Democracy – Is It Worth The Fight?
In light of recent elections, it’s very tempting to look at the argument that was once put forward that, as half the population is below average in intelligence and/or political awareness, that democracy is a flawed model and that we’d be better off adopting the model where only the elite got to vote…
Ah, those bloody inner-city elites. Woke nonsense. Thank god we have a few people with their feet on the ground who can vote in a man of the people like Donald Trump, who’ll be taking advice from such down-to-earth people as Robert Kennedy Jnr and Elon Musk… (admittedly the latter is planning to establish a colony on Mars so that we don’t have to worry about staying “down-to-earth” or even saving it, but there ya go…)
I still have some faith that a system where we all get a say is a much better system than one where a few special people get to make all the decisions, however, the problem is that politics has rarely been an area where people put forward potential solutions and sensibly debate possible outcomes. Instead, it resembles a gladiatorial contest where the winner gets to make the decisions and the losers are left with just tossing rocks until the next election.
If we take the problem of wars, I have put forward a perfect solution which none of the politicians want to know about. In a time where we should be concerned about global emissions, instead of sending ships, planes and armies to another country at great expense, once war has been declared, Country A could simply say to Country B that it wanted to bomb a particular area of their country and Country B could bomb it much more cheaply because they already have troops and equipment there. In return, Country B could then say, “Well, now we’d like to retaliate and we’d like you to blow up your munitions factory with about fifty nearby civilian houses destroyed…” At this point, Country A could escalate and ask Country B to destroy an energy plant, leading to Country B retaliating by asking Country A to destroy some vital piece of infrastructure…
When I suggested this, someone said that it was absurd and wanted to know why any country would be prepared to blow up its own areas and kill its own citizens, I shrugged and said that it was pretty much what happens now, except that each country has to destroy the other one’s things and then wait for the country to retaliate; my way just saves on the shipping costs. “But,” the person objected, “what would happen if one country didn’t follow through? This might mean that the whole thing would stop and before you know it, you’d have peace breaking out!”
Anyway, back to democracy…
The fundamental problem is that we don’t have the various sides of politics saying that we have a big problem and we don’t know what to do about it; we have everyone arguing that they’re the only ones with the solution and the various other sides are just wrong.
If we take the recent cap on student numbers as a prime example, we have Peter Dutton telling us in his budget reply that we need to put a cap on student numbers. Now, whatever your position on this issue, I’d suggest that you’d believe that Mr Dutton is in favour of a cap. However, when Labor put forward their bill proposing a cap, the Coalition announced that they’ll oppose Labor’s bill because it’s not the cap that they want and it won’t solve the problem of housing or Mexicans or inflation or Labor’s inability to manage money. (Yes, Labor have produced two surpluses but they’re the ones who can’t manage money!)
Then, of course, there’s the misinformation bill. Of course, there are two sides to the banning of misinformation. The first is that there’s a danger if it’s the government deciding what is and isn’t misinformation, we could end up in the classic Orwellian nightmare of Newspeak. However, there is also the fact that there is a genuine problem with misinformation. I mean, we’re talking about something that’s misinformation by it’s very nature and surely – just as there are laws against slandering a person – it’s reasonable to expect that people should not be able to say whatever without consequences. Does free speech give you the right to shout “Fire” in a crowded theatre, etc? Well, obviously, yes if there is a fire, but surely you should have to explain yourself if you did it for some other reason. Rather than a mature debate about what we should do about actual misinformation, we end up with political point scoring.
Actually, I did find it refreshing during the Voice debate to hear so many Coalition MPs tell us that – not only did they oppose the Voice and Treaty – but they were dead against truth-telling as well. One of the few times we’ve had honesty from that bunch of liars!
While scepticism about what the media and the politicians tell us is a sign of a healthy democracy, this doesn’t mean that cynicism is the next logical step. And that’s the trouble with the whole fake news schtick of Donald Trump: anything that threatens our worldview can be dismissed as fake news, while we’re happy to believe the anecdote about some outrageous happening and generalise it to all schools, all politicians, all churches, all LGTBI groups, all inner city people, all Americans…
And this isn’t good for healthy debates about real problems that nobody has the complete answer for. It doesn’t help when people don’t know the difference between “communist” and “totalitarian” as in the comment about Jeff Bezos which I put at the top. It’s pretty hard to believe that the richest man in the world is running Amazon like a socialist collective in any way.
