In the following video, an Austrian man makes the case for electoral reforms in his country that would allow citizens to participate in the political process through direct democracy.
I’m not a fan of direct democracy, so this appeal leaves me unmoved. Especially in the age of a universal franchise, encouraging more political participation by ignorant self-absorbed people is guaranteed to result in even greater dysfunction.
Nevertheless, everyone should watch this fellow plead his case. Many thanks to Hellequin GB for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes and RAIR Foundation for the subtitling:
Video transcript:
| 00:00 | About 40 people rule in Austria: | |
| 00:04 | provincial governors, party and [?] people. | |
| 00:08 | They are very easy to “convince” | |
| 00:12 | to do something that is against the interests of their own people. | |
| 00:16 | The solution must be that we introduce direct democracy, | |
| 00:20 | where people have a say, and not just tick every a box every four or five years, | |
| 00:25 | but also decide thematically and in terms of content. | |
| 00:28 | That we, this direct democracy, | |
| 00:31 | we demand, promote and enforce. | |
| 00:34 | Because it is simply much more difficult to “convince” four million people | |
| 00:40 | to act against their own interests than 40 politicians. | |
| 00:45 | Politically, direct democracy is the solution | |
| 00:48 | we must impose through our work | |
| 00:53 | on this issue. | |
| 00:56 | You can help, and you can participate NOW, too. If we want it to go in the right direction, | |
| 01:01 | we will need a system change. | |
| 01:05 | Away from party dictatorships towards direct democracy | |
| 01:10 | and the participation of the people. | |
| 01:13 | Only together are we strong. |
I think he has a very simplistic understanding of democracy, and no understanding of why democracies can be every bit as vile and more so than a less representative form of government.
Any form of government where the average citizen has a voice in it can only work if the population is ethnically and religiously homogenous, educated, and moral. And there has to be rights which the government or voters are incapable of taking away or suspending just because a majority wants it.
Of course, at this stage in the game western democracies are too far gone to be saved by voting our way out of the mess we are in. Autocracy or dictatorship will probably be necessary for at least several generations to implement the reforms, wait for generations which have memories of the current system to die off, and properly educate and inculcate morality, religion, duty, and patriotism into the ruling class and anyone allowed the privilege of voting for them.
I think the best change may be total transparency except for some things. So everything is a public record that you can access, with out it getting filtered. If you are found to have secret communications you lose your position. Who edited a bill, who talked to them,…
Yep, and that is exactly the reason why the Soros Orc-import Ltd. is running overtime for decades now.
I talked the other day with a black guy about direct democracy, and he had to admit that it will never work in South Africa or anywhere else where there is Multiculturalism practised and to many different cultures or tribes clash.
He even said that even if South africa were all black, it wouldn’t work most likely, because the more stronger and numerous tribes would overrule the concerns of the smaller ones if it infringes on anything they want or have.
Imagine how much power the muslims would get with direct democracy. Bad idea. Also the people would just wote for more handouts to them selves. People now are generally just too stupid and degenerate to handle direct democracy. It was Santayana who wrote that the idea of democracy assumes plebeians can behave like patricians, or something like that.
Time to put the Arch Duke back in charge and rule with an iron fist, democracy is what got us these weak, feckless, pathetic, corrupt politicians in the first place, democracy is dead.
I am a fan of direct democracy. Among all the systems we know, it still offers the greatest chance for reason to have any franchise at all. An unelected leadership is always hit or miss, there have been good ones and bad ones in both extremes. None of them lasted forever. Also, representative democracy isn’t any better if the rot is for the same reason. Stupid people don’t vote for leaders wiser than themselves. Direct democracy does require a majority of mature, reasonable participants to function well. The universal principles of evolution are sorting those out that don’t. Unfortunately, this works against the individual who finds himself in a bad place when the surrounding society declines into intellectual twilight. Handling the pain of it being one’s own kin that does this is too much to bear, indeed. But what’s the difference when things go wrong, really? A bad leadership is simply something you can dissociate yourself from and blame the person or whatever. With direct democracy, you can’t escape from sharing in the responsibility, that’s why even on the good side many don’t like it. That, and the fact that we often can’t get over our own differences, religion still being a major blocker. Hardly anyone likes to have his own world view criticized, after all the world would be a better place if everyone believed the same, right? One thing the dumb have over intellectuals is the ability to organize. Even if it’s just a lowly instinct to follow any alpha that picks up the ball, it makes the group more powerful. We either learn it or we don’t have a place in the universe, because they will follow you anywhere, or worse, may come out of your own offspring. This is one area where even the best nation state can fail. Something like the Free State Project? A colony on Mars? You can escape from some circumstances if there are any places left to go, but you can’t escape human nature. If we establish a new population somewhere, it will go the same way after a few generations. America is the best example, at the time it was as far away as the next planet is for us today and it was built from scratch. Its Founding Fathers had great knowledge about these machinations and sought to overcome them. They would spin in their graves looking at it now. Whom do you want to blame for it?