Tuesday, July 18, 2006

No pure democracy has ever been on this earth

When is the last time that government has ever waited to hear from the majority of an entire population? Woman were ignored for the longest time, and slaves too. So most of the earth's history has already been disqualified from pure democracy. These days the majority of the vote is taken to be the majority of the population, but two issues arise from that: 1) Majority vote is not majority population, 2) A small, well-organized, and motivated faction can exercise great political influence by voice and by vote, and 3) Apathy does not constitute endorsement of any view, even of the majority of the voters. In reality, modern democracy cannot be described as the rule of the people, but instead as the rule of the voters, or the rule of the factions.

When has any government been content and patient to wait for the majority of the people before closing its elections and extrapolating the will of the people? And why do intellectual elites deem their issues to be of such great importance as to berate the people for ignorance and apathy when their pet issues are neglected and thus rejected for lack of resonance with the people? And finally, how do representatives pretend to represent when most of the work represents their own interests and agendas, lacking support from the majority of their entire constituency? Who do representatives represent and how do they withold from the people the power to override their vote, which vote is considered to represent the will of the people? Such weaknesses are inherent in the nature of the current practices of government and politics, and they challenge the very foundation of power for a great many politicians and special interest groups, hence the justification for substantial opposition from those who pretend to be democracy's strongest advocates, but in reality are the strongest advocates of the modern, corrupted forms of democracy.

In a real democracy, the representatives represent the people, only acting with and according to their explicit and expressed will. Likewise, the government only governs by the established will of the majority of either the people or their representatives. The government should never have the power to discriminate, except in the execution of justice or enforcement of impartial, indiscriminate laws, or in the contracting of private agencies by bid for government work according the relevant requirements of each respectively.

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