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The Politify.org News and Articles section contains updates on the progress of the Politify platform; it contains information about events and happenings of interest to our readers and it contains articles with information, ideas, suggestions, questions, opinions and more. Anything to start a conversation on the theme of social development and governance.

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Disclaimer

* Politify will never make any commercial or political deal that will prevent the organisation as a whole from acting in full capacity to deliver its social benefit ambitions.
* The Politify platform, when finally complete, will be protected by strict anti-corruption policies to ensure that its voting systems can never be compromised by any commercial dealings.
* The details of these anti-corruption policies to be published and discussed publicly on the Politify platform when created.
* The commercial and the social benefit goals will always be kept separate so that the capitalistic interests of the organisation will never compromise the integrity of its voting and social advocacy systems.
* The Politify platform will always remain neutral allowing any individual or group to make a positive contribution to society and to the way it is governed.
* Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

Politify - Early Proposal Video

A Look Back at the Beginning

Hopefully most of you will have seen the opening video on our Home page. If you haven't seen it yet, you can view it at the You Tube link https://youtu.be/zFywNQtsMFI This video was created back in 2013 at the beginning of the project and its final version was a collaborative construction. At that time though, Politify founder Cameron Gibbs also created a slightly more straightforward version with a few extra details. Less of the marketing excitation and more of the academic thoughtfulness. It is release here for your interest. Compare the videos and see which one you prefer.

Video Transcript:

Scene 1:
Currently we have what is called a representative democracy. About every 3 years, we all go to a polling place to elect our representatives. Each area has a number of candidates available for you to select and we all try to vote for the candidates that we like the best. If elected, your favourite candidate then gets the job of representing your area in the Federal parliament. Australia is divided up into 150 different electoral areas and so there are 150 politicians working in the House of Representatives.

Piece to Camera:
Let's think about that! That's just 150 people whose job it is, to represent the views of 30 Million Australians. Do you think that's possible?

Scene 2:
The ideal of our representative democracy is that we should be able to elect individuals and groups who we think have similar views to us, who will champion our values and who will act on our behalf to give us what we need and want. But the reality is that no matter who you choose, they will do some things you like and some things you don't. Politicians have their own values and their own point of view telling them what is right and wrong. They have their own reasons for wanting to have an influence on the political system. If they are a virtued politician, they might want to represent their people well but really they are individuals. They can only generalise. Even if you have a conversation with your local member of parliament, your words and ideas will need to be considered amongst hundreds and sometimes thousands of voices. So how could they possibly represent your views? Its impossible!

Scene 3:
Piece to camera:
We at Politify believe that we can make our system even better.

We are proposing to give you, the people, the power. Right now, we are building an internet system that will bridge the gap between the representatives and those they are supposed to be representing. It will allow any person to contribute an idea, to challenge an idea or to ask a question. But more than that, it is a system that will work socially to elevate the best ideas to the top.

Scene 4:
Ideas will be shaped and guided by sophisticated reasoning assistance tools to make sure that the ideas are fact based, logical and appropriate. Ideas will be tested based on the following philosophy:

Words on screen:
An idea should exist until someone finds fault with it.
But that fault is an idea and it should exist until someone finds fault with it.
And so on...

"So that this process can continue to its logical conclusion, this process needs to end only when there are no more faults to explore."

"So that we are only managing reasonable arguments, when finding fault, you need to say:"

Words on screen:
What is wrong.
What defines it as wrong
And where possible, you should suggest its correction.

Now there is obviously a lot more to this. But the conclusion from following these steps is that it will allow society to follow the current most fault free ideas.

To see how it all works, and to contribute to our crowdfunding campaign, please visit politfy.org.au

The power of this system is that it only takes one person to have a great idea. You might be that person.

So what will you suggest first?

Words on screen:
I am my own representative at Politify.org.au

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Volunteers, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

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Politify.org Articles  

Video and Topic Review

November 2018 Monthly Meeting

Next meeting happening on the 12th of December 2018 at Crowd HQ. See further details here.

Two videos reviewed during the meeting:
Video 1 - Meeting The Enemy
Video 2 - Self Defence Doesn't Exist in Australia

Video 1:

Meeting The Enemy

A feminist comes to terms with the Men's Rights movement

Cassie Jaye - TEDxMarin

"By facing long-held assumptions, one woman reevaluates her own gender biases."
Presenter Cassie Jaye is the documentary filmmaker who created the The Red Pill

Video 1 In Review:

URL: https://youtu.be/3WMuzhQXJoY
Video Title: MEETING THE ENEMY A feminist comes to terms with the Men's Rights movement | Cassie Jaye | TEDxMarin
Featuring: Cassie Jaye
Produced by:  TEDxMarin https://www.ted.com/about/programs-initiatives/tedx-program
Publishing Date: 18 October 2017
Platform where video was found/displayed: You Tube

Video 1 Discussion:

Crowd HQ
1240 Albany Hwy, Cannington WA 6107

Topics emerging from Video 1:

The following is a list of topics that were either observed directly being discussed in the video or they were associated with the video by meeting chair Cameron Gibbs or by others in attendance at the monthly meeting. These topics were used to lead the discussion. Meeting participants then responded to these, elaborated on some or went in different directions.

Feminists not actually listening to men - A generalisation that could be taken from the video.
Generalisations to be avoided.
People not actually listening to others in groups they think are their opposition.

Nobody will listen to you more than someone that transcribes your words.

Statements honouring unique contributions to society not necessarily anti- or oppositional.

Care and compassion for all.
Adding to the gender equality debate rather than being oppositional.

Incompatible counter arguments.
Argument and counter argument is not a contest. Counter arguments don't necessarily invalidate arguments so we need to be able to counter the counter.
An idea should exist until someone finds fault with it but that fault is an idea and should exist until someone finds fault with it. This is a principle that Politify is founded on.

Group think and tribalism

When you begin to humanise your enemy, you yourself may be dehumanised by your own tribe.

Your enemy is your own ego, your own self labels.

Not identifying with a label that is being abused or misused is not the same as being opposed to the core issues that spawned that label.

Video 2:

Self-Defense Doesn't Exist In Australia

"The issue being highlighted here is the need for public scrutiny of legislation. If a YouTube blogger with no formal qualifications in law, can spot a logical flaw in the legislation and the people responsible for creating the law can't, then this demonstrates a clear need for public scrutiny and crowd based problem solving." Says Politify founder Cameron Gibbs.

Defense = American English
Defence = British English

Video 2 In Review:

URL: https://youtu.be/t5ltfJFkiiA
Video Title: SELF-DEFENSE DOESN'T EXIST IN AUSTRALIA
Featuring: Sydney Watson
Produced by:  Sydney Watson
Publishing Date: 14 March 2018
Platform where video was found/displayed: You Tube

Video 2 Discussion:

Crowd HQ
1240 Albany Hwy, Cannington WA 6107

Topics emerging from Video 2:

The following is a list of topics that were either observed directly being discussed in the video or they were associated with the video by meeting chair Cameron Gibbs or by others in attendance at the monthly meeting. These topics were used to lead the discussion. Meeting participants then responded to these, elaborated on some or went in different directions.

Crime and violence getting worse and worse
People committing crimes are likely to be armed

Three main areas of defence:
Defence of yourself or another person with a weapon
Defence of yourself or another person with fists or your body
Defence of your home/property

Banning weapons (even some considered as defencive weaponse) appears to be more about limiting the opportunity for abuse with those weapons rather than limiting opportunity for defence.
If nobody has access to a weapon then we reduce the chance of a weapon based abuse and we require that people find other ways to resolve disputes.

