[AnonymousPlanet]

Heinlein's attitude towards citizenship in Starship Troopers very much reminded me of the attitude of the Prussian society regarding proper membership. In that mindset, only military discipline and a readiness for sacrifice formed a proper human being who would be a worthwhile member of society. This attitude can be seen as the Achilles' heel of humanism: every human is equal until you decide that some people just aren't human enough. I believe that this is how a country once championing humanism could take enlightenment (rationalization) and industrialization to such horrible conclusions.

Whenever considering a separation between full citizen and not-yet citizen, please keep this in mind.

[csydas]

I agree with both this and the above comment, in that I see this ideal as a dream at best, which is why as enticing as his views are, I can't fully say "yes, this is worth trying", especially since Heinlein's characters tend to be larger than life where the public just sort of accepts them for whatever reason.

So, please do understand in no way do I advocate for the actual separation. I think it'd be disastrous and used as a tool of oppression more than anything, despite my admiration of it in the initial post.

[TheOtherHobbes]

There's been a fundamental failure to teach basic intellectual literacy in the UK since the 1970s.

Issues have been reduced to opinions - often argued dishonestly, at the expense of basic facts - which in turn have been reduced to emotions.

It's one thing to think about how an issue affects you personally. It's something else entirely to utterly fail to understand that your hot-button feelings about one or two issues can have huge consequences.

Culture works through connections that increase the degrees of freedom of the system as a whole, not through individual moods and biases.

You can't run a 21st century economy without understanding this, and being able to make pragmatic choices based on it.