Dilemna- On Lying to the People

[Carinthium]

(Apologies if this is a long one, but real-life situations are difficult. I figured a lot of people would want to assess the whole of the situation, so I had to fill in the details)

Assume you're a person living in the following hypothetical country. Three possible roles are considered you might have.

-The country has a state religion (fictional religion Archism to avoid controversy), and outlaws all others. Anybody found to be a 'heretic' or 'infidel' faces discrimination comparable to southern Blacks in almost all things, with the exception that they can vote. In total, religious minorities amount to about 10% of the populace. These minorities are spread out, not confined to one area.

-Because obedience to the Law is highly stressed in Archism, judges have not dared stray from the letter of the Constitution for fear of popular revolt. In the past, most judges have not dared stray from the absolute letter of the letter for this reason. Most controversial decisions have been straw-manned as based on a "Living Constitution" even though this has not in fact been the case.

-The country has a history of popular revolts in favor of Archism, including pogroms against minorities. Because the Constitution severely limits the size of standing armies the Government is hopeless to prevent said revolts from toppling it. These revolts have sometimes been averted, but only when the people have been persuaded that the government has no choice if it wishes to keep to the Constitution.

-Ironically, Archism has been quite good for democracy. Religious duties exist to watch and scrutinise one's rulers for actions against the faith, which have been extended over time for scrutinising them full-stop. Politics, far from being a taboo topic, is a standard topic of conversation, leading to far more vibrant democracy. Furthermore, everybody is familiar with the concept of 'dodging the question'- it can be done without a revolt, but everybody down to the street cleaners will realise you've done it.

-The top 1% of the country economically are opposed to these the popular trends. They are secularist and wish to remove religious discrimination, but also wish to institute a system so laizze-faire it makes 18th century Britain look socialist.

-The country has a Constitution which is rooted in a treaty between a secularist faction and Archist faction saying "Let's fight our battle out amongst the people rather than go to war". The secularists lost decisively, and by now that is ancient history. The Constitution also has a clause stating that if it is broken, the People have the legal right to overthrow the government and institute a new one under the same Constitution.

-In modern times, there are two parties. The Archist Party is the Party of the People, advocating religious discrimination combined with EU-style socialism. Up against them are the Fairness Party, who try to relax religious discrimination and reduce the extent of the Welfare State. Fairness Party politicians have been accused of a conspiracy to create complete religious equality. This is in fact true, but Fairness Party politicians repeatedly deny it. Most of the Fairness politicians also want to abolish social welfare completely, but consider religious reform their first priority.

Branches:

A: You are an individual with massive amounts of political talent, and could run for politics with either party. For which party do you run? What policies do you make? If in the Fairness Party, how do you respond to accusations regarding the conspiracy? To what extent do you lie to the people? Whatever you do, why do you do it?

B: You are a judge in a case involving a member of a religious minority. Said individual has broken laws regarding seperate toilet facilities by accident, and is to be put to death. In a desperation move, their lawyer has attempted a legally highly implausible argument that said discrimination is unconstitutional despite lack of a basis in written law or intentions.

C: You are a highly popular and charismatic general in the army. A nearby secular state has made an offer- if you work with them, they will come in and install Secular Democracy by force in order to protect the religious minorities. You have enough support amongst the army to make a difference to what occurs. The secular state is much larger than yours- by sheer force of numbers, they will be able to prevent an Iraq-like situation. However, constant gurellia warfare is likely to happen.

You also know that if you attempt the coup, then if you can come up with a highly convincing-sounding but false legal rationalisation then you will significantly reduce the extent of partisanship. What do you do and why?


All of the three variants come down to one basic dilemna- to what extent are you willing to lie to ordinary people in the name of getting your way? Can you justify lying to the people in favor of your own personal opinions? Are you willing to squash a vibrant democracy in order to get something out of doing so?

Significant amount of detail has been included in case people wish to try and Take a Third Option.

[Ahriman238]

Some of this premise seems self-contradictory on the face of it. A Constitution rooted in a peace traty between religious and secularist groups, which enshrines religious discrimination. A large religious base that observes the letter of the law absolutely, yet can and has overthrown multiple governments for attempting reform. Don't get me wrong, real-life is similarly messy.

Well, then, if obeying the letter of the law is important to Archism, (and to officials who wish to avoid a lynching) it seems I must become an expert in the law and the Good Book both, whatever my personal feelings about the faith.

The system is pretty clearly stacked against government officials and activist judges attempting reform. Having the wealthy elite be secularists is an interesting twist I might be able to leverage. Treason is a very extreme option, not taking it off the table completely, but I'd want to know a hell of a lot more about the neighbor I'd be inviting in.