Whether or not you agree with the restrictions on access to weapons for defencive purposes, it is still clear that there are problems with the laws. Victims of crime can be double punished by also becoming victims of the law.
If the experts can't see these problems in law and a self righteous video blogger can, how can we trust our authorities?

Fight or flight behaviours need to be understood and be included as a consideration within the law.
Defence against any wrong needs the chronology of the wrong doing to be considered. So if a person commits a crime against you first and you respond, even if the outcome of your response is considered excessive/unfortunate/tragic, if you wouldn't have had opportunity or cause for the response without the crime first being committed against you, then you can't be seen to be open for prosecution.
Subjective measures of force.
What is reasonable and excessive?

Criminals break laws and they carry weapons.

If people can't legally defend themselves, what is the social incentive not to commit crime?

Is it moral to respond excessively?

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Volunteers, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

Share our news and articles and help create real social and political change.

Show your support for Politify.org and Register for an account today.

When you share this article please make sure you link to the Direct Article Link to help support our proof of audience efforts. Your cooperation with this is much appreciated.

Direct Article Link

Politify.org Articles  

Video and Topic Review

October 2018 Monthly Meeting

Next meeting happening on the 14th of November 2018 at Crowd HQ. See further details here.

Dirty Jobs' Mike Rowe on the High Cost of College

Is College/University the only Route to Career Success?

"If we are lending money that ostensibly we don't have to kids who have no hope of making it back in order to train them for jobs that clearly don't exist, I might suggest that we've gone around the bend a little bit," says TV personality Mike Rowe, best known as the longtime host of Discovery Channel's Dirty Jobs.

Video In Review:

URL: https://youtu.be/qzKzu86Agg0
Video Title: Dirty Jobs' Mike Rowe on the High Cost of College
Featuring: Nick Gillespie interviewing Mike Rowe
Produced by:  Reason TV
Publishing Date: 13 December 2013
Platform where video was found/displayed: You Tube

Meeting Discussion:

Crowd HQ
1240 Albany Hwy, Cannington WA 6107

Topics emerging during the meeting:

The following is a list of topics that were either observed directly being discussed in the video or they were associated with the video by meeting chair Cameron Gibbs or by others in attendance at the monthly meeting.

The video was discussing a situation within the USA but it also has parallels to things happening in Australia where the meeting was held and in other countries.

Situational differences and similarities between the USA and Australia
Social Money into universities VS Private money into universities
Learning for the sake of it VS Learning for a purpose

Is University obsolete?
      Modern learning methods including The Kahn Academy
      Access to knowledge
      Who is checking that you actually know something?
      Over supply of degrees

Is "Work" as an institution obsolete?
      Universal Basic Income
      Cryptocurrency
      The Politify project, Altruism First
      Alternative economic systems
      Job redundancy
      Freelancer working
      What Mike Rowe describes as "Mercinary working"

Cost of the degree / learning
Health and fitness more important than learning

The USA currently offers scholarships to support the following:
      Intelligence
      Athleticism
      Need
Who supports work ethic?

How do we promote the other ideas and values that society needs and wants?

"Work Smart Not Hard" is transformed to "Work Smart And Hard"

In a new world economy, who is going to do the heavy lifting? Who is going to build the roads, fix the septic tanks and sewers. Who is going to clean the streets and process the recycling?
Can we rely on companies and capitalism to serve the social need?
Can we rely on government to serve the social need?
Do not for profits, charities, volunteer organisations and NGOs adequately fill the gaps in need that are not supplied by companies and government?

Follow your passion VS Follow opportunity
Follow social benefit / need
Failure of aspirational wish fulfillment

Failure of the credential system supplied by colleges and universities
Logical fallacies in the credentialing system
The hidden cost of compliance for business and the immense anger around this
Hiring someone isn't just about paying their wage.

Acronyms, sayings and catch phrases intended to guide a social behaviour but now limiting society
How far do we take them?

Influence of technology and innovation on existing job opportunities.
Displacement Theory
Aspirations changing over time.

Efficiency taken too far has social consequences
Total efficiency is total robots - do we want this?

Jobs = Personal purpose
Art in your work

Proposed Politify Projects:

The following is a list of projects proposed during the meeting. They are projects proposed either by inspiration from the video, inspired by discussion or proposed independently by attentdees.

• Bumper Bonanza Sale - Raising money for the final stage of Politify.org platform development - See the News and Articles Section of Politify.org
• The Legal Purpose Initiative - All laws have a purpose. All laws need to be connected back to a social benefit. If they are not then they must be considered authoritarian in nature and they need to be removed. - See the News and Articles Section of Politify.org
• Self Improvement As a National Ambition - Create a national Self Improvement Day - See the News and Articles Section of Politify.org - Consider learnings from the R U OK Day
• The Socratic Web - The solution to Fake News, Story Telling and Misinformation - See the News and Articles Section of Politify.org
• Altruism First - Creating economic systems that support and encourage social benefit as a priority - Leveraging the social decision making systems of the Politify.org platform - Currently no literature
• Farmer's Growth - A Food Abundance Project - Leveraging the economic systems proposed for the Altruism First project, we build protections for farmers and growers of food - Currently no literature
• Negative Rent - A proposal to allow house the most vulnerable people in our society by allowing them to be caretakers of liability and dromant properties - See the article by Chris Caston It is time to re-imagine how we live.

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Volunteers, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

Share our news and articles and help create real social and political change.

Show your support for Politify.org and Register for an account today.

When you share this article please make sure you link to the Direct Article Link to help support our proof of audience efforts. Your cooperation with this is much appreciated.

Direct Article Link

Politify.org Articles  

The Curse of the Critical Analyst

Intellectual Subtleties Giving Perceived Authority to Stalwarts

Information:

A Brief History of the Idea of Critical Thinking
The Foundation for Critical Thinking
http://www.criticalthinking.org/pages/a-brief-history-of-the-idea-of-critical-thinking/408
Sub-Reference:

The intellectual roots of critical thinking are as ancient as its etymology, traceable, ultimately, to the teaching practice and vision of Socrates 2,500 years ago who discovered by a method of probing questioning that people could not rationally justify their confident claims to knowledge. Confused meanings, inadequate evidence, or self-contradictory beliefs often lurked beneath smooth but largely empty rhetoric.

Information:

Karl Popper
Author: Multiple Wikipedia Contributors
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Popper
Sub-Reference:

Sir Karl Raimund Popper is generally regarded as one of the 20th century's greatest philosophers of science.

Popper is known for his rejection of the classical inductivist views on the scientific method, in favour of empirical falsification: A theory in the empirical sciences can never be proven, but it can be falsified, meaning that it can and should be scrutinized by decisive experiments. Popper is also known for his opposition to the classical justificationist account of knowledge, which he replaced with critical rationalism, namely "the first non-justificational philosophy of criticism in the history of philosophy.

Popper coined the term "critical rationalism" to describe his philosophy. Concerning the method of science, the term indicates his rejection of classical empiricism, and the classical observationalist-inductivist account of science that had grown out of it.

Logically, no number of positive outcomes at the level of experimental testing can confirm a scientific theory, but a single counterexample is logically decisive; it shows the theory, from which the implication is derived, to be false.

