[gwnn]

A friend of mine told me something like

"True democracy should be the WILL OF THE PEOPLE applied before any other principle. If the majority of the people wants to nuke Greenland (where the definition of majority may be up to debate), we should nuke Greenland."

Opinions?

(sorry for insulting Roland, Helene and the other Danes for my disgusting illustration)

[mike777]

gwnn, on Feb 1 2008, 02:10 AM, said:

A friend of mine told me something like

"True democracy should be the WILL OF THE PEOPLE applied before any other principle. If the majority of the people wants to nuke Greenland (where the definition of majority may be up to debate), we should nuke Greenland."

Opinions?

(sorry for insulting Roland, Helene and the other Danes for my disgusting illustration)

It is called the tyranny of democracy. Well known for thousands of years, that is why republics were invented, thousands of years ago.

[hotShot]

Does

Quote

WILL OF THE PEOPLE

mean a lynch mob, or what the people want after doing some thinking?

[Gerben42]

People voting have lots of time to think about what they're gonna vote, but never seem to. Why else would some obviously bad politicians and politicians with obviously bad ideas get so many votes?

[gwnn]

hotShot, on Feb 1 2008, 11:18 AM, said:

Does

Quote

WILL OF THE PEOPLE

mean a lynch mob, or what the people want after doing some thinking?

I think it's the latter - the objective, deep desire of the people, independent of "the spur of the moment" (to revive an expression from the Venice Cup thread). How that can be determined is up to debate, but is irrelevant for the purposes of this thread.

[helene_t]

Yes, I think you should nuke Greenland, so to speak. The alternative is to grant some dictator the mandate to overrule the will of the people whenever the people is "wrong" in his humble opinion. That may be a good idea if I personally have faith in a particular dictator, but it is the antithesis of democracy.

What you can do is to democratically decide to put certain "breaks" on the democracy, for example by requiring a qualified majority for changes to the constitution and all those kind of things. For example, if we once decided democratically on a constitution that says we are not going to use nukes against a country that has not threatened to use nukes against us (or some such) then we would not nuke Greenland unless a qualified majority wanted to change the constitution.

[gwnn]

helene_t, on Feb 1 2008, 02:24 PM, said:

Yes, I think you should nuke Greenland, so to speak. The alternative is to grant some dictator the mandate to overrule the will of the people whenever the people is "wrong" in his humble opinion. That may be a good idea if I personally have faith in a particular dictator, but it is the antithesis of democracy.

What you can do is to democratically decide to put certain "breaks" on the democracy, for example by requiring a qualified majority for changes to the constitution and all those kind of things. For example, if we once decided democratically on a constitution that says we are not going to use nukes against a country that has not threatened to use nukes against us (or some such) then we would not nuke Greenland unless a qualified majority wanted to change the constitution.

so you weren't that offended?

[helene_t]

lolol I never get offended. But if you plan to nuke Lancashire, give me 24 hours notice so I can pack my things.

[PassedOut]

gwnn, on Feb 1 2008, 02:10 AM, said:

If the majority of the people wants to nuke Greenland (where the definition of majority may be up to debate), we should nuke Greenland."

Absolutely not. One reason we have a constitution and laws is to guard against taking drastic actions based on the whims of the times.

In fact, it's mind-boggling to think that voters in the US can elect leaders who can disrupt (or end) the lives of people in other countries, people who have no vote in the matter whatsoever. And they can do so on a mere hunch, as Bush did in Iraq.

[Al_U_Card]

It is a question of progress(ion).

As we all know (intrinsically) the IQ of a group is the average IQ of all of the participants divided by the number involved.

Democracy starts out as mob rule and the constitutions and laws and legislative structures condition it so that it gets refined and sanitized. Eventually we get something that most people can endure. Now that's progress!

[gwnn]

Al_U_Card, on Feb 1 2008, 05:37 PM, said:

It is a question of progress(ion).

As we all know (intrinsically) the IQ of a group is the average IQ of all of the participants divided by the number involved.

Democracy starts out as mob rule and the constitutions and laws and legislative structures condition it so that it gets refined and sanitized. Eventually we get something that most people can endure. Now that's progress!

Yes but as the group of "the people who have changed something in the constitution" gets larger and larger, won't the IQ of said group also decrease?

