People are stupid. This is like saying water is wet. But still, many fail to take this fact into account when considering the merits of democracy.
Democracy is fantastic so long as people understand what they are voting for and what impact their decisions might have. However, increasingly, people are rushing to the polls without necessary information, to vote on issues they simply do not comprehend. For this reason, democracy can be flawed, even destructive.
Leaders say they will respect the will of their people, but should they if their people were deceived?
In the U.K., emboldened xenophobia and nationalism led British citizens to vote for leaving the European Union. After the Brexit vote, however, the leave campaign admitted that all of their promises were untrue. The British people had voted for lies. Experts knew this decision would be stupid, but the Brits refused to listen to them. As the leader of the leave campaign Michael Gove said, “I think people in this country have had enough of experts.” Thanks to their democracy, the U.K. made an idiotic decision based on lies and in defiance of experts who spend their entire lives studying the economy.
In the U.S., Donald Trump is the only indication anyone needs to recognize the shortcomings of democracy. Trump is the champion of the uninformed. He accused Ted Cruz’s father of killing John Kennedy, he called undocumented immigrants “rapists,” he assured voters that his private parts were adequately sized, and he has flip flopped on issues multiple times. Any other candidate would not only fail to get the nomination, but would never get elected to any office ever. But Trump is different because anti-intellectualism is so celebrated in the U.S.: he can say anything without consequence.
Evangelicals endorse Trump despite the fact that he is so irreligious that he egregiously misquoted the bible at a Christian university. Americans think Trump is better at fighting ISIS than Hillary Clinton (a former Secretary of State) even though he has absolutely no plan to fight ISIS or any foreign policy experience at all. Finally, Trump spouts conspiracy theories that many voters believe; half of Americans believe climate change is not caused by humans, and only 14 percent of Republicans think President Obama is a Christian.
I am sure readers may mischaracterize me as anti-American. However, nothing is as quintessentially American as questioning U.S. institutions. In fact, it is a right granted to Americans in the Constitution. Under its current iteration in the U.S. and the U.K., democracy in the hands of the uninformed becomes a force for terror. Is democracy the will of the people when the people have been lied to? Must leaders respect voters’ decisions if they do not know what they voted for? Must we tolerate voters who espouse conspiracy theories and disagree with science? Democracy allowed the U.K. to make a terrifying economic decision, and the U.S. is coming too close to electing a vacuous hot-head with zero political experience. Sure, democracy can be a voice for justice, but remember, some of the most brutal fascists were elected democratically.