Perhaps Winston Churchill got it right when he said: “Democracy is the worst form of government apart from all the others.”
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17 comments
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Harry Lime -
Bert -
Peter Gumley -
Arnd -
Canguro -
herbert -
Arnd -
Max Gross -
Steve Davis -
Canguro -
Arnd -
Arnd -
paul walter -
leefe -
Henry -
Clakka -
paul walter
Return to home pageFrankly, I think that fight has been lost.Our so called ‘democracies’ have been run basically by money, in the form of large corporations, vested interests and ,up until now, by self serving media wallahs…a la the arsehole Murdoch.We can see by the latest farrago of fools in the country of our’great friend’how far ‘democracy’ has been subverted.
To round out this failure is the acquiescence of politicians who are too faint hearted,plain stupid, or have actively enabled this takeover.That is, despite all the bullshit that is spewed on the population by our alleged ‘representatives’.
.It’s going to get a lot worse, before it ever gets better.I was tempted to say we are fucked,but I’m still hanging on by a fingernail.
Interesting use of the work ‘fucked’ Harry. A young work a work mate once told me he was ‘fucked’. I said I remembered that feeling and smiled, remembered the feeling fondly. But I was already old at that time, and the older I get the fonder the memory is.
As for democracy, we can remember how we felt when we first engaged in it, when we felt we actually had a say. We still can, it’s called engaging, become active, fight for democracy. The alternative is not worth having.
….”as half the population is below average in intelligence and/or political awareness, ….” That all depends who sets the bar and what their intention is. Don’t forget that there are plenty of people who are relatively uneducated (eg; my Grandma), but have wisdom coupled with common sense. The fact that many people do not engage with politics is because the current state of politics (Uni-party) is both unattractive and non-responsive to any opinion outside their narrative. Selective “journalism” that provides infotainment rather than substantive facts only serves the purpose of the UniParty and its controllers.
If “democracy” is as good as it gets – and it really isn’t all that good – why is there not more people considering doing away with governments altogether?
Ya know … – anarchism-like.
Or maybe people like whinging and moaning too much? I mean, what would Rossleigh carry on about if there weren’t any idiotic government? And Rob Sitch and Utopia would be unthinkable – and Utopia is kind of funny.
Arnd, the inevitable squabbles and disagreements that would arise should the contemporary models of government be disbanded & done away with would preclude a successful introduction of an anarchist style of self-governance.
I’m thinking, for example, of things like distribution of state and federal monies into what we currently see as those areas that benefit from these funding approaches: roads and public transport, healthcare, education & public housing as well as the private sectors of construction, finance, corporate businesses, along with things like national security – policing borders, fighting against crimes of all types, maintenance of some semblance of a national defence capacity, diplomatic relationships with the rest of the world etc. etc… it’s a very long list of tasks & activities that the current albeit flawed models of government undertake. Hard to see a bunch of Kropotkinites sitting around the table and arriving at best-practice solutions to these challenges.
Particularly so in a country such as this which has steadily moved into becoming one of the most multicultural models of society on the planet.
Or perhaps you disagree?
‘Anyway, back to democracy…
The fundamental problem is that we don’t have the various sides of politics saying that we have a big problem and we don’t know what to do about it; we have everyone arguing that they’re the only ones with the solution and the various other sides are just wrong.
If we take the recent cap on student numbers as a prime example…’
It seems the capacity to see the big picture has dissolved into myopia and vagaries. Here we are faffing about in a dim wood for answers, whilst the fulfilment of the cynical neoliberal/liberal masterplan to commodify and corporatise tertiary education presses on relentlessly with its crude divide-and-conquer cultural effects: the uncritical gift of ignorance that keeps on giving to the corporate donors and ruling incumbents per the spawning of a monstrously deluded population hooked on social media for its next hit of ego-inflating mis/disinformation from malevolent actors, cheap gurus, and con-artists.
And without the knowledge base and critical thinking enabled by a half-decent education the sophistry of pernicious influencers is elevated to acceptable discourse as it white-ants the foundations of a just and equitable society.
https://bettinaarndt.substack.com/p/justice-denied
Canguro, I kind of agree with you, AND I kind of disagree. Obviously, if, all of a sudden, as of tomorrow morning 9.00 am, the administration of ministerial portfolios like defence, immigration or even environmental protection and social services, were left to, say, Steve Davis or myself, they’d become an instant mess.
