Individual descretion occurs within a context of established norms and rules, which would be very different under a society in which everyone protects one another, rather than one in which such responsibility has been forfeit to a power that controls the population.
A society of the prior kind would be safer, by not being held hostage, and by not being disempowered to control itself.
Individual descretion occurs within a context of established norms and rules, which would be very different under a society in which everyone protects one another
It’s called a gang. That’s just gangs. Or tribes. Not a thing that scales up too well. Also not known for its safety.
by not being held hostage
You could literally be held hostage, unless your gang (hope you belong to a tough one) does something about it.
We aren’t disempowered, we vote and elect representatives. We give input that takes those norms and rules and puts them into laws to eliminate that individual discretion that is most often faulty (people have emotions after all, so don’t behave fairly when it’s personal).
Basically all the safest places in the world have violence monopolized by the state to enforce laws. All the most dangerous are where that isn’t the case (gangs, warlords, cartels, corruption) with few exceptions.
A gang is a criminal organization. Its relation to surrounding society is antagonistic, and it is broadly indifferent to the harmful effects it causes to anyone outside. Gangs often enrich themselves by theft supported by violence. They generally do not produce.
A group whose members live nearby to one another and who keep each other safe is a community. Members of a community generally participate in production, as the shared source of wealth and sustenance.
A tribe is a political structure often constituted as a loose affiliation of bands. A band is a kind of community. Bands are usually relatively isolated socially and geographically from other communities.
Many other communities, as often found in modern societies, are highly integrated with other communities, and maintain favorable relationships with them, seeking a minimization of violence, and fostering shared peace and prosperity through production and trade.
Voting is not empowering.
Voting is at best a choice of whom to empower. Those who compete against one another for the votes of the public generally have more in common with each other than with the public. Most rules change very little regardless of who is elected, and most rules carry the broader effect of protecting the power of those already empowered.
Broadly, voting generally maintains and protects, not challenges, the status quo and the disempowerment of the public.
For the public to become empowered, it would need to gain some power relative to those for whom it votes.
States perpetrate violence on massive scales. They function to protect themselves, not to protect the public. For almost the entirety of human existence, people have protected each other without states.
The idea that the state, even as a principle, should protect the public, is quite recent, even relative to the duration since states have emerged, and the practical reality is quite different from the principle.
When the interests of the public come into conflict with the interests of the state, then the state inflicts violence against the public.
When the capacity of the state becomes strained, to inflict violence against the public, then the state simply exercises its power to augment its capacity to inflict violence.