/meta/ - Ruthless criticism of all that exists (in leftypol.org)

The Just Republic: In defense of the modocracy

TLDR: Plato’s republic is the ideal form of governance for an imageboard

>“For surely, Thrasymachus, it's injustice that produces factions, hatreds, and quarrels among themselves, and justice that produces unanimity and friendship. Isn't it so?… if it's the work of injustice, wherever it is, to implant hatred, then, when injustice comes into being, both among free men and slaves, will it not also cause them to hate one another and to form factions, and to be be unable to accomplish anything in common with one another?… Then does it come to light as possessing a power such that, wherever it comes into being, be it in a city, a clan, an army, or whatever else, it first of all makes that thing unable to accomplish anything together with itself due to faction and difference, and then it a makes that thing an enemy both to itself and to everything opposite and to the just? Isn't it so?… And then when it is in one man, I suppose it will do the same thing which it naturally accomplishes. First it will make him unable to act, because he is at faction and is not of one mind with himself, and, second, an enemy both to himself and to just men” - Plato, The Republic

As said previously in my note on recent events, the frequency of splits, the schizo-paranoia, it’s clear that there is something incredibly broken about how leftypol recruits staff and moderators, and this has almost lead to the death of leftypol several times. Many people here, including certain former moderators, have expressed the desire to have more “user input”, for user congresses. This is all utterly misguided. It’s fine to have a channel for user feedback, and to take suggestions, but the idea of LARPing a direct democracy, without accountability, in an anonymous or pseudo-anonymous medium just can’t work. The capitalist structure of ownership, of private property with regards to web domains and servers, really prevents this from being anything more than a democracy in name only. As we have seen, the only people with real power are those that control these resources, and everything else is really just play-acting. At worst, it just introduces an ability for loud retards to override the silent majority or right wing crossposters to manufacture consensus.

Instead of LARPing as an Athenian direct democracy, the moderators should model their form of governance after Athenian democracy’s greatest critic: Plato. If we must do a historical LARP, the form of governance that imageboards should take is that of a Platonic republic.

Plato’s “Republic”, often derided as a mere excuse for despotism, is really anything but. According to Plato, the object of governing is the well being of the governed in the same way that the object of medicine is the healing of the human body. The answer to the question of the definition of justice is answered indirectly, through the example of what a just society would be. A human being does not exist apart from a society. A just society is just a macro-version of a just man, and vice versa: a just man is a micro-version of a just society/state. There is a sort of social contract where people agree to act justly, in order to accomplish greater things than if they where constantly fighting, bickering, and trying to rip each other off.

Plato is often attacked for his advocacy of censorship. I suppose my answer to that is that the moderator IS a censor. That’s literally all they do. Every moderator, ever. It’s only a question of degree. The alternative is unlimited free speech, which no site, even 8chan itself, could sustain.

In Platos republic there are three groups: The artisans, or producers, the auxiliaries, a warrior/administrative class, and the guardians or governers who would rule society for it’s benefit.

>Until age 18, would-be guardians should be engaged in basic intellectual study and physical training, followed by two years of military training. However, a correction is then introduced where the study of gymnastics (martial arts) and warfare – 3 plus 2 years, respectively – are supplanted by philosophy for 5 years instead. Next, they receive ten years of mathematics until age 30, and then five years of dialectic(philosophy) training. Guardians then spend the next 15 years as leaders, trying to "lead people from the cave". Upon reaching 50, they are fully aware of the form of good, and totally mature and ready to lead.

Obviously, in this analogy, the guardians are the admins/mods/tech people, the auxiliaries are the lower ranked janitors, and the artisans are the anons.

>And they are always crowded around the shipowner himself, begging and doing every thing so that he'll turn the rudder over to them. And sometimes, if they fail at persuasion and other men succeed at it, they either kill the others or throw them out of the ship. Enchaining the noble shipowner with mandrake, drink, or something else, they rule the ship, using what's in it; and drinking and feasting, they sail as such men would be thought likely to sail. Besides this, they praise and call 'skilled sailor,' 'pilot,' and 'knower of the ship's business' the man who is clever at figuring out how they will get the rule, either by persuading or by forcing the shipowner, while the man who is not of this sort they blame as useless. - Plato, describing the coupists thousands of years in advance

Similar to the guardians of Platos republic, there needs to be a rigorous system for both vetting and training mods and technical staff.

Vetting: Mods need to build a mod application app. This would include a series of multiple choice questions designed to weed out candidates with BPD, narcissism, schizophrenia, and other harmful personality traits or psychological disorders. The second stage would include the candidate including some background info, such as a post they made for the janitors to check the post history, their ideology, general background, etc. If they pass these stages then they can start the training/probation period.

For technical janitors there is a final, optional to non technical jannies, stage. They must use a platform, perhaps like codeacademy/hackerrank/etc. To take and complete a number of basic courses on php, sql, database, javascript, html/css, cybersecurity etc. and screencap the completion pages, attach/upload the images or otherwise show them to the jannies, in order to ensure they have basic competency in these technologies. There are free and paid options for this but the free options are already adequate. The technical training can also be done concurrently with the janitorial probation period if needed.

Training: a long period of probation/apprenticeship (not 15 years, but more like 4-6 months) where the new candidate is not allowed to vote on matters but is appointed a janitor with minimal power of a certain board and rotated throughout the boards periodically, probably starting on /b/, and being moved around from board to board, until they finally have janitor power on /leftypol/. After this they will be approved or disapproved by the current mods, either a simple majority, supermajority, or unanimous consent.

Only then should the person be admitted to the mod team.