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infamouscowyesterday at 9:51 PM2 repliesview on HN

Owners are a minority of voters, which raises an obvious question: why does the majority tolerate it?

Every serious attempt to answer that ends up admitting something uncomfortable, that democracy only functions as intended if voters are consistently rational and informed. But that assumption doesn’t hold. It never has. Even the Athenians put Socrates, father of Western civilization, to death.

If society were at all rational, we'd see a lot more people swing from lampposts.


Replies

ipaddryesterday at 10:13 PM

Wealth can be spent on influence. That includes news converage / ads / or donations.

dexwiztoday at 12:36 AM

Because many people run on policies and then just don't follow up. Trump ran on "no more wars" and then started a war. Most people have such a team mindset they will choose denial over admitted they were duped, and then do it all again.