"The People"

This is not my work.  This was published first by Edward Feenman.  Verbatim.

It is the greatest of fallacies; indeed it might be the greatest public relations stunt ever conceived. It cannot be defined. It cannot be touched or spoken to. It cannot be seen. It has no substance.

And yet we as individuals identify ourselves as it with perfectly unhindered irrationality, while at the same time never being able to grasp its totality of non-existence. It is used to describe every last one of us, even when it singles out one of us to bully and plunder. It represents the basis of the entire structure of power over us, while at the same time somehow being us. And the power of it has created the most impressive false dialectic ever conceived in the history of the world.

Monarchies and dictatorships are surely envious of it, for even the most violent of militarized tyrannies cannot match the shear driving force of the consent of it. And all who oppose it have learned that no power in the world, including an act of God, seems to be able to stop it.

So just what is it?

It is the ambiguous title of “the People.”

In its most surreal application, the People is most often used to cause a lack of tangible responsibility for the actions of the People. Like the Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde model, the men and women that make up the citizenry of government can simply blame the government for everything done in the People’s name, even though it was supposedly done with the consent of the governed. For the government, the men and women that make up that legislature and Executive branch can simply blame the citizenry for giving their consent as the governed People, never admitting that their own actions (which are often despite the actual People’s will) were anything but the will of the People.

Either way, it seems, no one is ever to blame for the actions of the People because the People simply does not exist.

Does the People cast a shadow? Can the People be touched or seen? Can the People actually only speak with one voice, considering it supposedly equates to all the citizens in the nation? Can the elected officials somehow be the People despite the rest of the People just because those People voted for the legislators to be the voice of the People?

Just who, in the end, do you suppose is taking responsibility as the actual People? Is it the president? Is he the People when He decides to act as the People without actually consulting the People? Is the entire citizenry of People thus responsible as a collective People for the actions of the president acting as the People?

The People vs. The People

I can just imagine it… where all parties claiming to be the People actually go into arbitration so as to decide just who is in actuality responsible for the actions of government. It would be more devious than a divorce case, more televised than the O.J. Simpson case, and more flippant than a cat in a hot tub.

The common People would claim that the government committed a crime. The government would then counter-claim that the People voted for government, and therefore the crime was in the name of the People. But, so argues the attorney for the voting People, government is acting without consulting the People in its actions. To which government’s Attorney General retorts that the People gave consent for the government to act as the People in all things political, which really means that government is the spirit of the People. Nay, nay, says the common People’s representative, for the People have voiced in private and have called and sent petitions to these re-presentations of the People in government and spoken their individual opinions of government’s actions, and a majority of the People do not approve of government’s actions while acting as the People. And still in stalemate defiance, the government would claim that while the People certainly have the right to individually voice their personal opinions under the doctrine of “free speech”, says the Attorney General for the United States (i.e. the People), the People (government) is certainly not required in any way to consider the People’s (any citizen’s) individual opinions on the actions of government (the People)…

And at this point, Judge Judy slams her gavel down in Talmudic entropy and declares a mistrial due to irreconcilable differences in sameness.

And when the opinions of the case are written into case law, it would read that no distinction could be established in either separating the government from the People or the People from government, and that no individual citizen could claim to be the People, for all the People cannot be manifest in just one common person. Finally, it is the courts opinion that no individual or group of persons can claim to be the actual full body of People, because the People is a plural title for a singular body politic called the People. Therefore, only government can call itself the People, despite the fact that government is merely a fiction of law with no substance, and so the People cannot in fact sue the government for the government is in fact and in title actually the People.

Final decision: the case cannot exist because the People cannot sue the People. The government cannot sue itself. The People, therefore, must submit to the will of the People.

Here exists the hand of the People,

claiming to exist despite its non-existence,

presenting its own representation.

Say What?

If the above is confusing for you, ask yourself a few questions….

Are you a People? Is there any way that the word People can be a singular term that refers to only one man or woman?

Is government a People? Inasmuch as Walmart is a corporation, and the entire staff, board, CEO, shareholders, and owners could loosely be called a People, then yes.

Is government the People? How can government be all of us People if we are not voting for the actions or laws created by the small group of People in government?

Sure, we vote for which persons will inhabit government, but those People never ask permission from the rest of the People who voted for them when they pass laws on the People’s behalf. But if the government (the People) is able to put the responsibility of its actions on the entirety of all the People, then is it any wonder that the People never punish the People in government for crimes against the People?

Trying to figure out just what the People is at this point is like looking at an infinite, self-similar fractal. The beginning and the ending of just what the People is can never be truly be ascertained. And just when you think you have it figured out, you realize the paradox that its true quantitative power is that it is an equation with no solution  an impossible perfection of the political corruption of natural reason and logic.

Don’t get lost

How can such a nonsensical word as the People have been foisted upon the masses of men, who self-identify as both an individual sentient being and a fictional plural construct? How can hundreds of millions of men be convinced that they are not men but legally a single hive-minded political term known as the People? And from that experiential belief, how were so many strong-willed men able to be convinced that We, the People is the creator of all things and all laws, and that even though they are supposedly one of the People, the People can somehow single one of the individual People out and sue, fine, tax, punish, imprison, and even put to death that individual all in the name of that great god called We, the People? Amazingly, even as individual sentient beings, we still consider and address ourselves not as our selves, but as the whole People. I am We. We am I.

And therein lies the greatest word magic and trickery ever spell-cast. For by saying I am We, the People, a man is really saying I am of government. I am a fictional representation of myself. I am an individual fictional person and one of the fictional People at the same time? I am not man. I have no voice. I am totally controllable. I am a creation of government…

Literally, my will is the People’s will, and so therefore the People’s will tells me my will, whether I like it or not, and whether the People them-selves like it or not. Cause there are no real People, just a bunch of subjects called persons. It’s all just a fiction. Just a name. A big lie.