[kenberg]

I am always skeptical of those who attach "True" as an adjective to some broad concept. Usually this indicates that they are about to make some demand. "If you truly love me you will buy me a mink coat."

Almost everyone believes there should be restraints on the popular will. So I suppose you could say that the popular will is that the popular will should be restrained, and so this restraint is True Democracy. Such semantics just tie us in knots.

I guess a resolution is that he can talk of True Democracy, using this to mean what he wishes, and the rest of us will just talk of, and prefer, democracy.

[grrigg]

Not going to offer an opinion, but just a historical note. The will of the people has throughout history meant the will of males of possibly right ethnic heritage possessing the right amount of money and/or land. There isnt much empirical evidence of "true democracy" and how it works. The founding fathers in particular were quite suspicious of the will of the people, thats why we have electoral college.

Of course now most restrictions on voting have been removed except for age. However we delegate 99.9% of the actual decision making to elected officials. In many ways this is very far from the spirit of democracy (whatever it is ).

[mike777]

grrigg, on Feb 1 2008, 12:11 PM, said:

Not going to offer an opinion, but just a historical note. The will of the people has throughout history meant the will of males of possibly right ethnic heritage possessing the right amount of money and/or land. There isnt much empirical evidence of "true democracy" and how it works. The founding fathers in particular were quite suspicious of the will of the people, thats why we have electoral college.

Of course now most restrictions on voting have been removed except for age. However we delegate 99.9% of the actual decision making to elected officials. In many ways this is very far from the spirit of democracy (whatever it is  ).

As I said this is why they invented republics thousands of years ago, to work around this problem.

The whole tyranny of democracy was well known thousands of years ago.

[luke warm]

you never know what particular group, ethnic or otherwise, will at any one time form the majority... that's why i'd prefer the constitution to be inviolable (more or less), and it's why i prefer a republic to a democracy... the absolute best form of gov't would be one in which i am benevolent dictator, but that probably won't happen any time soon

[DrTodd13]

Come on people. A Constitution doesn't mean anything. It is a piece of paper and isn't going to hop around arresting people who violate it. We have daily, systematic violation of our constitution in the US and nothing happens. Why? Because that is what the people want. Regardless of how many "supermajorities" you try to build in, they can always be ignored. If people believed in the principles the constitution embodies then you wouldn't need the constitution. If the people don't believe in those principles, a constitution is powerless to stop them. The simple fact is that anything with voting involved will eventually devolve to tyranny of the majority. There is no stable form of government. Dictators go to far and people power defeats them. Anything based on voting will devolve into people trying to live at the expense of others and this is an impossibility. Anarchy systematically does not violate anyone's rights but those with a lust for power will inevitably try to acquire it and good people are too scared or lazy to be eternally vigilant to stop them so anarchy devolves to dictatorship. Pick your poison.

[finally17]

Go ahead and define a "true democracy" as the applied will of a majority (with whatever definition of majority you prefer). But in that case a "true democracy" would suck.

The proliferation of the idea that there are inviolables, certain truths and rights that must not be encroached upon regardless of what the people, even unanimously, might will, is the perhaps the most important function the Bill of Rights, or any US document, ever served.

[grrigg]

finally17, on Feb 1 2008, 11:41 PM, said:

The proliferation of the idea that there are inviolables, certain truths and rights that must not be encroached upon regardless of what the people, even unanimously, might will, is the perhaps the most important function the Bill of Rights, or any US document, ever served.

This goes completely against the spirit of the Constitution lol. If something is desired unanimously, the Constitution is amended. Nothing is set in stone.

[helene_t]

Agree with Greg. I'm all for a constitution that would prevent us from nuking Greenland in the event that 51% of the population felt, for a brief moment induced by a crisis, like nuking Greenland, but that constitution would need to be democratically decided, including a democratically decided procedure for how the constitution may be revised in the future. Let the wisest legal scholar in the World argue for a particular constitution, if the majority ignores his advice, he's not going to get his constitution through.

[finally17]

grrigg, on Feb 2 2008, 12:58 AM, said:

This goes completely against the spirit of the Constitution lol. If something is desired unanimously, the Constitution is amended. Nothing is set in stone.

No. It perhaps goes against the letter of the Constitution, but it certainly doesn't go against the spirit. That is the very essence of the first 10 amendments, known as the Bill of Rights: that there are truths that shall not be violated.