TWOP - a dissection

Well David you asked me to have a look at the TWOP so it's your own fault ;-)


I'll work my way through each heading starting with Home:

TWOP believes that anyone paying any form of tax in Britain is paying for government.

Yep I'll agree with that

Therefore, in a capitalist society where you have a right to do what you want with what you pay for, the government should be an executive body without the power to set policy.

Hmm yes, the argument against is that the people do set policy by appointing/electing people/Parties that state what they'd do. Of course that has shown its flaws in that they'll say one thing then do another and it's not as if we can get rid of them very easily should they do this.  Do we need to go the whole hog and remove policy decision from them entirely? This is something I've been thinking about and I'll publish my thoughts another time.

What's TWOP? A bit of rhetoric but the meat lies in the listing of some of its features:

i) All government decisions will be made online, by calm and sensible discussion

I was with you all the way up to the end - have you seen forums? We'd start off with a topic such as "Reduce dependency on foreign oil" and the first response will be "First!" followed by "Damn you beat me to it" then "'First' how gay", "No you is ta GAY!" and degenerates from there. Either that or it'll turn into a discussion on Quantum Physics.

ii) Businesses will have the vote just like other taxpayers

Again that seems logical after all it is businesses that really do things in this country; but how will that work? If I'm the sole owner of two businesses do I get three votes; how many people will list themselves as self-employed working as contractors so as to get two votes. It's fraught with problems.

iii) Mass media will be banned from influencing public opinion

Which means we won't have any mass media. Even confining themselves to celebrity tattle will be an influence - "We should all be as thin as Cheryl Cole!", "Ban Salt!"

The New British Way! Good at least not the New English Way.

We are known as a nation of shopkeepers; that phrase always uttered with a faint sneer of derision.

Which is odd as it was written by Adam Smith (he of the £20 note) as part of an empire-building remark, being a nation of shopkeepers in this regard is a good thing. We also get the repetitious "We are known" by whom exactly?

our every word and action subject to Health and Safety regulations

Which ties to point (iii) above as well as the supposed (point iii again) incoming American tendency to sue at the least provocation. So many of the stories of the Elf'n'safety have little or nothing to do with the HSE and come off the back of people reading and believing the media stories.

We dwell like woodlice in the dark, damp places, corralled into orderly swarms by the stormtroopers of Political Correctness.

Yet groups such as the EDL and the BNP exist, these stormtroopers aren't doing a very good job. To look at the contrast examine current unrest in those countries that really do clamp down on things.

We'll never get to the stars with that attitude

I agree I really do. One of the overarching goals of the entire Earth should be to get off it; I'm serious. As it stands we've all got our eggs in one basket. To ensure the long term survival of our species (and those we bring with us) we have to get off this planet and start spreading.

The New British Way, also known as The Attitude, is the deliberate fight against any point of view and any type of behaviour that acts against individualism.

Ah problem

The Attitude is not a license to behave any way you want to.

Problem solved, by contradiction? You can express your individualism in any way you like so long as you don't affect anyone else's individualism. I've tried to express the problem before by hypothesising about a company that poisons a town's water supply during its manufacturing processing. Hey no-one is making you drink that water, no-one is making you stay in that town; that's all your decision.

The typical Brit will be like Cal Lightman;[...]

Please don't be a link to Fox, please don't be a link to Fox...  oh.

[...]irreverent, cocky, unpredictable, irrepressible, and absolutely, one-hundred-percent confident in himself.

Britain no longer a nation of shopkeepers,but a nation of tosspots instead. The trouble with that attitude (or is it Attitude) is that it really only works when you're right. I don't really want to bring this up but... George Bush. Hmm okay in theory if we're all like that we won't get swayed into doing things by someone else, but that would contradict point (i). If I'm one-hundred-percent confident in myself and so is the person I'm debating against neither of us are going to shift from our positions. So policy will be enacted as being - that which the majority already agree with; in which case I refer to my original point about only working when you're right.

Contrary to what officials, pimps and other criminals think, 'respect' has nothing to do with fear.

Oo did you see the "other" there and its implications? Odd to include officials there as everything I've heard coming out of their mouths backs up the view here: respect ≠ fear.

Respect means dealing with other people as if they matter; as if their views are as important as yours.

But they're not! Okay sorry I jest... but only a little. This attitude leads us to the teaching of Creationism, Global warming sceptics etc. who think that their non-scientific, untrained views are as important (or most often relevant) as those espoused by people being backed up with evidence.

Even if you think they're wrong, it means listening to them, talking calmly to them, seeking to resolve a situation by discussion rather than by shouting, threats, or violence.

Well yes no need to use threats or violence, and as I've made by position clear from a discussion about WFBNP it's better to try and show them why they're wrong than just telling them they're wrong. But again this contradicts our notion of debate with a 100% confident person.

That's why future decisions on government policy must be made online. Even with 'emoticons', it is hard to get worked up in an online debate,

Wow you really haven't seen some forums.

Trust and respect go hand-in-hand.

Not quite someone can be respected for making a killing on the market, but you wouldn't necessarily trust them to baby-sit "Do you know how much babies can be sold for!"

To trust is to give up control - to grant the freedom to make mistakes.

But why would I, a 100% confident individual, ever need to do that?

It's me. It's you. It's ego

It's me referring to untrained people again. Right simple terms - the Ego (in Freudian terms) is the mediator between the Id and Reality; what one might expect in the Trinity (Id, Ego SuperEgo) is Id "I want" Ego "Yes/No you can/can't do that" and SuperEgo "But you shouldn't". However the Ego is biased towards the Id so it becomes "I want" - "How do I do/get it". The Ego is a rationalising tool.

For those with a 'poor' Ego it's difficult to rationalise the desires of the Id ("I want" - "You can't have") conversely those with a 'over' Ego can get to rationalise things ("I want" - "Sure because it's a Tuesday") with the SuperEgo only stepping in, if we're lucky, when it's along the lines of "I want to kill him" - "Well they are annoying" - "Uh no"

Before you can respect anyone else, you must respect yourself. Before you can trust anyone else, you must trust yourself, your own judgment, the likelihood that, in any new or unexpected situation, you will get it right rather than getting it wrong. Without this faith in yourself, you cannot change the world; you cannot do anything.

Tie that to my previous paragraph and you can see I agree. Innovation comes from the interaction of "I want" and "How do I get it". However point back to the 100% confident and that equates to a 'over' Ego. So as an example "I want all the money" rationalises to "Taxing the rich hurts the country" I'm not saying the rationale is wrong, just be aware of where it comes from.

In order to respect yourself, in order to trust yourself, you need to be doing things that give rise to respect and to trust. Do you face up to your problems bravely, or hide from them and pretend they don't exist, like a coward?

Yep in no way biasing the question there.

What applies to others must apply to us. What applies to us can be applied to others.

Except doesn't that contradict Individualism? I'm not like everyone else, you're not like me. I'm not implying I'm better, merely different.

Build a True Democracy. As I've mentioned elsewhere do a search for Demarchy (again a term so well known it doesn't feature in the Firefox dictionary)

There are three things we need to do: advertise, recruit, and train

Just like the army

All this takes money. 

Which would be the fourth thing.

Facebook - founded in 2008 4 people like. "There are no discussions"

The TWOP Blog. Which doesn't link back to the TWOP forum by the way. That would take a lot more work to examine.

Okay some interesting points that need work and further explanation to iron out the kinks, certainly not so bad as some sites I've seen.