Since you also wrote Quantum Vibe, and I really like that, I am trying to get into EFT. But honestly, I am being balked by the first few comics. They are too political, and it makes me cringe inside, hard. It's making me shy away from EFT. I am sure that it's just as brilliant as Quantum vibe, but reading it makes me angry. What follows is basically the thoughts that go through my head in a loop when I try to read it. I want to like it, I LOVE Quantum Vibe, but I can't get past the heavy handed start. I'm sorry. I feel bad for not being able to get around my own prejudices here. Buut...
I don't intend to deliberately troll/flame-bate, but I do want to get this off my chest....
**Caution: If you are prone to getting angry at the ramblings of someone who doesn't quite agree with your politics, please just TLDR this and/or ignore it.**
I mean, yes, I realize that the government can certainly go too far, and yes, I'd even agree that the government in EFT is how our government has been developing: Give money to the super rich, don't tax the middle class. This makes it look like we have more economic 'growth' then we really do, because the super rich don't spend their money so we can have more dollars floating around for the same number of goods.
But the way it's written feels like it's a 'take that' at the idea of government it's self, and that's honestly foolish. We've never found a primitive tribe with no power-structure. Humans naturally form a power-structure. All a government is is a formalized power structure. What's more, I recall reading a sociology study to the general effect of 'the harsher the conditions the more restrictive the power-structure becomes and the more sharing of resources for mutual survival takes place."
Further 'power structures', including 'familial clusters', 'allied tribes of varying strengths who form a collection of duties for each tribe in the alliance', 'your circle of friends' etc. All of them become 'governments' the instant that they are formalized. And power structures like that are necessary: There are three places where 'the free hand' breaks down. Natural monopolies (Roads, Telephone/communication systems (which can be rendered deliberately incompatible with each other, or refuse to accept traffic from competitor, or charge LOTS for traffic from competitor... remember when Bell was the only phone company in town? Ever notice that Broadband costs A LOT MORE when there's only one company that offers it in your neighborhood?), 'Public goods' (a firefighting service (Remember the days of private firefighters attacking each other while buildings burned to the ground in new york?), vaccination programs (which, if you don't get enough people, don't work as well, so people NEED to be forced, bribed, or otherwise coerced for it to actually work well) A professional standing army (As opposed to the method used by the Greeks or the Romans prior to the Marcus reforms, or the mercenary soldiers used during hundred year war and the crusades) etc.), and... I don't remember the name of the third type, but it's basically stuff like art where the artist produces JUST THE ONE work of art, and the owner can lock it away where no one can see it, and the price becomes insane. Also like collectable cards/collectable goods.
Government (or at least power structure) intervention is needed for the public goods. And Government/power structure intervention is needed to keep natural monopolies from screwing people over.
So why is a formalized 'Goverment' better in my mind than an non-formalized 'power structure'? Accountability, and (slightly) decreased 'spite'. I have been treated TERRIBLY in my life by non-formalized power structures, as has my mother, and generally most of my family. My mother, when I was three, had a stroke. She still cannot walk and I am 25. Working with the government and the American Disabilities Act law that is so hated by non-disabled people, especially libertarians, she made the town in which we live one of the most wheelchair accessible cities in the USA. Now she, and many other disabled people here, can go out, shop, work, and be economically productive instead of being economic burdens. Every year I see more people in wheelchairs move here. Without the combination of the carrot (We will shop here!) and the stick (Or else we will bring the government on your head) she would not have gotten compliance. It usually took both.
In elementary school, I was the 'target' of the other kids. I learned to fight dirty, and soon was being attacked by small mobs instead of individuals. I became famous for, in a fight in which I was afraid for my life, throwing a desk full of books. Occasionally I was tossed off of the top of the equipment, or otherwise mobbed. Those kids were not a government, that was an informal power-structure. In camp I was thrown out because I was involved in a canoeing accident and I was a little kid who didn't know the difference between the word 'mistake' and 'accident' so, because I kept saying it was a mistake, they thought it had been deliberate. I was thrown out of my fancy private boarding highschool because the whole girls dorm, regularly, once a semester, decided some guy was sexually harassing them. I survived my first semester, and one boy was thrown out. Second semester it was me. (I didn't even know some of my accusers past being faces in the crowd).
I don't want to go into my girlfriend's struggles with her apartment company over her roommates' bad behavior that she was powerless to stop due to her shyness and her not being a native English speaker, as that would pad this already long rant. And I'm not going to go into my dad's problems in college with his math professors being angry at him for getting A's because they hated him (My family draws hate from others. Mostly because we're outspoken, simple, and honest, even when it's a really bad time to be honest and outspoken, and we're in acadamia where simplicity is also frowned upon.)
These are 'non governmental power structures'. On the other hand, the government treats me pretty well. Because of the government, I got my diploma and went on to college, even though NO OTHER PRIVATE SCHOOL would touch me with 'claimed sexual harassment' on my record. When it was discovered that shady developers had gotten a flood prone area classified as not flood prone so they could build houses there, the victims in the area (Including many of my friends who were living in the apartments there) were paid back their damages by the government. Whenever I wanted books to read and could not afford them, I would read them in the library paid for by the government. The Government of my home town throws regular festivals, about once a month, in the summer for the entertainment of it's citizens. It costs The Government little more than blocking some streets for a few days, and about $40 per garage band playing (at 6 a night, for 3 nights) but if the government didn't give permission to block the roads, angry drivers would be demanding the head of whomever was responsible.
Anyway, I personally do not fear the government. I fear the corporations. While they have power-structures, they're built in a way that the leaders feel no responsibility for the actions of the power-structure. The 'best' way to build a sociopath is to get one person to give orders without feeling responsible for them, and force another person to obey. I feel that by hating or fearing the government we are removing from our arsenal the only real tool we have against the corporations. Ultimately all power must be backed up by force of arms, and dammit, our government has more than enough force of arms to take down a rogue corporation. A small town does not, and a large city would likely not care enough to.
At least our government pretends to feel responsible for whatever going on in the country, which is better than, say, British Petroleum (oops 'Beyond Petroleum'), Enron, The Lehman Brothers, General Electric (They pay NEGATIVE taxes to ship our jobs overseas, which... is 'wat') etc's CEOs feel about their employees and corporation. Corporations are to governments as sociopaths are to normal people, and governments are to 'small town/local politics' harsh, impersonal, cold, and rigid. So compared to your ideal 'small town' power structure, a corporation is a harsh, impersonal, cold sociopath.
And that's why corporations scare me, and I honestly am less afraid of our incompetent government that cannot find it's ass with both hands.
*Sigh* I know this looks like a 'troll' post, but it's not. These are my personal, and somewhat complex, ramblings. I'm sorry if they upset anyone.
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TLDR; I <3 Quantum Vibe, I want to <3 EFT but can't, my family must be made of the most abrasive people in the universe for how poorly we get treated by informal power structures, making the coldness of the government better then the hatred we regularly get elsewhere, and corporations are SCARY.
