this post was submitted on 23 Dec 2023
190 points (99.5% liked)

Global News

3203 readers
562 users here now

What is global news?

Something that happened or was uncovered recently anywhere in the world. It doesn't have to have global implications. Just has to be informative in some way.


Post guidelines

Title formatPost title should mirror the news source title.
URL formatPost URL should be the original link to the article (even if paywalled) and archived copies left in the body. It allows avoiding duplicate posts when cross-posting.
[Opinion] prefixOpinion (op-ed) articles must use [Opinion] prefix before the title.
Country prefixCountry prefix can be added tothe title with a separator (|, :, etc.) where title is not clear enough from which country the news is coming from.


Rules

1. English onlyTitle and associated content has to be in English.
2. No social media postsAvoid all social media posts. Try searching for a source that has a written article or transcription on the subject.
3. Respectful communicationAll communication has to be respectful of differing opinions, viewpoints, and experiences.
4. InclusivityEveryone is welcome here regardless of age, body size, visible or invisible disability, ethnicity, sex characteristics, gender identity and expression, education, socio-economic status, nationality, personal appearance, race, caste, color, religion, or sexual identity and orientation.
5. Ad hominem attacksAny kind of personal attacks are expressly forbidden. If you can't argue your position without attacking a person's character, you already lost the argument.
6. Off-topic tangentsStay on topic. Keep it relevant.
7. Instance rules may applyIf something is not covered by community rules, but are against lemmy.zip instance rules, they will be enforced.


Companion communities

Icon generated via LLM model | Banner attribution


If someone is interested in moderating this community, message @brikox@lemmy.zip.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] emergencyfood@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The law / constitution requires that elections be held. You can't break the law without a lot of people noticing. But you can bend it sufficiently to ensure you win.

[–] rottingleaf@lemmy.zip 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's not about noticing, it's about magical thinking.

Voters feel as if the government has some strength if they voted for somebody or "chose not to vote".

That government feels that even if there's no intrigue at all, having a vote makes them somehow popular.

Source - live in Russia, know this shit.

[–] emergencyfood@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Ah, I see. In my country the party in power will do whatever they can get away with to improve their chances of winning. So we have elections, but they aren't really 'fair'.

[–] rottingleaf@lemmy.zip 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

There are gradations. Most likely in your country the elections are more real than in Russia.

I'm talking about the reason that ritual even exists, and the effect it has.

Instead of imprisoning people it's more efficient to allow them to imprison themselves.

Some random Russian middle-age school teacher just goes on with their not particularly happy life because 1) they think they should limit themselves and everybody is doing that and 2) they think they've taken an obligation, as imperfect as the process may be.

Medieval monarchs had their subjects swear oaths for a reason, even though the supporting layer would be jails and gallows.

Humans are not rational beings. We do not act on universal principles. We act on instincts.

All this is intended to persuade "subjects" to control themselves and "sheriffs" (which are a crowd too, state apparatus is too big a thing to be attributed conscious goals at ruling a country) to think that their position is safe.

I was very unhappy until I realized this, in many areas of life.