Information:

The Relativity of Wrong
By Isaac Asimov
http://chem.tufts.edu/answersinscience/relativityofwrong.htm
Sub-Reference:

"John, when people thought the earth was flat, they were wrong. When people thought the earth was spherical, they were wrong. But if you think that thinking the earth is spherical is just as wrong as thinking the earth is flat, then your view is wronger than both of them put together."

The basic trouble, you see, is that people think that "right" and "wrong" are absolute; that everything that isn't perfectly and completely right is totally and equally wrong.

Naturally, the theories we now have might be considered wrong in the simplistic sense of my English Lit correspondent, but in a much truer and subtler sense, they need only be considered incomplete.

Information:

Six Thinking Hats
de Bono Thinking Systems
http://www.debonothinkingsystems.com/tools/6hats.htm
Sub-Reference:

The Six Thinking Hats (or modes)
The White Hat - calls for information known or needed.
The Red Hat - signifies feelings, hunches and intuition.
The Black Hat - is judgment, the devil's advocate or why something may not work.
The Yellow Hat - symbolizes brightness and optimism.
The Green Hat - focuses on creativity: the possibilities, alternatives and new ideas.
The Blue Hat - is used to manage the thinking process.\

Defining the Problem

A critical analysis of a subject or an idea is often used as a counter to hopeful thinking, a bias towards optimism where problems are ignored, as a counter to misinformation and as a counter to belief based thinking and magical thinking. In this context, a critical analysis can level one's view back towards being more objective. However, what is happening here is that we are attempting to balance the bias of one subjective view of the world with the bias from another. We are trying to balance the positive with the negative which can create a pendulum swing of emotional themes within the discussion. Introducing any bias into a discussion can contaminate the emotional detachment needed to be truly, academically objective.

Within any discussion about building something or solving a problem, we need to be as objective as possible about what is known and not known, where there is potential and where there are real issues to be overcome. Spend too much time absorbed in what is known at the expense of questioning and seeking out what is not and we fail to incrementally advance past the limits of our current knowledge. Spend too much time on what we don't know and we have no base of knowledge to launch from. Here we get stuck in feelings of uncertainty that can erode confidence. Spend too much time on exploring what we see as opportunities, consumed by hope and we blind ourselves to seeing the things that will bring those opportunities crashing down. Spend too much time on the problems as if they are unresolvable and not a construct of the mind and we bring everything to a halt.

Where a person can see the need for objectivity and they understand the emotional balance required to seek out this objectivity, a critical analysis can be applied consciously to good benefit. Because of this, the mental ability that comes with being able to perform a critical analysis has been promoted as a virtuous skill amongst academics for what looks like a few thousand years. However, in part because of that history, the "Critical Analyst" as a personality type, a person who operates with a critical-by-default style of analysis, has been promoted as virtuous as well without having regard for the context that makes the practice virtuous. This promotion of the personality type and the bias as opposed the consciously applied mental practice brings less of a benefit to society and in my view, in places, can be thought of as a depression inducing curse that can bind the gears of problem solving.

Closely related to the critical-by-default analysis style is the concept of being sceptical. I use the word "being" here on purpose so that I can specifically talk about an intuited modality of operation as distinct from a consciously applied mental behaviour. Consciously applying scepticism when presented with a new idea can ensure we don't accept anything as true and factual and useful until the information or idea has been consciously tested. We shouldn't just accept things as fact just because someone said it is. People are inherently bad at absorbing and communicating facts and inevitably will weave in their own focus and interpretations into the account of what they observe. Operating with scepticism is operating with an awareness of this. Doing this consciously but objectively we can consider possibilities without accepting those possibilities as truth until further validated. Again, in context, the mindset of not accepting something as a truth until it is further validated is a virtuous behaviour but to a critical-by-default analyst, this concept of scepticism can quickly morph into a bias towards an automated idea rejection. Taken to extremes it can become a form of intellectual bigotry where no new idea is considered unless the person evaluating it sought it out as one of their own. Only if the idea fits with pre-established prejudices will the new idea be considered as valid and the person doing this may feel justified to reject all new ideas because they mistakenly think they are operating virtuously as a sceptic or a critical analyst.

The problem with being sceptical as a modality of operation, as a part of one's personality, is that the person being sceptical sets the rules on how they can be convinced and the rules they set are always subjective and imposing work on another. Given my awareness of these subtle behavioural distinctions, the concept of "burdern of proof" as an invalidating point of logic, this is a notion I must consciously reject. In my opinion it needs to be seen as a modern truism that it is NOBODY'S job to convince you. It is instead your own job to seek out new ideas and new information, to test and question, to add knowledge and ideas to your own wherever they can be found to be valid and to remove beliefs, assumptions and ideas that have been invalidated. That said, pushing back the burden of proof onto a person who is clearly delusional, may serve as a tool and a technique to have them further investigate their views should they be so inclined to do so. The point here being that burden of proof should not be used as a way of "winning an argument" and instead if you are yourself interested in truth, you will take on the burdern of seeking truth for yourself.

Instead of being sceptical, I encourage you instead to be understanding. Seek to understand another's point of view. Seek to understand how they have arrived at a conclusion they have reached. Meet them half-way in terms of the workload needed to communicate a set of ideas. Then be objective with your evaluation of the validity of the ideas they present as opposed to being dismissive simply because they have not yet met your communication disrupting, subjective, emotionally themed criteria for being convinced. Try to seek any validity in their point of view that may be there. Having adopted this approach for a long time now, I have come to see validity in a large array of world views even if the conclusions reached or the actions proposed by individuals have issues.

Have you ever been in a situation where you are trying to explain an idea to someone and the person you are talking to just doesn't seem to be getting it? Have you ever been explaining an idea to them and instead of them seeing the opportunity, all they see are the problems? Have you ever felt like your well reasoned arguments have been dismissed summarily and for reasons that you could easily rebut? In situations like these, perhaps you are talking to a critical analyst.

An analyst is someone who will crawl their mind over a subject, considering in sequence, the different aspects of that subject. They generally will be open to seeing different points of view. If you get someone who is relatively unbiased, they will likely be able to consider both the opportunities and those areas of an idea that require careful and cautious attention. A critical analyst is someone that has a tendency to also crawl their mind over a subject but contrary to the very useful analyst, the critical analyst will show bias when it comes to highlighting those areas that require careful and cautious attention. This bias will often result in them taking a nay-saying, depressive, shut-you-down position and this is hardly ever useful.

I should point out that the critical analyst is also distinct from someone who can offer constructive criticism. Constructive criticism as its name suggests is generally constructive and it is therefor helpful. Constructive criticism is generally delivered at a time when one is working to develop something and it helps with the improvement process. Critical analysts on the other hand are generally not at all concerned with the creation side of things. Generally they are only concerned with finding an opportunity to tell you how flawed your thinking is.

The problem I wish to highlight here in this article is that in our society, the critical analyst has gained a an authoritarian foothold. Analysts have been celebrated for their ability to thoroughly acquire knowledge about a subject and rightfully so. If you point to any scientific or technological breakthrough you will find that the person most directly responsible for its conception will be someone who has strong analytical skills. The problem is that while we have been celebrating the presence of the analyst, a large number of critical analyst archetypes have been grouped in with the analysts and now they are in many positions of power and influence.