It seems the best option is to study the laws and scriptures night and day, then lead a grassroots Archist movement, or find a suitable patsy to lead it for me. The religious majority seems interested in social justice and democracy, which is awesome. Really, so far religious discrimination is the only thing I have against them. So I push a more liberal interpretation of their scripture, while emphasizing that We, the God-Fearing People of Whatsisnation, have already won. The evil secularists can't hurt us, so let them speak freely and practice their strange beliefs, because really at this point We're really kicking a guy when he's down and never getting up. And I'll bet I can push that angle without lying or inventing anything from their scripture.

[Carinthium]

The Constitution itself does not enshrine religious discrimination- what enshrines religious discrimination in practice is the fact that ordinary people genuinely support it.

Yeah- the stacking bit was because I was trying to make it a moral dilemna about whether it was acceptable for a leader to lie to the people for the good for a minority. I put in the other details in case somebody wanted to Take a Third Option.

[someone_else]

I like this concept, it's messy as hell, just like reality. Would be an awesome setting for a few novels. I hope someone that has talent sees this.

-The country has a history of popular revolts in favor of Archism, including pogroms against minorities. Because the Constitution severely limits the size of standing armies the Government is hopeless to prevent said revolts from toppling it. These revolts have sometimes been averted, but only when the people have been persuaded that the government has no choice if it wishes to keep to the Constitution.

A clarification: what is the goal of these popular revolts? If Archism is pro-law, and law states that stuff has to be done with a Government and voting and stuff, why revolts? Pogroms and generic genocide of minorities I can understand, assuming that their constitution allows that, but why revolts?

If the revolts happen when Government goes bonkers and shits all over the Constitution I'm sold to Archism and I'm moving there ASAP.

[Carinthium]

Effectively that- when the government is breaking the Constitution the ordinary people revolt as it has lost it's legitimacy. They then force it back on path.

[Ahriman238]

It's also a values call. The Archists have a strong interest in a healthy democracy, and educated and involved populace. The Fairness Party wants to eliminate or severely reduce welfare. So what's more important, good social programs or freedom of conscience?

I said go with an Archist grassroots movement (which I'm sticking with, until and unless more information comes to light making that a poor plan) because I think it'd be easier to make the religious people a bit more tolerant than to convince the Fairness Party to drop the rest of their platform for this one monumentally important issue. Either is going to be an uphill, probably doomed struggle.

[someone_else]

Ok.

A I would run with the Archist party and try to convert the "genocide non-archists" to "forced expatriation". They get X money and a free ticket to Tatooine. Or wherever they want to go. And arrange things with other nations to give them citizenship. Assuming it is doable for the Constitution. If not (please tell me) consider this answer invalid and I'll think some more.

B I'm a judge and everyone and their dog is ready to hang me if I don't follow law to the letter. If the thing pulled off by the defendant is bullshit I have little choice other than declaring it as such. Still, death penalty for going in the wrong bathroom isn't a bit extreme? Why the hell there are still these minorities with such oppressive laws? Used in mines and cotton fields like black guys back then?

C Hahahah. I tell them to fuck off and die. I never trust anyone that asks me to betray someone, as with this mindset it is equally likely to betray me in turn when convenient.
If I decide to betray someone/something, I will act on my decision alone AND will do it by taking contact with someone whose integrity I trust. Which decreases considerably the cases where a betrayal is a good choice, at least imho.

All of the three variants come down to one basic dilemna- to what extent are you willing to lie to ordinary people in the name of getting your way? Can you justify lying to the people in favor of your own personal opinions?

I have no problems with lying to common people, as long as it does no harm or limited harm (to them).
But when you go big, the chances that shit will see the light and someone will hammer that in your face is too high.
If you lack an overwhelming amount of resources to pull on anwyay, either remain pristine or STFU.

Are you willing to squash a vibrant democracy in order to get something out of doing so?

Absolutely not.

[Carinthium]

The Archists are specifically modelling the reigme against non-Archists to be severely opressive as a way of "gently" nudging them to convert. They have taken lessons from amongst other things the pre-1960s South on how to do this.

It is constitutional to expel rather than opress non-Archists, if a proposal that would need a lot of work to get support for.

[someone_else]

Dunno. Death sentence for going in the wrong bathroom does not sound horribly "gentle" to me.

A. addendum: Another plan would be to work out a non-Archist conversion system actually based on rewards of becoming an Archist and not on fear of pogroms or racial laws inspired from rednecks.

EDIT: you might want to work on making the example a bit more controversial. To me this is pretty one-sided Archists = Good.

[Carinthium]

My mistake there- I'd actually thought most people would side with the Fairness Party. Let's say for the sake of the scenario that "gentle" is comparative because the means traditionally used make the means they use nowadays look gentle by comparison.