How much blame do ordinary people deserve for the actions of their governments?

[crmarvin42]

This post represents the fundamental disconnect that is at the heart of this thread. It's a mistake to think that the people that put Japanese Americans in concentration camps are the same people that were subsequently embarrassed that happened. American are not and never were monolithic. Those that want human rights to exist have always been at odds with those who only care for themselves or some narrowly-scoped community, and there's a lot of people that vaguely think they should be in favor of decency but are easily persuaded otherwise.

Their relative numbers vary over time, and it's not a monotonic progression from self-interest to commitment to humane values. Looked at from a very long lens, you can convince yourself there's been some progress, but the setbacks have been pretty obvious.

Is being in the same country as selfish people the same thing as being a selfish person? How much blame can you heap on people who know their actions are going to be ineffective because so many of their countrymen cannot be depended on to act humanely, or even in their own rational interst?

Maybe I’m a little raw from an incident earlier this evening*, but my take is that we all collectively share the blame to a degree. Even those of us who did everything legal in their power to stop Trumps return to power deserve a little bit of it. That is because we (and I am very much including myself in this) didn’t do everything possible, only what was legal or that which we felt comfortable doing. Folks that literally voted for this, and continue to support it, lie/deflect/dissemble to misrepresent what he is doing, etc. - they of course deserve much more of the blame, but not all.

We know the system is rigged. We’ve know how it is rigged for years now. And YET, we’ve continued to let the fly-wheel spin because it is convenient. Because we have so much to lose from rocking the boat, we did what we felt comfortable with, and let the system keep chewing people up, and granting power to those least qualified to hold it.

I work in an industry based in Trump country, populated disproportionately with Trumpists, and I’ve been mostly quiet. Sure, I’ve had 1-on-1 conversations with folks. Pushed back to some small degree when I thought it wouldn’t cost me anything. In my personal life I’ve donated to campaigns, advocated online and in person, donated to charities and food pantries. But, I’ve also used my skills and intellect to enrich my colleagues, who are pretty fucking awful human beings outside of the office*. I knew they were dog shit, but kept quiet about it, because I knew it could cost me something I was unwilling to pay.

I held back because I was in a trap of my own construction. We don’t get to absolve ourselves because we didn’t want it to happen. Because we, ultimately, allowed it to happen on our watch.



*(work colleague 1 denied covid was real; colleague 2 flat out stated that they didn’t care about deaths in 3rd world countries and that the 9/11 survivors deserved nothing because everyone should have had life insurance. I promptly told them to fuck off and stormed out. I might not have a job in the morning. We will see)

 

[crmarvin42]

The whole premise is too generalizing and broad that it's ultimately not a very helpful framework. What constitutes an ordinary person? What exactly does the blame mean?

I see people propose that paying taxes to support the government or not rising up will also result in a portion of the blame, but it makes some absurd results. Would an undocumented person share some blame in Trump's actions even if they had no voting power, and were against Trump, if they simply paid their taxes? Would a physically or mentally infirm person share some blame if they are unable to resist? Would a prisoner share in any blame if they participate in prison labor? Would a comatose person who has a portfolio that generates taxable dividends have any blame?

I think it comes down to, “does the person in question have agency, and how much?”

• Coma patient has no agency, though they might have in the past, depending on how they assembled that portfolio.
• Prisoners have essentially no agency, though they might have had some before incarceration. So while they are incarcerated they accrue no additional blame.
• The infirm person who is unable to resist has no agency, so no.
• The undocumented person has very little agency without the right to vote, but they do have some. They could take their labor to contribute to another countries economy. They could stay here, and contribute in other ways to resistance movements. So it is possible some degree of blame could be deserved, depending on their degree of complicity in the areas where they do have agency.

Ultimately, we need to adopt a bit of a catholic view of culpability in this country. Everyone is at least partly to blame for the atrocities we commit, just as all of us like to take pride in the things we do right around the world. But blame and credit/pride are not binary. It is a continuum, and your place on that sliding scale is determined on what you did with the power and agency you had.

Billionaires have lots of agency. Both to influence government policy, and to fill in the gaps it leaves behind (nothing forces you to pay a minimum wage, or to offer shitty benefits). Poor people have little. We can’t put a number on it, and we shouldn’t waste too much time negotiating small differences in blame. But we should all accept that we own a share of it, if for no other reason, than to motivate us to try and minimize our individual share by doing more than we are today.

 

[Coriolanus]

I think it comes down to, “does the person in question have agency, and how much?”

• Coma patient has no agency, though they might have in the past, depending on how they assembled that portfolio.
• Prisoners have essentially no agency, though they might have had some before incarceration. So while they are incarcerated they accrue no additional blame.
• The infirm person who is unable to resist has no agency, so no.
• The undocumented person has very little agency without the right to vote, but they do have some. They could take their labor to contribute to another countries economy. They could stay here, and contribute in other ways to resistance movements. So it is possible some degree of blame could be deserved, depending on their degree of complicity in the areas where they do have agency.

Ultimately, we need to adopt a bit of a catholic view of culpability in this country. Everyone is at least partly to blame for the atrocities we commit, just as all of us like to take pride in the things we do right around the world. But blame and credit/pride are not binary. It is a continuum, and your place on that sliding scale is determined on what you did with the power and agency you had.

Billionaires have lots of agency. Both to influence government policy, and to fill in the gaps it leaves behind (nothing forces you to pay a minimum wage, or to offer shitty benefits). Poor people have little. We can’t put a number on it, and we shouldn’t waste too much time negotiating small differences in blame. But we should all accept that we own a share of it, if for no other reason, than to motivate us to try and minimize our individual share by doing more than we are today.

How much agency would a Democrat in a deep red state have? They might vote against Trump and and his allies, but electorally speaking, they have no ability to affect any election outcomes in their area.

 

[upthehill]

I get what you are trying to say, but that is a very low bar to be setting.

“Yes, they tried, but they were blocked” does not really cut it when we are talking about systems that are actively harming people. If something is that fundamentally almost entirely fucked, you do not just shrug when it proves politically or legally difficult, you make it the fight. You push harder, you spend political capital, you stop pretending it can sit on a to-do list.

Because the alternative is exactly what we saw.

The machinery stays in place. The rhetoric softens a tiny amount, the edges get rounded off, but the core system keeps doing what it was built to do. And at that point, from the outside, the difference between “we wanted to fix it” and “we left it there” starts to look pretty academic.

I am not as was not saying both sides are the same, they are clearly not.

But if the outcome for the people on the receiving end is still detention, still processing, still dehumanisation, then blaming courts, Republicans, or the media does not change a fucking thing about the lived reality.

At some point, “we tried” is not enough.

Either you dismantle it, or you own the fact you did not.

 

[crmarvin42]

How much agency would a Democrat in a deep red state have? They might vote against Trump and and his allies, but electorally speaking, they have no ability to affect any election outcomes in their area.

That reduces the concept of agency to voting. Which in a deep red state, is usually ineffective. But voting is the bare minimum for political participation under the law.

You can organize for a candidate or cause. you could build the community network necessary to increase your odds next time. You could donate to fill in the gaps of bad policy, or to support candidates in swing states to could neutralize your own states representatives.

And those are just the legal options. The labor movement was illegal when it first started. Striking, no matter how peaceful, could cost you your life or freedom.

It’s not a binary. It is proportional to your complicity and lack of appropriate action.