So how did it all go so wrong? Looking back over my limited knowledge of history and applying a summary opinion to it all I'd say that elitism and academia were to blame. Education for the masses has been a wonderful introduction into recent history but go back only a hundred years or so and education was only for the rich. To get ahead and to stay ahead, one needed to be educated. Knowledge is power and power brings the ability to earn a living, to survive, to thrive and to establish oneself within a position of privilege and influence. Once a position is gained, one has a need to defend their knowledge gained position even as one's understanding of that knowledge changes. One could theorise that this was once a matter of survival.

Imagine a hypothetical scenario from the past where some upstart in the village came in with a new idea for a water well in the middle of the village and this idea was popularly favored over a bucket transport system bringing fresh water to the village from a nearby river. The bucket transport system promoted by a land owner in a privileged position with land meeting the edge of the river. He is there collecting his income from the status quo, selling buckets and giving a job to a team of water carriers as he collects toll from them travelling across his land. He is comforted by the fact that the village will always need water. Faced with this new idea of a well and only he having enough wealth and influence to dig the well, he would have to quickly dismiss the new idea save losing his social position and his ability to survive. In this situation, critical analysis seems like the perfect intellectual tool for the wealthy and educated land owner. The perfect tool for the job of defense. Analysis is not something that everyone in the village can do therefore by being a critical analyst and highlighting all of the possible problems. Problems with digging the well, finding the best spot for it, keeping it clean, distributing it fairly, making sure it doesn't go dry and figuring out where we are going to put all the sand and rock that comes out of the ground. Promote these as insurmountable problems and cite your well-paid-for education as authority on the subject and there is a good chance that your rival will not be able to best you in a game of wits. With the critical analyst steering the conversation towards the negatives, any lookers on from the village are also not likely to be able to see around the negativity smokescreen and if they do they certainly don't have the power to act independent. Using this approach a critical analyst can successfully make it very difficult for any free thinking person to gain intellectual traction and it is all done to maintain a position of privilege.

This hypothetical speculation of mine takes scene within the early days of education and the early days of promoting the benefits of critical analysis within the emerging bureacracies of Europe. At a time where the forces against one's survival would have been far greater than today. So what about now? Well the plagues and the snake oil salesmen and the feuding peasants are still amongst us but in modern times with education being freely available to most of the masses and with the improved access to information and with social mechanisms in place to stop it getting out of hand, the threat of new ideas destabilising a person's position of privilege and power is no longer the most common promoter of the critical analyst archetype. In developed countries at least we have social mechanisms in place to ensure that most of us are kept comfortable and safe. That said, this hypothetical scenario shows how the critical-by-default behaviour might have established itself as a character trait, advertised as virtuous, becoming ubiquitous within our societies.

So why do some people maintain the critical analysis side to their personality? I'd say that in modern times it is less about maintaining a privileged position and it is more done as a part of a right-fighting, wanting to be heard, wanting to feel relevant, wanting to feel powerful over the situation kind of mindset. That coupled with perhaps the misguided idea, brought forward from the past, that being a critical analyst is inherently virtuous. Having in the past done it myself, I'd say that shutting down an idea can make oneself feel powerful and controlling whereas being presented with an open opportunity can feel like work and joy and happiness that we just don't have the energy for. Given that energy is conserved by being a nay-sayer and energy needs to be used to explore an opportunity, unfortunately, some might even make the point that the human condition favours a nay-saying, critical-analysis mindset. Truth be told, we could be here for the next six months analysing why some people have critical analysis as a go-to way of being and at the end of that six months we maybe could write a nice thesis for a psychology degree.

Cutting to the main point of this article... In part because of the history of academia, in part for personal and emotional reasons and in part because of energy conservation being built into the human condition, you will find that critical analysts as a personality type are everywhere. Many are our lawyers, our politicians, our doctors, our economists, our IT professionals. They are in every industry and they can be the gum that binds up the gearing of our society.

The Proposed Solution

So how do we deal with the critical analyst?

Well first of all, if you have seen yourself in my descriptions of a critical analyst then I encourage you to examine the emotional bias that you bring to your analysis. It is on the level of emotional intelligence that critical analysis as a personality type can be shifted to critical analysis as a consciously chosen tool of the mind. After that, I encourage you to seek out a book by Dr. Edward de Bono where he describes the Six Thinking Hats. I have to admit to having never read any of his books but having worked out similar theories of mind myself, I have found his six thinking hats concept to be one of the easiest ways to explain how to develop a fully-rounded, objectivity-seeking mindset. Should this article go viral Dr de Bono can thank me for the free promotion of his book and his thinking systems.

Secondly if you ever are trying to communicate a new idea or a solution to a problem and you need to deal with someone else who is a critical analyst, here are a few things I have learned:

1. Never, ever, ever engage them on their terms. Do not ever answer their analysis by trying to find fault with their arguments. They won't get it and you will only start a long, boring, depressing conversation that will get you both nowhere and that is exactly where they want you.
2. Do always employ a dodge and divert tactic. If they bring up one criticism, you counter by pointing out an unrelated opportunity. This is not to say you avoid the criticism, it is just to say that you should avoid getting stuck on it. They may raise a genuine issue but where they raise it as a show stopper, you can re-frame it later as a challenge to be overcome and the work you can do to have it be overcome.
3. Never engage them for any length of time. If you do they will regroup their thoughts and come back to their critical analysing ways. Also you increase your profile on their threat assessment radar. Get in quick, deliver your opportunity and get out before they have a chance to find fault with it. They can then work through the opportunity without needing to have their nay-saying be socially validated.
4. Always, always, always be friendly and greet them with a smile but don't overwhelm them with your positivity. The less they see you as being bias by that positivity, the less they will feel they need to counter your emotion.
5. If you have already seen some of the issues with your solution and are already working to overcome those issues, do your best to communicate this efficiently. Beat them to the nay-saying but demonstrate the work you have already done to overcome it.
6. Never, ever let them get you down. You might think they are trying to make your life miserable by stifling your creative tendencies but if you are positive and you don't let them, they lose their power. Chances are they are not being negative on purpose anyway, its just a behaviour. 

As much as I'd love to have a complete answer here, truth is that some sticky minds just can't be unstuck. If you find yourself confronted by a stalwart of a critical analyst and you find no way of going through them, try to go around them. If you have no joy with one person, move onto the next. Hopefully in time, as your great ideas gain social traction, the nay-sayers will come around.

In Summary

• Scepticism and Critical Analysis represent useful, objectivity-seeking mental behaviours only when used in context.
• The valid context for use is as a counter to the following:
  • Hopeful thinking
  • A bias towards optimism where problems are ignored
  • As a counter to misinformation
  • As a counter to belief based thinking
  • As a counter to magical thinking
• Even in this valid context we are attempting to counter one bias point of view with another, potentially creating a pendulum swing of emotional themes within the discussion, from positive to negative.
• For the above reason, even the valid context should be avoided where possible.
• To maintain objectivity, instead of being a critical analyst, just be an analyst.
• When a person is being sceptical by default they are requiring that others be convincing.
• "Burden of Proof" cannot be used to invalidate an idea.
• It is NOBODY'S job to convince you. It is instead your own job to seek out new ideas and new information, to test and question, to add knowledge and ideas to your own wherever they can be found to be valid and to remove beliefs, assumptions and ideas that have been invalidated.
• Instead of being sceptical, seek to be understanding and then evaluate the idea you have now understood.
• Being an objective analyst is virtuous. Being a critical analyst is not.
• Instead of being a critical analyst, just be an analyst!

