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These days I have a hard time telling the difference between either, because no one in a democracy will ever vote for crazy policies like having surveillance ca

These days I have a hard time telling the difference between either, because no one in a democracy will ever vote for crazy policies like having surveillance cameras pointing at themselves or having increasing harsher laws on freedoms both online and offline. If so many important things are not up for the vote, is it really a democracy?

ClapperHeid 4y ago
>>If so many important things are not up for the vote, is it really a democracy? Exactly. For me, this is the myth of democracy. A party campaigns on a manifesto containing a few cherry-picked policies, aimed at appealing to enough of the electorate, to get them elected [quite often with less than 50% of the vote] And, assuming they have an overall majority in parliament, this then means that every decision they subsequently make over the next 4 years is legitimised in advance because "you voted for this". The only true democracy would involve regular referenda, whenever major new policies were proposed. This should be technically feasible with current technology. But, given the last time we had a referendum in UK the people didn't vote for the option they were meant to, I'm doubtful we'd ever see such a thing implemented.
- largepeepee 4y ago
  We don't even need new tech, Switzerland for example has been doing direct democracy like this for ages.
- dane-pgp 4y ago
  > the last time we had a referendum in UK the people didn't vote for the option they were meant to You mean "the people believed false promises and voted for something they inevitably regretted". https://qz.com/brexit-polls-support-popularity-eu-uk-1849952964 https://qz.com/brexit-polls-support-popularity-eu-uk-1849952...
fennecfoxy 4y ago
I'd rather have that flavour of democracy than the one that voted someone like Trump into power. Hell, he's still managing to wreak havoc over there even post-potus.

ClapperHeid 4y ago

>>If so many important things are not up for the vote, is it really a democracy? Exactly. For me, this is the myth of democracy. A party campaigns on a manifesto containing a few cherry-picked policies, aimed at appealing to enough of the electorate, to get them elected [quite often with less than 50% of the vote] And, assuming they have an overall majority in parliament, this then means that every decision they subsequently make over the next 4 years is legitimised in advance because "you voted for this". The only true democracy would involve regular referenda, whenever major new policies were proposed. This should be technically feasible with current technology. But, given the last time we had a referendum in UK the people didn't vote for the option they were meant to, I'm doubtful we'd ever see such a thing implemented.

largepeepee 4y ago
We don't even need new tech, Switzerland for example has been doing direct democracy like this for ages.
dane-pgp 4y ago
> the last time we had a referendum in UK the people didn't vote for the option they were meant to You mean "the people believed false promises and voted for something they inevitably regretted". https://qz.com/brexit-polls-support-popularity-eu-uk-1849952964 https://qz.com/brexit-polls-support-popularity-eu-uk-1849952...

fennecfoxy 4y ago

I'd rather have that flavour of democracy than the one that voted someone like Trump into power. Hell, he's still managing to wreak havoc over there even post-potus.