power over everybody else. It's a damn tragedy it what this is!

I will say this: people use completely different methods in politics than in their job. If you take a group of really good ... let's say plumbers, you notice they are all really good in relatively the same way, the reach remarkably similar conclusions in their job: if you buy poor materials from a firm, you do not buy from them again. If a technique works better than another, you use it. If a store is more expensive, you buy supplies at the cheaper one. Logic and common sense prevail.
These same people reaching the exact same conclusions in their job can have wildly different views on politics. You will find a socialist, a centrist and a libertarian among this group. Why is that?!

He's good at killing walking mushroom but did he ever wonder why was Bowser in charge?!


Well mostly because they do not approach politics the way they approach the job. One does not see the results of his actions - a bad vote let's say- as clearly as the results of buying bad pipes; one does not put as much research into economics and philosophy as into plumbing tools. In the short term, this may seem like a successful strategy, and maybe it works, until it doesn't.
And then what?

Furthermore, it is more likely to use feelings more when it comes to politics then when tightening gaskets - are gaskets tightened or even something used in plumbing? I don't really need to know as I am not a plumber. But while I can call a plumber when my sink is leaking, I cannot call an expert when I have to vote. And seeing that votes are given as if they don’t cost a thing – they don’t, not the politicians at least, you will sooner or later get one - why would I even bother calling anyone.
Just give me the damn stamp and I'll do the rest!

Some say that people should know they are uninformed and somehow defer to elites or the informed. But if you are uninformed, how can you tell who these people are? It's a catch-22, something that happens a lot when it comes to politics. We keep running in circles.

A good method to...nah, just kidding, remember: good people!


Now, I try not to judge people to much on their views, even though I know sometimes nothing of substance goes into them, but it is hard, in the end, to accept that these good people are willing to make political decisions - which are basically use of violence - without taking a bit of time to think things clearly.

"He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself." - Thomas Paine

They are friends, they are family, they are people doing their best. But looking at the world, sometimes their best is just not enough. I'm sorry but trying harder becomes a must if you don't want to wake up one day, that your stamp is gone or useless.

This looks like a long enough post already, so stay tuned, same time, same channel, for more.