Proposed Implementation

Ideas are contributed to Politify as single idea sentences and arranged into hierarchical contexts to give them relevance and meaning. They can then be attached to other ideas with relationships to form more complicated constructions. This allows for each idea to be validated or challenged individually without affecting other, related or connected ideas.

Within the Politify platform, there are tools to challenge an idea based on the presence of an emotional bias. This can be any bias towards any emotional influence that causes objectivity on the subject to be displaced. With those emotionally themed ideas challenged, they can either be rephrased or reframed to bring them back to an objective expression so as to maintain any validity within the idea, or they can be replaced with an idea that can be validated objectively.

Because the Politify environment is a group effort, progress of any plan is not necesarily dependent on any one individual in any position of influence. So if a stalwart is encountered who can be reasoned with, they won't hold up progress. That said, valid arguments against an idea, must be addressed to remove a challenge.

There are tools to manage trolling, spamming, bot-posting and nay-saying practices. These practices being efficiently taken care of so as not to distract from the main purpose.

Suggested Discussion Topics

• Where is scepticism justified?
• Where is a critical analysis justified?
• When to apply a burden of proof?
• How to consciously and objectively apply criticism and scepticism.
• Constructive applications of criticism and scepticism.
• "Burden of proof" should NOT be on a list of logical fallacies as there can be no difinitive test of proof.
• Examples of misguided applications of the crytical analyst behaviour set.

 Author

Cameron Gibbs
Politify Founder

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

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New Voiceover for the Politify Introduction Video

Performance by Politify Founder Cameron Gibbs

Hopefully most of you will have seen the opening video on our Home page. If you haven't seen it yet, you can view it at the You Tube link https://youtu.be/zFywNQtsMFI This video was created back in 2013 at the beginning of the project. At that time I did have ambitions for the Politify platform to go global but I had the view that I would start with my home country of Australia and build from there. Because of this view, I focussed on the Australian political system and showed how Politify could be used to improve the system in Australia. I also included imagery from Australian politics. The more people I spoke to though, the more I saw that most people instantly understood that the Politify platform, like the internet itself, could be a global resource.

Here we are now in 2018, with the Politify platform nearing a release ready state and I am preparing for its launch. It is time to update the video to reflect this new global vision. My friend Glen who did the voiceover for the original video wasn't available so I've done my best to inject some appropriate emotion into my voice. Giving my best impression of a news-reader's voice, I have recorded the new voiceover. Let me know what you think?

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Audio Transcript:

Politify is going to give you, the people, political power!

Politify is a platform for your ideas and your views to be heard. Anyone can post a suggestion and rally the support of the people. Your collective voice is sent directly to local and national politicians, in your country, to create real change.

Here's how it will work...

Currently politicians are given the duty of representing your views. They are required to act on your behalf and we hope they have your benefit in mind. But most of them won't know you're your name, they won't know your struggles, they won't know your background, your needs or your wants. So without knowing anything about you, how could they possibly represent you?

Ideally, in a representative system, we should be able to elect individuals and groups who we think have similar views to us, who will champion our values and who will act on our behalf to give us what we need and want. But no matter who you choose, they will do some things you like and some things you don't.

What if...we could bridge the gap between our political representatives and those they are supposed to be representing. Poilitify will allow any person to contribute an idea, to challenge an idea or to ask a question. But more than that, it is a system that will work socially to elevate the best ideas to the top!!!

Ideas will be shaped and guided by sophisticated reasoning assistance tools to make sure that the ideas are fact based, logical and appropriate.

Politify can be used to tackle some of society's greatest social challenges.
Including climate change.
Plastic in our oceans.
Refugee support.
Homelessness
Theft and vandalism.
Murder, violence and war.
Medicine affordability and world hunger
With Politify we can work together to build fairer economic systems to lift people out of poverty and to spread the opportunities for individual advancement.

Politify's hierarchical subject systems are nuanced enough to allow debate over local details but scoped wide enough to allow decision making and coordination on a grand international level.

Now there is obviously a lot more to this. But Politify will allow society to follow and support the best ideas in their local area, nationally and even around the world.

Polifity is about joining our minds together to offer great solutions to social challenges. The greater our voice and the better our ideas... the less we can be ignored.

Politify are looking for team members, funding and supporters!

The power of Polifity is that it only takes one person to have a great idea. That person might be you.

Visit Politify.org to learn more.

Author

Cameron Gibbs
Politify Founder

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

Share our news and articles and help create real social and political change.

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Free Speech Vs Censorship

Open-Forum Idea-Invalidation as the practical middle ground

Free Speech protests at the University of California, Berkeley USA in 1964

Information:

Free Speech Movement
Author: Multiple Wikipedia Contributors
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Speech_Movement

Information:

Hate Speech
National Coalition Against Censorship
HOME / ISSUES / HATE SPEECH
http://ncac.org/issue/hate-speech
Sub-Reference:

Should government control, even ban, speech that “incites religious and ethnic hatred”?
...censoring disturbing or even offensive speech, especially in art and literature, often violates not only the intentions or spirit of the speaker or writer, but suggests a perhaps willful lack of understanding of language itself: the ambiguity of words and images, as well as the role of context in determining meaning.

Information:

Curbing hate speech isn’t censorship – it’s the law
New Scientist
Magazine issue 3166, published 24 February 2018
https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23731662-900-curbing-hate-speech-isnt-censorship-its-the-law/
Sub-Reference:

A survey of 115 UK universities and students’ unions carried out by online magazine Spiked supposedly found that 63 of them “actively censor speech and ideas”. But a closer look reveals that the majority simply attempt to prohibit hate speech.

Defining the Problem

Declaring "freedom of speech" as a right is often thought of as a counter against the state control of criticism against public policy. Governments are inherently formed on top of certain ideals and ideologies and formed by groups that support those ideals and ideologies. What this inevitably means is that governments, no matter what process forms them (democratic, communist, capitalist, socialist, military coup etc), are always going to be formed from a coming together of common interests and by validating a common way of experiencing the world. It is inevitable therefore that the ruling body of people that form the government bureaucracy, all are going to be promoting one set of ideas often to the exclusion of others. Free speech therefore is an idea that is championed as a basic right throughout free thinking movements as a way of making sure the special interests and biases of the ruling body, do not subjugate, suppress and/or oppress those who may have a different experience base, a different point of view and different ideas to share. Allow freedom of speech and we allow a lively environment of debate, discussion and intellectual growth within our communities, we prevent the oppression of the intelligent and we allow open communication of problems and issues so that we may collectively seek to find solutions to them.

Of course one of the downsides to allowing free speech is that often, we will get individuals and groups who for various reasons, attach themselves to ideas that are commonly thought of as crazy, frustratingly disruptive or perhaps even dangerous. Not just bad ideas but also suggestions for causing harm to others can be stirred up in emotion fueled frenzies, socially validated with mobs forming around them. These ideas can sometimes be promoted by well meaning people who themselves occupy the middle ground on a subject. They connect themselves to a legitimate concern while disconnecting themselves from the extremism they toe along with them. For example feminist groups who have very clear man-hating prejudice as a part of their group, free trade promoters who have weapons and drug dealers as their advocates, open government advocates seeking government accountability who also have radicalised conspiracy theorists amongst them, anti-terrorism campaigners who have people amongst them thinking all terrorists are muslim etc. Groups formed around legitimate concerns and legitimate ideas can have the scope of their ideology tribe creeped out into some very illegitimate areas. So we are faced with the challenge of allowing and promoting the right to discuss those legitimate concerns and ideas freely while at the same time discouraging and in some cases even preventing other ideas which could be described as illegitimate or even harmful.

