Item — HN Reader

Okay, so people should not trust their government. Ways they can not trust their government are by

1. Separation of powers

2. Accountability via body-cams

3. Freedom of speech to protect political progress that threatens incumbents

4. Making voting systems that have auditibility

etc. These are all good practical ways to reduce trust in government with no downside. Why ask for "trust" instead of offering proof?

It is our role in a democracy not to trust our government, but to guide it (by selecting the correct representatives) to represent us on the things we agree on.

1 comments

That's a great point. And to the extent that we do allow "government" and grant it some authority, transparency is - to my mind - absolutely essential. That is, if we're going to give a subset of people some privileged degree of power over others, then it is extremely incumbent upon us to ensure that that position isn't abused. And personally I feel like our current (US) government is far, far away from being properly transparent, or accountable to the people.

So anything that moves towards less secrecy, and more transparency, is compatible with my "don't trust government" position. Of course one can argue about just how far to take it, but I think most of us agree that we've gone too far in the secrecy and obfuscation direction as of late.