Politicians and gaslighting and making excuses for the state

"It's really your fault that you're getting abused in this way!"

Democracy is trash.

What kind of a goofy system is it where 51% of a citizenry can decide to boss around, loot, or march into war 49% of the citizenry just because… votes?

That’s in a pure democracy, of course. Our modern Western democracies are supposed to be better because they are something like “constitutional republics” where the minority has rights enshrined in law and the power of the majority is constrained by law.

Those enshrinements and constraints look pretty feeble to me. They are violated routinely. Almost at a whim.

Sometimes when you complain about modern democratic governments, someone will point out that for all their faults, these political systems are the “least bad” known to man.

“Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time…” — Winston Churchill

Maybe so, Winston. But humanity is a young species, and we have hardly exhausted all the possible ways human beings can arrange themselves into social institutions. Not all rules and norms have been considered.

I’m betting that sooner or later humanity will figure out a much better system. We’ve already worked out the theory, we just need to embrace and adopt it.

These articles are meant to be short, so I’m not going to explain Anarcho-Capitalism here. You can follow the zillions of references in the link above if you want to take a journey down that glorious rabbit hole.

Instead I’ll just close with another galling aspect of our modern Western democracies. The statists who defend them will claim that once you’re born into one of these damnable states, no matter what tyranny is imposed on you, it’s somehow your fault.

Don’t believe me? Well, does any of this sound familiar?

Victim: “This government is violating my rights!”

Statist response A: “Well, you voted for those politicians, so you support what they do, whatever it is.”

Statist response B: “Well, you participated in the voting system, so you tacitly support the outcome, whatever it is.”

Statist response C: “Well, you didn’t vote, so you can’t complain about the outcome, whatever it is. Get involved! This is a democracy!”

What kind of hideous gaslighting is that?

I’m cribbing from the great Michael Malice, who perhaps said it best:

“Perhaps it will be said that this consent is not a specific, but a general, one, and that the citizen is understood to have assented to every thing his representative may do, when he voted for him. But suppose he did not vote for him; and on the contrary did all in his power to get elected someone holding opposite views—what then? The reply will probably be that by taking part in such an election, he tacitly agreed to abide by the decision of the majority. And how if he did not vote at all? Why then he cannot justly complain of any tax, seeing that he made no protest against its imposition. So, curiously enough, it seems that he gave his consent in whatever way he acted—whether he said “Yes,” whether he said “No,” or whether he remained neuter! A rather awkward doctrine, this.”
― Michael Malice, The Anarchist Handbook

So, yeah, democracy is trash. The political means for allocating resources and directing behavior is vastly worse than the voluntary means. Not perfect. Humans don’t have that gear. But clearly better.

If for no other reason, it avoids that damnable gaslighting.

Naturally,

Adam

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