Debate rages currently in response to hate speech. While it is very clear to most objective observers that there are subjects and concepts that could be communicated to cause harm to others, those who wish to strictly protect people's rights to free speech say that any form of censorship imposed on those who speak out with hate, is putting government, law-makers and law-enforcers in charge of determining what can be said and what can't. They offer a slippery slope argument suggesting that opposition against and laws against clear hate speech may result in, for example, people also being prevented from speaking out hatefully against some of the poor practices of government, government agents and law enforcers.

So what might be the answer?
Currently I would say that most of the free world has for a very long time been locked into a state of apprehension where the lack of a clear solution has meant that hate speakers have at times been given a free run and free speech advocates have been tortured to justify this openness. The balance appears to push and pull as time goes by where sometimes government control is too controlling and sometimes government and community groups are rendered powerless against some very clear injustices.

In summary:

• If we allow governments to actively censor information and ideas then we potentially open the door to oppression and the silencing of political criticism.
• Censorship as the silencing of political criticism leading to the shutting down of ideas that could bring social benefit.
• Censorship as the silencing of political criticism allowing government created injustices, corruption and political bias to go without opposition.
• If we allow governments to actively censor information and material based on the sensibilities of some then we prevent access by those with different sensibilities.
• If we create the freedom to speek as a universal right without exception then we potentially open the door to hate speech, prejudice, harrassment, calls to violence, obscenity, the normalising of hurtful or harmful expressions and we lose the ability to control information and ideas that influence our lives and the lives of those we live around.
• Allow freedom of speech and we allow a lively environment of debate, discussion and intellectual growth within our communities but we must be careful to balance this with mechanisms for discouraging and in some cases even preventing the spread of ideas which could be described as illegitimate or even harmful.

The Proposed Solution

I would say that the problem comes from thinking about free speech as a universal, unconditional right or a rule. I would say that instead of having it as an absolute, we must instead bind it to a purpose. The freedom to speak must be granted for a purpose, for a social benefit. I would say that only when we disconnect it from this purpose and benefit do we start to encounter problems with letting crazy people and the emotionally disturbed run the show. So let us have freedom of speech protected as a rule but let us discuss its conditions, its limitations, when it is done for a beneficial purpose and when clearly the freedom no longer serves that purpose. As I see it, the purpose is to allow the exploration of new ideas; it is to allow for the collection of information; it is to allow criticism of government; but this is just my vision of purpose. We might ask who defines this purpose and who defines this list of conditions, limitations and exceptions and who decides when the freedom to speak is no longer beneficial to society? I would say that society as a whole needs to decide. With Politify as a tool, we no longer need to rely on groups of self-interested people who impose their biases and their limitations on the creation of this list. We get to crowdsource good reasoning on the subject.

The solution (as if you haven't guessed already) is the open-forum, direct-democracy systems of the Politify platform paired with the reasoning assistance tools and idea challenge tools that allow individual ideas to be invalidated by good reasoning practices. The ideas forming the concept of good reasoning themselves being open for debate but with the expectation that there are core principles and ideas that will be affirmed as objective and without good contest.

Have the ideas be free within the Politify framework; allow free debate around them in an open forum; but any ideas that are found to be actively working against the social benefit, these ideas can be invalidated by good academic reason, marked as not wanted in a public broadcast external to Politify and some even marked as uncontestably wrong/damaging. Once invalidated, the arguments that invalidate them are recorded and kept so that if anyone then wants to revisit those exact same ideas thinking they know better, the rest of us don't need to waste further time on it. Successfully invalidated ideas then are unlikely to gain further traction. That said, should new evidence come to be known or a new angle on existing ideas be seen, theoretically an invalidated idea could be rescued so long as it could be rescued by good reason. Here we bypass the problems of censorship as technically nothing is truly deleted or censored out of existence but we also solve the problem of not allowing hate speech or other socially damaging forms of expression because whenever someone revisits a long ago notion of hatred or obscenity, the arguments that invalidate the idea (including the history that is cited against it) are right next to it, forever pulling that idea apart.

Author's Note: While creating the Politify plaform, I operate with caution and an understanding that my own personal subjectivity and bias may be imposed on any system I create that would act to censor ideas. However, I must balance this with an understanding of the following... There are people amongst us who have an aversion to those rules of thought that are commonly considered amongst academics as the rules of good reason and logic. This aversion can be taken to the extremes of phobia and agitated rants against establishable facts. While it is a philosophical truth that nobody can truly know anything and this philosophical truth is clung to by many hoping to push through their evidence lacking notions of reality, there are practices of thought that can be used to establish points of knowledge that are so unlikely to be falsified by any practical test that attempts at its falsification are not worth effort. Here we can consider a philosophical saying of mine which sums up the scientific process but can also be used philisophically: "I think therefore I am, I measure it therefore it is, I perceive it in common with others who have measured it therefore my delusion is unlikely." Unlikely, not impossible but through peer review of our ideas and information gathering, we improve the chances of only the best of our ideas being promoted. The flaws in our ideas either being debated into oblivion or our flawed ideas so lowered in standing as to be no longer entertained as valid by the majority, hence never making it into public policy.

In Summary:

• Instead of freedom of speech being considered as a universal and unconditional right it should instead be connected to a socially beneficial purpose whereby the benefit is tested. If there is no longer a benefit to the freedom then the freedom must be removed or at least discouraged.
• The open forum debate systems of the Politify platform are proposed as a solution whereby the systems reward good reason and social benefit while discouraging flawed reason and social harm.
• Invalidated ideas are recorded next to the details and arguments that invalidate them.
• Invalidated ideas can potentially be rescued by good reason, new information or new insights into their application.

The Benefit of the Solution

Open-Forum Idea-Invalidation like the type being built into the Politify platform is the practical middle ground between government censorship and free speech as an unconditional right. Government censorship which has the potential for oppression. Unconditional free speech which gives hate speech and damaging ideas a free run through society. It is the best of both worlds because it still allows anyone to revisit an invalidated idea and allows the theoretical potential for ideas to be rescued. This is balanced by the fact that invalidated ideas are connected to all the good reasons why those ideas are considered to be inappropriate. These good arguements for the invalidation of any idea must be overcome in order to facilitate an idea rescue.

The direct democracy systems allow anyone to contribute either to the invalidation of an idea or to the rescue of an idea. The "Improve Politify" mechanisms allow for the systems of idea invalidation to be improved over time meaning that it is a total democracy system that does not harbour the subjective biases of its creators. Any intellectual limitations of the creators that exist can be overcome.

Proposed Implementation

The Politify, Direct Democracy portal is being developed now.

Suggested Discussion Topics

• Government censorship as the silencing of political criticism.
• Government censorship as the imposition of subjective sensitivities.
• Government censorship as a tool of oppression.
• Freedom of speech.
• Freedom of ideas.
• Freedom of hate.
• The benefit of criticism.
• The purpose of having freedom of speech.
• When the freedom to speak is no longer beneficial.

 Author

Cameron Gibbs
Politify Founder

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

Share our news and articles and help create real social and political change.

Show your support for Politify.org and Register for an account today.

When you share this article please make sure you link to the Direct Article Link to help support our proof of audience efforts. Your cooperation with this is much appreciated.