Otoh, the subject areas of those portfolios clearly already ARE a mess, and a steadily worsening one at that. Hence, a very substantial shift in perspective clearly is necessary.
Having given this need for paradigmatic change repeated thought over the decades, I have arrived at the conclusion that it ought to be drifted towards one predicated on anarchist principles.
Others might disagree. Indeed, many do. A goodly proportion of whom then proceed to express their as such patently sensible disenchantment with conventional democracy by voting for Trump, or Orban, Putin, Wilders, le Pen, or AfD and PIS.
Further: I always thought of this shift in principles – informed by the Marxist notion of the “Withering away of the state” and Henry de Saint-Simon’s idea that “The governance of people will loose its political character, and transform into the [mutual] administration of things” – as a long-term and indeed multi-generational undertaking.
I ran up against these ideas some thirty years ago, and thought back then that in the best-case scenario, this shift might take three generations and come into its own at the next turn of century.
I may still be correct – it’s just that progress towards this ideal will obviously not be linear, but involve a number of very destructive regressive steps.
In any case, I very confidently assure you and Rossleigh, and any of the multitudes who keep kvetching interminably about the need to maintain and preserve “stable institutions”, of one thing: Monitory Democracy (John Keane), as it has established itself in the political West since WWII will change dramatically!
Whether it changes for better or for worse – whether we continue with forlorn rear-guard action, or whether we grab hold of the agenda and purposefully shape it to serve our developing needs – is up to us.
“The cornerstone of democracy rests on the foundation of an educated electorate” – Thomas Jefferson. Oops!!!
Arnd, yes, the withering away of the state is the key to the emergence of a truly free and democratic society.
I believe we are witnessing that withering right now.
We are also witnessing the emergence of anarchist thinking, although those involved possibly are not aware that they are doing so.
Anarchist thinking comes to the fore firstly because history shows it to have been a huge part of the story of humanity, and secondly because eventually most of us will see the alternatives as dead-ends.
Problem is, we are also seeing the inevitable striking out at everyone and everything that we would expect of a dying monster.
And just by the way, I reckon I’d make a great Minister for Defence!
I’d cut the budget by half immediately!
Thanks Arnd, for your perfectly rational and reasonable reply. I hope you are correct.
Kvetching will cease, forthwith!
If I manage to crack the immortality challenge – never a guaranteed outcome – I’ll be keeping a close eye on things from above.
I think we need to use more Yiddish words – they are so spot-on!
And I shall certainly continue to kvetch. Loudly and often, and including here on The AIMN! But about the perfidy of the bourgeois order, not about its demise.
Hey Max, it wasn’t all that long ago that I ran across a rather bold claim on the internet, namely that during the interwar years and the development of Nazism, Germans were the best educated country in the whole world.
I haven’t investigated that claim myself, but I have to tell you – as someone who grew up in Germany in academic middle-class circumstances, and who was thoroughly steeped in the values, pretences and vanities of the Bildungsbürgertum – that I find this claim not just eminently plausible, but overwhelmingly convincing.
Roland Freisler held a PhD in jurisprudence. Martin Heidegger had been awarded a Dr phil. hab. (the level after a mere PhD), as did Carl Schmitt. There’s plenty more examples.
There are counter-intuitive, but nevertheless well supported conjectures that the better educated may be not less, but more susceptible to motivated reasoning. Being better at reasoning certainly would explain their being better at arriving at the conclusions they (subconsciously?) prefer:
Maybe take with a grain of salt or two whatever it is them well-educated folks from inside the Beltway, or from inside the Big House on Capital Hill, Canberra, tell you.
Of course it is worth the fight. But the population is increasingly homogenised, heterogenised and desensitised and time is running out fast.
” …one where a few special people get to make all the decisions … ”
And this is where we run into problems.
Who are these special people? How do we decide who is sufficiently special to qualify? Who decides those criteria? It always seems to be a bunch of arseholes annointing themselves as being the only ones worthy of weilding power.
leefe, for Labor the special person is Albo, for Libs it is Dutton, for MSM it is Murdoch & Stokes, etc
Yo! QED or QEF or WTF? Onward, ever onward to the spot twixt the lip and the cup ….. Charge!
Well put, Leefe. I’d query a few minor details, but I think it is well summed up on the actuality.