Is democracy too important to leave to the peeps?

[Rum]

Brexit - an economic train crash of a disaster happening in slow motion - voted for by people who didn't know better. Trump - and ignorant neo-fascist a possibility for the most powerful position in the world.

People in this country would vote for the death penalty tomorrow if MPs let them. They don't because they believe in something non-democratic and liberal. (I use this as an example of the political elite holding back a popular damn rather than opening up a debate on the subject).

Is it time to tell people they can only vote if they can prove they aren't stupid!?

[cronus]

Democracy isn't the issue. Never was the issue. It's all about whose flying the god damned plane. And why I can see the waves outside the window here?

[Tyrannical]

I'm still laughing about the thread title lol

Death penalty? If the British voted on it I bet those Islamic sex groomers of under age girls would be hanging from lamp posts. No one was outraged when mussolini ended up that way......

[Svartalf]

Problem is that it's even more important it not be left to a bunch of corrupt aristocrats and other entitled elites, or possibly worse, to a clique of self important technocrats.

If we could find a Cincinnatus, or a bunch of public minded citizens to handle the affairs of state, we might maybe leave the hoi polloi out of it, but so long as the ruling classes can't be trusted, an injection of lowbrow idiocy in indispensable.

[Hermit]

Problem is that it's even more important it not be left to a bunch of corrupt aristocrats and other entitled elites, or possibly worse, to a clique of self important technocrats.

If we could find a Cincinnatus, or a bunch of public minded citizens to handle the affairs of state, we might maybe leave the hoi polloi out of it, but so long as the ruling classes can't be trusted, an injection of lowbrow idiocy in indispensable.

Quite so. Or, in Winston Churchill's words: "democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

He is also alleged to have said "The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter" but no source earlier than a 1992 usenet post has been found so far.

The least tractable problem is when a nation's democratically elected representatives vote for someone to become their dictator. That actually happened with the enactment of the Enabling Law in 1933.

[Tyrannical]

Egypt!
Military coup and they executed / imprisoned the leaders and outlawed their party lol

[pErvinalia]

Education and media are the problem. Democracy seems to work ok in Scandinavia where the populace is better educated.

[JimC]

We don't need no education
We don't need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the classroom
Teachers leave them kids alone
Hey! Teachers! Leave them kids alone!
All in all it's just another brick in the wall.
All in all you're just another brick in the wall.
We don't need no education
We don't need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the classroom
Teachers leave those kids alone
Hey! Teachers! Leave those kids alone!
All in all you're just another brick in the wall.
All in all you're just another brick in the wall.
"Wrong, do it again!"
"If you don't eat yer meat, you can't have any pudding.
How can you have any pudding if you don't eat yer meat?"
"You! Yes, you behind the bike sheds, stand still laddy!"

[Pappa]

Part of the problem with the EU referendum was that we're not accustomed to direct democracy in the UK. Although, I think the whole debacle could have been different if voters were given enough time and information to make an informed decision (as they were in the Scottish independence referendum). It was rushed through in a few short months. Voters had no idea of the exit conditions they were voting on, as the Government were unable to provide any real information, and nor was anyone else, so the media filled the vacuum with nonsense and shit.

[Scot Dutchy]

Referenda are the worst way to decide anything. You dont leave it to the electorate to make important decisions that what MP's are paid for. It is never a black and white decision.
Brexit was the worst decision made ever by any PM. The whole question was way over the head of the average voter and was reduced by the Leave campaign to one item; immigration which is in fact a non item in the EU. The repercussions of the vote was not even appreciated by the advocates of the leave campaign who were in fact playing a Bullingdon club game which got completely out hand which they even admitted has much.

Now everyone is walking around with egg on their faces. The Brexit has been kicked into the very long grass. May is hoping it will stay there for at least a good few years while memories go vague and disappear.

[MrJonno]

Nations and anything important should be run by elites (ie the clever and experienced) but with some democratic accountability, ie representative democracy. Referendums are an insane way to run anything. It's one thing to give the people a choice between reasonable intelligent people as a leader (most British politicians are reasonable bright except for Corbyn of course ). Germany bans referendums as they are such a good way to give tyrannical powers on a whim to nutters

[Svartalf]

the elites are not often so clever as they are supposed to be, and they are vulnerable to cronyism and general corruption, ergo, they are not fit to rule alone.

[Hermit]

Germany bans referendums as they are such a good way to give tyrannical powers on a whim to nutters

There goes another irony meter. Hitler got his dictatorial powers not by a referendum, but by a vote of members of parliament, when the latter voted the Ermächtigungsgesetz into law. Being a constitutional change, passing the law required two thirds of both houses to vote "yes". That meant at least 390 of the 584 needed to be in favour. The outcome was 444 yes votes and 94 votes against. The NSDAP did not even have the majority of seats at the time.

[Meekychuppet]

Brexit - an economic train crash of a disaster happening in slow motion - voted for by people who didn't know better. Trump - and ignorant neo-fascist a possibility for the most powerful position in the world.

People in this country would vote for the death penalty tomorrow if MPs let them. They don't because they believe in something non-democratic and liberal. (I use this as an example of the political elite holding back a popular damn rather than opening up a debate on the subject).

Is it time to tell people they can only vote if they can prove they aren't stupid!?

Rum - making astonishing baseless assertions and using them as the foundations of absurd arguments. Sadly in the UK we have a whole raft of people talking down to 'out' voters like that. We knew exactly what we were doing when we voted thanks very much.

[Meekychuppet]

Referenda are the worst way to decide anything. You dont leave it to the electorate to make important decisions that what MP's are paid for. It is never a black and white decision.
Brexit was the worst decision made ever by any PM. The whole question was way over the head of the average voter and was reduced by the Leave campaign to one item; immigration which is in fact a non item in the EU. The repercussions of the vote was not even appreciated by the advocates of the leave campaign who were in fact playing a Bullingdon club game which got completely out hand which they even admitted has much.

Now everyone is walking around with egg on their faces. The Brexit has been kicked into the very long grass. May is hoping it will stay there for at least a good few years while memories go vague and disappear.

That might well be the biggest pile of horse shit I've ever read on here. Have you spoken to any 'out' voters?