[Reader-list] Proposal for a reader-list protocol :Democracy must be outside itself

[ARNAB CHATTERJEE]

Dear (Dr.) Prem,
               The doctor was added as a crown to your
health thinking and thanks you've accepted it! 
The core of your response strikes at the heart of what
you and I want/ed to do: open out yr list to the
"people (who) would > take the protocol,  and >
critique, modify, reject, customise and otherwise
> transform it" ! Fine, and that is the normative part
of building norms which will be consensually agreed
upon by those who will be affected by thoe norms !
Absolutely right and there is nothing to disagree
except a fatal point! It is a running debate and an
interesting one: i would request you to think over it.

Why is it that democracy has to found itself outside
of democratic procedures? 
   Let me explain. Democracy for instance believes in
one sense---decisions by a majoritarian vote; it
ideally believes in the consent of the governed,
accountability and so on. But suppose democracy itself
is subjected to its own procedure: vote whether you
want democracy or not. Respondents vote for a no!
Then? It is possible therefore to show, that an ideal
end when opened to a brittle (even its own) means
might just abolish itself and therefore--this is most
important-- democracy subjects several things to its
procedure but itself; it simply cannot afford to that.
Similarly, I would like to know if you open up  your
protocols to modification and transformation---even
consent by argumentation, would you agree if an
overwhelming majority decides to abandon your list? Or
there is something you would like to keep out of
argumentation? Please tell me.
         And a clarification on the helping part.
Helping is made always externally : You help me, she
helps him--even the government can help. etc. But how
can I help myself unless I stand outside myself and
lend a helping hand?( help yourself is thus meaning
less); since this is impossible. When I am into an
act, I'm doing it as if no body does it. Heidegger
gave  good example!  An expert hammerman when is using
the hammer --he uses it such that (as if) he is not
using it; the smooth transition is such that is quite
unconscious; he may well think about a cinema, his
children while doing that arduous job. That
subject-object distinction is nearly erased in this.
If there is a problem--say the hammer head breaks,
then he comes back to the divisive reality and
responds. So when one writes one is not into a helping
project that is very voluntary. When one writes, one
cannot but write. Like Nietzsche once said on a new
year: I'm thinking because I'm living, I want to live
because I want to think more. And much of it is
"useless" --what (atleast) I write--in consequential
atleast to me and even many on the list ( yours in
"defeat"). But its uselessness is what absorbs me and
many others ( I can think about Inder Salim here)--a
kind of destructivity that is in constant
writing,chatting, art or performing yet meaning
nothing.  I'm afraid you might just be undermining the
value of the negative itself. I read a recent article
with the following question, "shall we miss anything
significant in a world without hate speech?" And I'm
still searching the obscure arguments made to answer
that. Could you suggest an easier one? I hope you do.

Yours in discourse and "debt"
Arnab
--- Prem Chandavarkar <prem.cnt at gmail.com> wrote:

> 1.  If you see a post with which you disagree, your
> disagreement should be
> phrased so as to also imply an acknowledgement of
> the person's right to
> speak.
> 
> 2. If you see a post whose language or attitude you
> find offensive or
> unpalatable, just ignore it.  Over a period of time,
> that will be the best
> filter to sort who is likely to speak constructively
> on this list.
> 
> 3. The reader-list is a space for an exchange of
> ideas.  Therefore, speak in
> order to learn, not in order to convince.
> 
> 4. If your desire is to convince, then please think
> about whether a
> discussion forum is a place you should intrude upon.
> 
> 5. Attack issues, do not attack people.
> 
> 6. When you respond to a post, do not just negate
> it, but engage with it and
> build on it in order to throw up a new idea into the
> public commons that is
> the reader-list.
> 
> 7. When you post a new message on a fresh subject,
> do so only if you feel
> that critique or dissent will be helpful to you.
> 
> 8. And finally, remember that we interact on this
> list through language; and
> language always has two dimensions - speaking and
> listening.  Participation
> in this list requires a commitment to both
> dimensions.
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