
United States Pirate Party - wslh
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Pirate_Party
======
jellicle
It is tremendously difficult to get a broad-but-shallow movement like the
Pirate movement into political office in a first-past-the-post system like the
U.S.'s. Since the U.S.'s democracy is so weak and unrepresentative, a
political movement can have 3%, 5%, 10%, even 20% of the U.S. population on
its side and still get zero seats in the legislature. It will be almost
impossible for the Pirates to elect even one congressperson until they're
polling over 20% nationally, which obviously is a huge huge hurdle to
overcome.

The knowledge of how large that hurdle is reduces the incentive to
participate.

It's a shame that a country which wants to think of itself as the world's
foremost democracy is so undemocratic in its electoral structure.

~~~
davidw
Your logic is correct about the snowball's chance in hell most 3rd parties
have in the US, but the editorializing weakens your comment, IMO. You're right
in some ways, but there is no perfect electoral system. A representative
democracy like here in Italy carries risks of its own: that a small party will
hold the critical votes needed for a majority in parliament, and so hold a
much larger party 'hostage'. That is quite undemocratic in its own way, and
also leads to "weak" democracy because it's often difficult to hold fairly
diverse coalitions together long enough to do anything coherent.

~~~
Mvandenbergh
Agreed. PR has its own problems and allowing marginal parties a place in
government also means that you're going to have fascist and nationalist
parties represented in your legislature as many European countries do.

~~~
alxtye
Having fascist and nationalist parties is a demonstration of democracy
working, is it not?

~~~
davidw
Don't forget the hammer and sickle waving communists, either.

There's something to be said for being inclusive, but there's also something
to be said for not giving a platform and a voice to every nutjob out there,
either.

It's a balancing act...

~~~
jmj42
"I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you
to continue to write." --Voltaire (1770)

There is _nothing_ "to be said for not giving a platform and a voice to every
nutjob out there." The balance must always lie with not restricting speech. If
that means that a nutjob (as you call it), gets to say unpopular things, then
so be it.

~~~
philwelch
It's not a matter of restricting speech, it's a matter of restricting the
power to govern. It's Europe that actually bans fascists from marching down
the street bearing swastika banners, and yet they still get elected to
parliaments.

~~~
jmj42
The power to govern is, in effect, speech, so by limiting ones ability gain
political influence, you are limiting speech.

The ability of small political parties to gain representation in government
is, I believe, a good thing, even (perhaps especially) when the views of those
small parties are unpopular. Even those with extreme views have a right to
express them.

Now, while I believe that all people have a right to speech, they do not have
a right to be heard. There's an important distinction there. If someone cannot
get elected due to extreme or unpopular views (I, for instance, will not vote
anyone who holds various social stances that I consider detestable), that's
acceptable. Not being able to get elected due to a mandated ban on your
position is not something I can accept.

I'll grant you, the ability to gain office with extreme views has had some
pretty dire consequences in the past, but I still cannot bring myself to
believe that, even in the most extreme cases, limiting speech is acceptable.

~~~
philwelch
> The power to govern is, in effect, speech, so by limiting ones ability gain
> political influence, you are limiting speech.

What? No, this is ridiculous. The power to govern is the power to use
organized violence to achieve your goals. Limiting the ability to gain and
exercise political power is exactly the point of any kind of liberal form of
government.

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sudonim
The Pirate Party is a great example of what I hope is a continuing trend
towards the death of nationalism. PP is a global political party whose
candidates have shared values where national borders are essentially
irrelevant. We're an increasingly global people and thus far have only shown
the power of that in internet lynch mobs and DDOS attacks. It will be
interesting to see if other global political parties like the Pirate Party
emerge in the next few years.

~~~
mkr-hn
Any movement will fracture as it expands to include more people. Is fracturing
across subideological lines better than fracturing across geopolitical lines?

~~~
im_dario
Pirates agree that there is differences between nationalities but they keep
together in a few core values that is hard to get fractured by them:

* civil rights (in and out the net) * copyright and patents reform * open government and open data (transparency, accountability)

<http://wa.pirate.is/about>

Disclaimer: I'm from Spain and we share these values, although we claim too
for citizen participation in government through direct/liquid democracy, which
is the current difference between some pirate parties and others, but they all
tend now to this due PP-DE success.

Also, we keep working together in projects like PP-EU (European Pirate Party),
aiming to be present around Europe in the next European elections:
<http://jay.lu/?p=2184>

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Core-TX
That PPI map is heavily outdated. There is 68 pirate parties around the world.
( Counting nation states. )

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Skygrinder
How does a party get "officialy registered"? From the wikipedia article i see
the Greek pirate party marked as "Active, unregistered" even though we could
vote for them in the recent elections.

~~~
hobin
I think it means registered at the PPI.

~~~
runn1ng
Yes, the PPI (which consist of representatives of pirate parties of the world)
has to vote for you on... I think annual conferences

you can either become (I think) an observing member without the voting rights,
or full member with voting rights.

~~~
im_dario
That is right, although they announced in Praga to hold more conferences per
year.

What is wrong (in parent comments) is the meaning of being "registered". The
map shows which parties are officially registered in their countries.

For example, PP-Sweden doesn't belong to PPI (oh, surprise!). Swedish
representatives couldn't travel to Belgium because of eruptions of
Eyjafjallajökull [1]

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_eruptions_of_Eyjafjallaj%C...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_eruptions_of_Eyjafjallaj%C3%B6kull)

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Androsynth
I have to agree with Lessig, why use a pejorative term to brand yourself? We
on HN know what they stand for and what the problems are with IP and
copyrights. We can see past the emotions brought up from the word pirate; but
can the general populace?

I think they chose that as a FU to the companies calling them Pirates, but I
feel they played a bit into the MPAA's hands with that one; the name may end
up hurting them more than helping them.

(The Tea Party on the other hand, chose the perfect name for their movement,
even if the group itself has been co-opted by more powerful, malignant forces)

~~~
im_dario
These are nice references about the name:

* [http://falkvinge.net/2011/11/07/origins-of-the-pirate-party-...](http://falkvinge.net/2011/11/07/origins-of-the-pirate-party-privacy-sharing-innovation/)

* <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirate_Party#History>

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scribblemacher
Does anyone here at HN identify themselves as a member of the Pirate Party?

~~~
zby
I am involved in re-registering the Polish Pirate Party.

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jeffool
Visiting their home site, it seems they're trying it again. I'm glad to see
this. It sort of fell apart once before.

