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Is Democracy Compatible with Freedom or Antithetical to Freedom?
576 sats \ 4 comments \ @kepford 28 Jan Politics_And_Law
Michael Malice asked this question in a recent appearance on a YouTube show
Is Democracy a system that is compatible with freedom or is it antithetical or incompatible with freedom?
What do you think?
And to be clear, the US is a democracy. Yes its a republic but it is one with democratic elections. Saying its a republic isn't saying it isn't a democracy. It is. But if you disagree that's fine. For sake of argument humor me. If you use the republic argument look at the number of tyrannies that are also republics around the world...
Democracy for many is a sacred cow. I'm not a monarchist but many that are like this book. Don't let that turn you off from reading Democracy: The God That Failed. Its a good critique of Democracy which is hard to find.
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111 sats \ 0 replies \ @0xIlmari 29 Jan
Democracy is a solution to the question of "How do we manage public resources and resolve issues that affect multiple people?" and its answer is "We vote and the minority accepts the majority's choice."
As long as the association is voluntary, I'd say it's compatible with freedom. You give up some self-determination rights and enter a social contract with a belief that people as a whole will benefit from the arrangement.
Actual modern democracies have two main issues:
  • They are not voluntary. You are born into the system like a slave and can't leave because the cartel holds power over the entire planet.
  • The system (government that was entrusted to execute the will of the people) oversteps its boundaries and starts telling people what they can and cannot do with their bodies, money and property. This can happen both because the leaders become corrupt and start thinking they "rule" the people or because people themselves (through fear or ignorance) relinquish more rights.
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39 sats \ 0 replies \ @galt 29 Jan
Democracy is not freedom, sooner or later there will be only lunatics and idiots to vote for and they give themselves full control of our lives. On the long run there is no difference between tyrannical and democratic society, all democracies have turned into oppressive empires
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45 sats \ 0 replies \ @HardMoney 29 Jan
Depends on the culture and average intelligence. Decades of demoralization and socialist propaganda has brainwashed the average person into wanting more government control and reallocation of resources.
It’s almost like democracies slowly devolve into voluntary cucking by the state as time passes and new generations become naive / nihilistic
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35 sats \ 0 replies \ @Undisciplined 28 Jan
It's both antithetical to freedom and a check on runaway tyranny.
Sure, people in a democracy have some ability to push back against government overreach. One of the problems is that they will only do so, when the overreach is unpopular.
The worst aspect, though, is that popular violations of rights can be initiated by a democracy, when they may not have happened otherwise. For example, "Tax the rich!" is probably a non-starter outside of democracies.
Any system where people's rights are made secondary to the desires of others is not a free society.
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