Post #1342887
2026-04-18 19:36 UTC
Replies (5)
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@gerikson@awful.systems 2026-04-19 13:57
Good link, thanks. The commenter totally missed what a shock the executions of Charles I and Louis XVI were. The natural reaction to “if the king is bad just kill him” is for the king to more or less aggressively remove threats to their persons.
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@BurgersMcSlopshot@awful.systems 2026-04-19 02:38
"It's only monarchy if it's got a Habsburg jaw, otherwise it's just sparkling tyranny."
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@Soyweiser@awful.systems 2026-04-19 15:08
Love a good no true Scotsman in the title. Unrelated: apparently our king/queen (no idea which one specifically was to blame) is why .nl doesnt celebrate 1 may.
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@YourNetworkIsHaunted@awful.systems 2026-04-20 03:48
On one hand, I appreciate their acknowledgement that legitimacy matters to a government's ability to govern. While the talk about the king as a figure tied to a broader structure that creates obligations and requirements just as strongly as it does power and privilege isn't entirely historically accurate it's at least less absurd than Yarvin's notion of the dictator as a kind of unmoved mover - someone with both absolute power and absolute discretion to do what they want with it. At the same time, if you follow that chain of thought to it's actual conclusions you end up with some kind of radical democracy. Like, legitimacy is just a way to ask the question of why anyone should bother to do what the guy calling himself king says. Historically speaking this often boils down to trying to judge how credible the threat of violence is should you refuse. If the king isn't going to be around in a week due to an ongoing succession crisis then there's no point in getting ready to pay his taxes next month, essentially. But if we reframe the question another answer becomes available: why should people consent to be governed? And the democratic answer is that the government represents their interests and is trying to organize and take actions they support. Government by consent of the governed is a descriptive statement about how governments operate, not a normative one about how they should. Once you account for the extra costs and consequences of needing to manufacture consent through violence and repression the supposed efficiency of dictatorship evaporates.
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@gerikson@awful.systems 2026-04-20 07:21
If all you have is a blog, it's natural for you to think that you can effect regime change through blogging. But there's a very large step between 1. blog a lot 2. ??? 3. absolute CEO-king Culture matters. The US has had a de jure republic for almost 250 years. Even though the presidency has steadily moved to a more central role, it's one thing to have a literal KING in place. There needs to be a story there, and saying "we need to be more effective or the Chinese will win" doesn't really cut it. It took France almost 100 years to finally establish republican rule: revolution, Directory, First Empire, Bourbon Restoration, Orleanist monarchy, Second Republic, coup, Second Empire, catastrophic military defeat, Third Republic. Then we get narrow Pyhrric victory in WW1, defeat again, collaborationist dictatorship, 4th republic, de Gaulle gets fed up, 5th republic. Even today the French president has more power than in many other republican constitutions. How does Yarvin propose to remove the republican idea from American consciousness?