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I only agree with unideological truths when they are justifiable, argumentable, and manifestly take into account the interests of all parties involved, not only of the "markets", of the fishermen, of certain vulnerable categories that we pick, our clan, or our party. The exercise in futility is so because I gave numerous examples of what I understand by that, and what is the reasoning from which I claim certain stances are non ideological.

I gave Jake earlier the example of the psychiatric hospital. A sick man went out and killed someone. That provoked a lot of noise, of course, so measures were taken to enforce safety in these hospitals.
In order to reassure people that would risk to misunderstand these measures as some authoritarian/securitarian policy of a rightwing government, a statement has been made, broadly saying that such places are not prisons, yet people shouldn't be free of their movements either.

Now one can see this as trivial, and a slogan used to mask authoritarian policy. Someone less biased would likely understand that by putting in balance both situations, the idea was to show that both viewpoints are considered, none is forgotten, and the measures don't intend to turn psy clinics into prisons. A mark of pragmatic approach.

I gave this kind of examples all the time, and they were systematically taken as positions against train drivers, prisoners, immigrants, unions, NGOs, and so on. The fact that I presented the two sides and I said both are to be taken into account, apparently looked like a way to manipulate the real intention, the ideology that you think you point as hiding behind.

Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last! (Martin Luther King)

by ValentinD (walentijn arobase free spot frança) on Thu Dec 4th, 2008 at 02:36:25 PM EST
[ Parent ]
The hospital case you cite is a prime example of "nine-o'clock news" politics: Take a single case where something didn't work properly (for reasons that are usually not fully understood at the time) and respond to it by passing sweeping legislation in order to be seen as "tough on X" or "doing something about Y" and score cheap points on the momentary outrage.

That usually creates a legal hodge-podge with little structure, little consistency and plenty of unanticipated side effects. In other words, all the things you criticise bureaucracy for doing...

That we have a tabloid press (of which the Murdoch Times is part, to go by what our British comrades are saying) that facilitates this by treating news as if it were cheap, tasteless pornography is hardly a credit to our society, or our body politic.

- Jake

If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Thu Dec 4th, 2008 at 03:15:08 PM EST
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