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Don't Just Change The Date, Re-Purpose The Date

Australia Day, Reflecting on History

Information:

Australia Day - History
Author: Dr Elizabeth Kwan
National Australia Day Council
https://www.australiaday.org.au/about-australia-day/history/
Extracted Reference:

1788 - Captain Arthur Phillip, commander of the First Fleet of eleven convict ships from Great Britain, and the first Governor of New South Wales, arrived at Sydney Cove on 26 January and raised the Union Jack to signal the beginning of the colony.

Information:

Australia Day - Reconciliation
National Australia Day Council
https://www.australiaday.org.au/about-australia-day/reconciliation/
Extracted Reference:

Our national day provides an opportunity to acknowledge and learn about our nation's past. It's a time to reflect on and learn about our national journey including the ongoing history, traditions and cultures of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples.

Information:

Australia Day - An Encyclopedic History
Author: Multiple Wikipedia Contributors
Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia_Day

Information:

Australia Day, Invasion Day, Survival Day: What's in a name?
Author: Karina Marlow
SBS TV, NITV
Published: 20 January 2016
https://www.sbs.com.au/nitv/explainer/australia-day-invasion-day-survival-day-whats-name
Sub-Reference:
Nakkiah Lui, a Gamilaroi and Torres Strait Islander actor and playwright, wrote an opinion piece in the Guardian explaining why she refused to celebrate the day but instead viewed it as a day of mourning.

"We mourn the declaration of Australia as terra nullius (land that belongs to no one) as well as those who have died in massacres, those who were dispossessed of their land and homes, those were denied their humanity, those who were shackled, beaten, sent to prison camps, and made to live in reserves."

Information:

Australia Day, Invasion Day, Survival Day: What's in a name?
Author: Karina Marlow
SBS TV, NITV
Published: 20 January 2016
https://www.sbs.com.au/nitv/explainer/australia-day-invasion-day-survival-day-whats-name
Sub-Reference:
Lowitja O'Donoghue who was awarded Australian of the Year in 1984 pleaded for dialogue about changing the date of Australia Day.

"Let us find a day on which we can all feel included, in which we can all participate equally, and can celebrate with pride our common Australian identity."

Information:

#ChangeTheDate
Authors: Rachel Siewert and Lidia Thorpe
The Greens Party
Published: 19 January 2018
https://greens.org.au/magazine/national/changethedate
Extracted Reference:

"January 26 is a potent reminder of that history and our efforts to airbrush it. To continue to celebrate Australia Day on January 26 is to ignore that dispossession.
That is why The Greens will continue to push for a national conversation around an appropriate and inclusive alternative date, and over the coming year will be looking for ways that we can work with local councils and local communities around the country who want to start a conversation about changing the date."

Information:

#ChangeTheDate
Authors: Rachel Siewert and Lidia Thorpe
The Greens Party
Published: 19 January 2018
https://greens.org.au/magazine/national/changethedate
Sub-Reference:
MP for Northcote in Victoria, Lidia Thorpe

"Every Australia Day, I am reminded that this was a process that began on January 26.
We can no longer ignore that suffering.
I'm so moved to see people from all walks of life start to recognise that this is a day of great sorrow.
But it is not a sudden shift. This year marks the 80th anniversary of respected Aboriginal activist William Cooper calling for a day of mourning.
I am a proud Australian and I believe we should celebrate the diversity and community spirit that makes us a great nation.
But our First Nations people are hurting. We must find a way to walk forward together in hope and healing."

Information:

Cooper, William (1861–1941)
Author: Diane Barwick
Australian Dictionary of Biography
Published: Volume 8, (MUP), 1981
http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/cooper-william-5773
Extracted Reference:

"His grave is at Cumeroogunga; his main achievement was the establishment of a 'National Aborigines Day', first celebrated in 1940."

Information:

NAIDOC History
National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee (NAIDOC)
http://www.naidoc.org.au/about/naidoc-history
Extracted Reference:

"From 1940 until 1955, the Day of Mourning was held annually on the Sunday before Australia Day and was known as Aborigines Day. In 1955 Aborigines Day was shifted to the first Sunday in July after it was decided the day should become not simply a protest day but also a celebration of Aboriginal culture."

Information:

Celebrating NAIDOC Week
National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee (NAIDOC)
http://www.naidoc.org.au/celebrating-naidoc-week
Extracted Reference:

"NAIDOC celebrations are held around Australia each July to celebrate the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
The week is celebrated not just in the Indigenous communities but also in increasing numbers of government agencies, schools, local councils and workplaces.
Here are some ideas on how to celebrate NAIDOC Week:" A list of suggested actions follows.

Author's Notes: Through my obervation of the history and the different views that have come from it, the call to "Change The Date" doesn't appear to be coming as a direct and unified request from Aboriginal people. Instead, having a day to celebrate Aboriginal history, culture and achievements as has been promoted by NAIDOC, this appears to be working to grow awareness and understanding of the role that the Aboriginal people have had in Australia's history. This same work is furthered on Australia day with existing events being run with the title of "Survival Day" and "Invasion Day" and events where the general public are invited to come to understand the concept of mourning that happens on the 26th of January. However, having something legitimate to protest against appears to have given these initiatives on the 26th of January, a fame and a fire that doesn't appear to have been replicated in scale by other initiatives such as NAIDOC Week which was moved to July.

There do appear to be signs of continuing governmental oppression and often a widespread oblivion towards the issues that the Aboriginal people have been facing. This certainly would put a dampener on any call to celebrate something which includes laws, systems and bureacracies that either haven't been kind to Aboriginal people or haven't been helpful. In response to calls to give Aboriginal people political power that they may use to build solutions to the issues they face, there is evidence to suggest that the constitution of Australia has been blamed as lacking the legal and bureacratic framework to give them that power. It is hoped the Politify platform could be used to bypass those legal and political issues which are currently creating a roadblock to the removal of perceived opression by allowing those oppressive elements to be directly targetted and solutions found.

Wondering where the call to change the date has come from, there appears to be no polling of Aboriginal people that I can find so it is hard to say if this campaign is indeed an action driven by the Aboriginal people as a majority view or if it is perhaps a compassion fuelled beatup. A stirring of misplaced do-gooding sentiment channeled into a Greens party point scoring effort. Not that I am in any way against the Greens or their initiatives, I mean only to suggest that we may need to look deeper than a hashtag slogan.

The one thing that can't change is the date on which the First Fleet ships arrived. The question is, how do we respond to this as a fact?

To me, the date doesn't appear to be the issue. The issue appears to be the celebration, the potential for a lack of respect from a few minority groups and perhaps the ongoing lack of voice that the Aboriginal people feel they have in parliament. Problem is that all of us as individuals lack a voice. Unless we align with one popularist group or another and have the numbers aligned with an issue we care about, all of us are largely powerless within this not-so-representative democracy.

Are Celebration and Respect, mutually exclusive ways of being? I think it depends on what part of the story an individual has within their mind at the time they celebrate. It is certainly possible to shift an individual's focus, so shifting the story for more and more Australians is what I think the campaign should be about.

I reserve my judgement on this issue and reserve the right to change my mind with the view that there are still unanswered questions but I call for an objective and measured understanding of the history contributing to Australia Day and a logical, socially beneficial response to it.

