Call it What it is Government not Public \ stacker news ~bitcoin

Call it What it is Government not Public

2558 sats \ 12 comments \ @kepford 2 Oct 2023 bitcoin

Language matters. The words we use affect the way we think about things. For many years I've really tried to stop using public when the accurate description is government. The most common example for me is so called public schools. They are government schools. Why does this matter? Well, when we use the word public we are lying about how they work. They are funded involuntarily and run by the government. If they were public their funding would be voluntary and they would not be under government control.

He's why this matters. I've noticed over the years that Americans tend to see the problems in government run institutions in other nations but they are blind to it in the U.S. You see this with nations like North Korea and Russia. Russia Today is just propaganda... its government funded. Yet, in the US our government has magical powers apparently. When we say public we are lying to ourselves about incentives. When I learned about bitcoin it opened my eyes to the existence of fiat. I had never even heard the term before bitcoin.

Just something to think about.

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351 sats \ 2 replies \ @kepford OP 2 Oct 2023

I should have mentioned this but when you swap out public for government you get people's attention.

Here's another one. "Public Servant". I mean this one is so ridiculous few people actually use it. I rarely hear a politician referred to in this way. They aren't public and they aren't servants.

10 sats \ 1 reply \ @Undisciplined 2 Oct 2023

I've been hammering this point for years, but there is a problem with it. Many people will embrace the idea of "government" schools/research/etc. and really it's still a euphemism. If we went all the way with calling it what it is, we would call it "theft funded" or "extortion funded", maybe use "involuntary" or "coerced". Of course, that would be too offputting and would seriously undermine any persuasive punch.

449 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford OP 2 Oct 2023

You are right. I think what I am saying is more effective with people that think they are for small or no government but are blind to reality. Conservatives fall into this category and some libertarians. Calling them government schools probably triggers progressives which is also good I guess.

If you really wanna be brutally honest government schools are more like minimum security prisons. In most states in the US if you don't send your kids you will be put in jail so its literally backed by violence and if you don't pay your taxes that fund the school the same thing happens. Even those who have no kids pay for the schools. If you want to educate your kids in a different fashion or different school you must do so as well as prove you are doing it. AND you still have to pay for the government school.

When government schools are failing they aren't closed. When private schools fail they close. The US government schools could be worse, don't get me wrong but the idea that they are not indoctrination systems or that this is somehow a new thing is completely wrong.

When people look at what we are told are totalitarian states and their education systems we see them for what they are. Most cannot see the same goals and outcomes in their own nations. That's the crazy thing to me. Once you see it, you can't unsee it.

20 sats \ 1 reply \ @fm 2 Oct 2023

Russia Today is just propaganda

Almost as bad as BBC or NPR

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford OP 2 Oct 2023

10 sats \ 1 reply \ @Coinosphere 3 Oct 2023

I sense many Larkin Rose videos in your future, padawan.

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford OP 3 Oct 2023

LOL. I'm very familiar. :)

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @HardRich 2 Oct 2023

Very good point!

Also, it's sometimes a comparison between "public" vs "private." Like whether you work in the public or private sector. While "private" is good in the bitcoin world, I think it's easy for people to think "public" is a friendlier word than "private." As in, "Oh, you work for the public, you must be humane" vs "Oh, you work for a private company, you must have something to hide or you're greedy."

It seems more fair to call it "governmental" vs "civil." Now it sounds better to say, "I work in the civil sector" vs "I work in the governmental sector."

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @scottathan 2 Oct 2023

This

10 sats \ 0 replies \ @kepford OP 2 Oct 2023

Another one is "publicly funded" research. Swap that out to what it truly is. Government funded research. When things are invisible you can't see they need to be changed. The affect of linguistic lies might seem silly to some but I really think its insidious.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @rybka 3 Oct 2023

Great point. I think the distinction between public and private makes sense when talking money. "Public money" is usually in the context of government spending of money taken from the public, with an intended purpose to serve the public, while private money is profit made from business (albeit also from the public) and serves private interest and the business.

In the context of schools however it does get pretty muddy. In my country public schools are government-funded but completely free, but in states where even government-funded education is a business (USA, the UK etc) the distinction makes little sense really.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Natalia 3 Oct 2023

Language matters.

YES.! We have been played with different word games, and the word matters, as it subconsciously changes the way we perceive and express ourselves.

Even in a private matter, love, which should be between two individuals, yet the government manages to get into it, setting the frame of legal marriage: want to get married? come, you can even pay lower taxes once you married; want to divorce? come.

They even somehow have the "power" to decide how many kids people could have in certain places, pure madness.