A philosophical statement for your consideration. Agree or disagree?

Jump to Last Post 1-4 of 4 discussions (8 posts)
  1. tsmog profile image86
    tsmogposted 4 months ago

    From the Free Press newsletter for Sept 26, 2024 arrives a concluding statement following a short expose about rule breaking in governance by peeking at the Roman Empire in the days of Tiberius Gracchus. Yeah, never heard of him either. Anyway, supposedly about his time was the dawn of the demise of the Roman Empire.

    Getting to the statement being offered . . .

    "You probably know about last year’s trend of American men confessing on TikTok how often they think about the Roman Empire. I’m a bit different. I’m obsessed with what preceded the empire, Rome’s republic. Empires are a dime a dozen in human history. They rise and fall, from Babylon to the Soviet Union. But republics—a form of government in which a state is ruled by representatives of the people—these are orchids: rare, precious, and fleeting. If you take the long view of human history, tyranny is the norm. A system that checks the power of its leaders and legislators and makes them accountable to citizens? That’s special. ..."

    Thoughts, criticisms, accolades, and/or commentary?

    1. Ken Burgess profile image69
      Ken Burgessposted 4 months agoin reply to this

      Rome was a Republic when the citizens of Rome were its warriors, its soldiers, its officers, its leadership.

      Roman citizens started out being the warrior class, not a separation, not an elite class and wage/slave class that hired additional men-of-arms as needed.

      True there was a tier-ship to it, the major landowners would be the Officers, the Generals, the common free-men the soldiers.  But ALL had skin the game... ALL had something to lose.

      After Hannibal decimated the Roman Legions and wiped out their armies, occupying Rome and terrorizing it for over a decade, things changed.

      There were no longer enough Romans to fill the ranks, or maintain what had been built. So they adapted, more and more Rome used foreign armies to fight for them, hired professional troops made up of forced servitude or kidnapped foreigners or those who committed crimes and were sentenced to it... oversimplifying of course.

      I don't know if it correlates to many of the issues, social and authoritarian we see being enacted or suggested today.

      Except in one way.

      Consider the Roman Empire to be the equivalent of the World Today.

      And the fractures and fissures of what eventually became the fallen Roman Empire and the Byzantine Empire are occurring now.

      The West... America... is playing the role of the Roman Empire and its decline will occur much the way the Roman Empire fell last time... overrun, over-exhausted, transformed into something anew and then forgotten.

      BRICS... The East... will play the role of the Byzantine Empire whose better days are still ahead of it and its dominance is on the rise.


      Anyway...

      A similar comparison in both the American Citizen and the Roman Citizen would also be that in America's initial century the citizens were also predominantly the warriors as well.

      And as time went on, the definition of who a citizen was, or more importantly who was allowed representation and the ability to vote expanded as well.

      Then they both had their slavery and expansion periods, dominated by military conquest and exploitation of foreign resources.

      They also had their periods where they had brilliant leaders... and completely utterly incompetent ones that often brought on immense turmoil and decline.

      Bread and Circuses... they had those as well.

      1. tsmog profile image86
        tsmogposted 4 months agoin reply to this

        Wow! Thanks for the history!

      2. GA Anderson profile image81
        GA Andersonposted 4 months agoin reply to this

        "Bread and circuses." We've heard that (here) before, haven't we?

        The analogy works for me. Point by point it seems a legitimate comparison. 5^

        GA

  2. Kathryn L Hill profile image80
    Kathryn L Hillposted 4 months ago

    Extraction: From the Free Press newsletter for Sept 26, 2024 :

    "But republics

         —a form of government in which a state is ruled by representatives of the people—

    these are orchids: rare, precious, and fleeting.

    If you take the long view of human history, tyranny is the norm.

    A system that checks the power of its leaders and legislators and makes them accountable to citizens?

                                That’s special."

  3. Kathryn L Hill profile image80
    Kathryn L Hillposted 4 months ago

    good find! and more accolades for Tsmog today. smile

  4. Venkatachari M profile image86
    Venkatachari Mposted 4 months ago

    I think it is the same case with every country's history. The initial citizens were always the warriors and the soldiers. They used to guard their land and fight with the trespassers. But everything changed as time went on. People now think of their personal matters and rarely fight for common goals. It is a kind of indifference to other issues. The old way of living in herds and tribal groups was better than in this present worldly atmosphere. It is my personal perception.

    1. Kathryn L Hill profile image80
      Kathryn L Hillposted 4 months agoin reply to this

      We in the west have had a very cushy life, since the end of the forties. I have enjoyed the golden ages of the 60s and 70s, as so many of us have. The hard part will be that it ends for us boomers. We complained and whined about so much while we were basically living it up. And most of us are still enjoying life, but it may be close to the party being OVER.

      We are not going to know how to handle such times as what could lie ahead.

      Now, if Trump gets into office, God will be still smiling down on us.
      Man, we have had it good. Time to be thankful and pray for humility so we deserve getting "back on track."

      We need to be be more thankful and as I said: humble.

 
working

This website uses cookies

As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.

For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy

Show Details
Necessary
HubPages Device IDThis is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons.
LoginThis is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service.
Google RecaptchaThis is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy)
AkismetThis is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy)
HubPages Google AnalyticsThis is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy)
HubPages Traffic PixelThis is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized.
Amazon Web ServicesThis is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy)
CloudflareThis is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy)
Google Hosted LibrariesJavascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy)
Features
Google Custom SearchThis is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy)
Google MapsSome articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
Google ChartsThis is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy)
Google AdSense Host APIThis service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
Google YouTubeSome articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
VimeoSome articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy)
PaypalThis is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
Facebook LoginYou can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy)
MavenThis supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy)
Marketing
Google AdSenseThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Google DoubleClickGoogle provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Index ExchangeThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
SovrnThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Facebook AdsThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Amazon Unified Ad MarketplaceThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
AppNexusThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
OpenxThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Rubicon ProjectThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
TripleLiftThis is an ad network. (Privacy Policy)
Say MediaWe partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy)
Remarketing PixelsWe may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites.
Conversion Tracking PixelsWe may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service.
Statistics
Author Google AnalyticsThis is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy)
ComscoreComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy)
Amazon Tracking PixelSome articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy)
ClickscoThis is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy)