Political Philosophy Analysis - Essay Example

Political Philosophy Political community consists of individuals who have the responsibility to ensure that there are organized institutions for ensuring their freedom of justice for all. These people in the political community are often bound by same values and morals to govern their daily lives. There are several needs that a given political community needs to have to ensure their survival and security. The political community needs to have political freedom. This freedom enables citizens to democratically elect their leaders to represent them at the national level. In addition, the political community needs to have the freedom to contest and be elected to any political position. Freedom to vote for political candidate of their choice ensures that the citizens are not exploited by incompetent leaders once they take over political power to rule a given nation. Further, freedom to hold demonstrations is also of crucial need to the community; the citizens are able to voice their objections through such forums. Political freedom is of great importance to the survival of a political community. Civil freedom is also of great importance. By ensuring that there is civil freedom in a given political community, each individual is guaranteed the freedom of interacting with one another with minimum ethical or legal constraints. These rights include the need to form crucial relationships of marriages or forming organizations in aid to the society. Civil right of marriage ensures that there is continuity in the lives of the citizens: new members of the community are born to take over from the old members of the community. In addition, civil right enables the citizens to socialize fully and be able to develop required form of behavior. On ethical freedom; the society is guaranteed of measures that are aimed at regulating and showing them what is right and wrong. These measures will ensure that citizens do not engage in bad forms of behavior that can harm their counterparts. Laws should be put in place to govern the relationship of individuals within the state. This is achieved through reigning of those who violate the laws to the courts so that justice can prevail. Political community also needs a set of rules to govern their daily lives. In most communities, this has been ensured through the enactment of a constitution. Most importantly, the constitution ensures that the citizens are not ruled by dictators. It also ensures that actions of political leaders are monitored so that they do not cause harm to the society Philosophy aims at truth. Achieving truth comes from rejection of myths, dogmatism and irrational propositions. Citizens need to know that they don’t have to depend on what the community holds to be the common view concerning an issue. Personal reasoning of what is right and wrong is the only way to identify truth. In the course of finding truth, citizens should come out of mental domination of others to the society. Groupthink is a common means in which truth can never be achieved. Differentiating wrong from good arguments is the only way of achieving the truth. Socrates in the Clouds In the play ‘clouds’, Socrates is grossly misrepresented. He has been described as being a complete charlatan (quack) and is having his head literally in the clouds. It further states that Socrates only cares about science and his strange rituals. In addition, his students have also been described as being completely untamed; weak and young, acting as actual servants of Socrates. This misrepresentation means that Socrates is simply being separate, and not in thinking with the rest of the society. Therefore, Socrates and his thinking are in no way useful to the society. Further, they have been described as being social parasites. On the contrary, Socrates in platonic dialogues is considered as a great philosopher. Socrates had been the teacher to Plato, and after his death, Plato combined his philosophical thoughts so that he could explore philosophical issues in them. He (Plato) would use Socrates dialogues in his school as starting points for discussion. In the platonic dialogues, Socrates can be seen to be asking questions and not providing answers to them. Plato simply continued with Socrates’ philosophy which majorly concentrates on the issues of ethics. For example, what friendship is, what virtue is, and can it be taught? (Aristophanes and Marianetti, p 8). Socrates versus Nature In his philosophy, Socrates would ask someone who claimed to be an expert in a given discipline about a moral term he or she is using. He would as questions on the nature of piety, courage or justice. Socrates would then go on to say that the answer the person has been given is inaccurate or is contradictory. His claims then lead to the person giving the answers to come up with other more appropriate definitions, which upon assessment, prove to be problematic. Socrates philosophy therefore leads to more confusion than when an individual had not been questioned by him. Socrates is against nature since he states that by looking at piety; the standard of determining what is right and wrong, he is comes to a conclusion that happiness is inevitable. Knowing what is right and wrong might not lead to happiness (West, Plato, Stary and Aristophanes, p 35). Unjust Speech The unjust speech of Socrates states that: Socrates examined the citizens of Athens and found out that they did not what they thought they knew. He came up with many errors pointing at the Athenians. These led to the annoyance of Athenians to Socrates. Socrates was seen to be questioning the authority and the roles of the gods and their laws. Further, Socrates was also unable to provide Athenians with adequate answers concerning their lives. The idea of Socrates undercutting the laws and the tradition constituted the unjust speech. Socrates is not guilty of using the speech since his teachings were for the search of truth. Truth can only be achieved through rejection of mental domination and groupthink; every individual should strive to know what is right and wrong and need not follow the community’s way of doing things (West, Plato, Stary and Aristophanes, p 33). Socrates does not follow the gods of the city neither does he invent new gods. Socrates looks at reason as a guide to life. Human beings should be guided by reason whenever they engage in any action that may affect their lives. Reason ensures that an individual makes right choices that help to shape their lives. He calls for philosophical look at life. He further describes virtue as the philosophical life. To live good life, he says that life should include qualities of the soul and good political institutions to govern human life (West, Plato, Stary and Aristophanes, p 39). Socrates does not in any way corrupt the youth. Socrates advocates for reasoning in anything a person does. Any activity that the youth are bound to engage in should be guided by their rational thinking by weighing the consequences as well as the possible benefits they are bound to achieve in any action. Socrates views on reasoning will help the youth to solve their daily problems of substance abuse, prostitution and thug life. Engaging in these behaviors, need reasoning on the part of the youth so as to determine the benefits as well as the consequences to them. The youth should also realize that ignorance is not defense once they engage in unexpected behaviors in the society. According to Socrates, correct reasoning will lead to morality in the youth. In addition, morality ensures that there is secured conditions for freedom. Morality teaches the youth to stand up against these individuals who oppress them. They should do this by restraining their destructive passions, and the need to respect each other’s rights. Works cited Aristophanes and Marianetti Marie. The clouds: an annotated translation. New York, University Press of America, 1997. Pp 8-15. West Thomas, Plato, Stary Grace and Aristophanes. 4 texts on Socrates. Cornell University press, 1998. Pp 33- 40. Read More