Personally I hold a view of consent. I don't have any hold on the idea of keeping it on the 26th of January and I don't have any hold on the idea of changing it, however, I think any decision should be a conscious decision. Throughout writing this article, I have found myself changing positions several times but having analysed it as thoroughly as I can in the time of writing this, I do now feel that there is more reason to keep it on the 26th than to change it. Further, I think that the push to change it can only cause more division and more harm within our community and it will pull the fire and drive out of education efforts that are staged as protests. If it brings any benefit at all it will only be an emotional benefit to a very few which we absolutely should aim for but there is perhaps a better approach to delivering this emotional shift.

Defining the Problem

In Summary:

• If we do actually change the date then those same people who want to highlight the injustices of our history and the continuing injustices built into our political, legal and social framework, they all of a sudden lose justification for their campaign. Why? Because you won. You got your date change and now a large number of people think you need to be satisfied with that.
• Changing the date to one that avoids protest has been proven by NAIDOC to be a PR mistake with a reduced attention on the history.
• If we do actually change the date, the history hasn't gone away. We will still have to highlight all those same issues on that new date only now with less credibility.
• Its unlikely to be supported universally so division is guaranteed.
• Even the aboriginal communities who are the focus of the call, are divided in their views about the date and many have made the point publicly that there are much bigger issues to tackle.
• If we change the date, we collectively miss an opportunity to promote the solutions to the injustices that are continuing to be faced by Aboriginal people. Changing the date being no practical part of that solution.

The Proposed Solutions

In order to keep all of the benefits of a national day of celebration with its implied intentions of national pride and national unity, while at the same time maintaining respect for the wrongs of the past that have allowed our present to happen, I propose the following as solutions:

• Use Australia Day, with all of its historical significance, use the attention, the media coverage and a guaranteed audience, to review the history, to analyse, educate, inspire and unite. Repurpose it with education as the cause.
• Continue with the education campaigns, the Invasion Day and Survival Day campaigns. Make them a feature.
• Stop with the wrote learned statements of fake respect for Aboriginal land and culture coming from government officials and instead work to encourage some real respect by giving real people a voice.
• Politically empower aboriginal people at the same time as empowering every other individual by giving them a platform on which they can provide facts about the issues they face and discuss the solutions they seek and let's crowdsource some solutions direct from Aboriginal people themselves. The solutions channeled through the Politify platform.
• If the pain felt on the 26th of January is real for any individual and would not be healed by a change of date, let's train/employ Aboriginal councillors to assist with cultural/historical pain or pain born from thoughts of the past. Let's make this a personal development issue for individuals allowing them to take back their personal power.
• Acknowledge the pledge of the National Australia Day Council: "We aspire to an Australia Day that can increasingly include a recognition and celebration by all Australians of the importance of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders to our nation."
• Acknowledge that Australia Day on the 26th of January is already a very inclusive day with the majority of people showing respect when given the chance to do so. Expressions of respect and understanding only growing in popularity through time. Celebration and respect not being mutually exclusive ways of being.
• Let's work to fix some real social issues instead of spending time on a superficial date change.
• After all this is said, if I have got it all wrong and we give Aboriginal people a voice with Politify and we hear directly that a large percentage of Aboriginal people genuinely do want the date of Australia Day to change and for it to be a triumphant day of celebration that is not at all scarred by considerations of the past, let's react to the statistic as a fact and confidently move forward with change.

The Benefit of the Solutions

The solutions being proposed have the theme of promoting a decision being made consciously and without subconsciously drifting towards one pole or another in response to the binary "Change The Date" campaign. If we are going to change the date then this should be based on a polling of the views of Aboriginal people having regard for the fact that there may actually be no long term benefit to changing the date.

If we keep the date, we avoid creating further division and disrespect within our society.

The benefit of the solutions being proposed, would make use of the facts of history to inspire greater respect and understanding. The history being made even more of a feature of Australia Day.

Suggested Discussion Topics

• Poll of views coming direct from Aboriginal people.
• Do you participate in a day of mourning on the 26th of January?
  • Do you feel pain when you see people celebrating on a day of mourning?
• How can Respect and Celebration coexist on the same day?
• The role of personal responsibility when shifting pain.
• Accepting the existence of disrespectful idiots.
• Do you want the date to change?

 Author

Cameron Gibbs
Politify Founder

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

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Cryptocurrency Perspectives: Decentralisation, Decapitalisation, Disintermediation – Peerism

Appearance by Nathan Waters of Peerism on The Innovation Show

Information:

Platform: The Innovation Show is described as "A Global Show for Changemakers, Mavericks, Different Thinkers."
About the Show: In a world of constant disruption many businesses, many people and many parents stick their head in the sand. Innovation is a mindset, not a series of inventions, nor a series of startups nor new business models. The Innovation show is a show for round pegs in square holes, for those who are awake to the real world, to what is broken. The show aims to address issues that don't get enough attention, to explore possible solutions. The show shines a light on issues that are hidden from the limelight.
Host: Aidan McCullen
URL: http://www.theinnovationshow.io/

Information:

Platform: Peerism is described as "The Skill Token Economy for Post Capitalism."
About the Platform: Peerism solves job automation and wealth inequality via a proof-of-skill blockchain economic protocol which matches paid work to tokenized individual skill levels, and shares the wealth from AI.
Founder: Nathan Waters
URL: http://peerism.org/

Link to Nathan's Appearance:

EP 69: Decentralisation, Decapitalisation, Disintermediation – Peerism
Host: Aidan McCullen
Appearance by: Peerism Founder Nathan Waters
Published in December 2017
http://www.theinnovationshow.io/2017/12/10/ep-69-decentralisation-decapitalisation-disintermediation-peerism/

Nathan Waters is the founder of Peerism, a blockchain-based economic protocol which aims to solve job automation and wealth inequality via skill tokens, proof-of-skill and matching paid work to tokenized skill levels. He is a futurist, entrepreneur and social decentralist. He also founded and organises one of the largest Ethereum meetups in the world SydEthereum and the largest independent hackathon in Australia Hackagong.

http://peerism.org

https://medium.com/peerism/blockchain-commons-the-end-of-all-corporate-business-models-3178998148ba

http://sydethereum.com

The Real You – Aaron Jasinksi

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

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Inventions Of The Year 2017 discussed on Radio 3RRR

Appearance by Politify Founder Cameron Gibbs

The Party Show on Radio 3RRR appears on radio frequency 102.7FM in Melbourne, Australia and on the web via the radio station's On Demand service 3RRR On Demand.

The Party Show is a talkback radio discussion on a large variety of subjects with a series of experts encouraging an exchange of viewpoints. In this episode, invited guest Cameron Gibbs discussed his pick of the three inventions of the year for 2017. Cameron also discusses his own invention project, Politify.org.

Link to the Whole Show:

The Party Show
Presenters: Headly Gritter and DD
Broadcast on Sunday, November 19th, 2017, 12:00 AM (2 hours)
http://ondemand.rrr.org.au/grid/201711190000

Link to Cameron's Appearance:

The Party Show
Presenters: Headly Gritter and DD
Appearance by: Politify Founder Cameron Gibbs (Introduced as The Former Vice-President of the Inventors Association of Australia).
Broadcast on Sunday, November 19th, 2017, 12:00 AM (2 hours)
http://ondemand.rrr.org.au/grid/20171119003533

Author

Cameron Gibbs
Politify Founder

Disclaimer: Politify is a neutral platform created to allow anyone to share their ideas and to debate those ideas. Views expressed by Employees, Directors, Authors, Sponsors and/or Affiliates of Politify are their own views shared with equal opportunity using the Politify network. The veiws expressed are in no way indicative of any official policy of Politify as an organisation.

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Politify.org Articles