Every now and then some group of people end up making a democracy, but most don't put as many power-checks up as the US did when it was created (3 different branches) so must only last about one generation.
America's time is coming to an end. Crowds just aren't able to combat propaganda and other tactics from focused groups.
Damn, I think you made my day
https://apnews.com/article/france-retirement-age-strike-prot...
Good luck.
I'd take that as a mix of internalized propaganda (democracy is Da Best, therefore the dystopia must be the opposite - a psycho dictator at the top), mass-market appeal (most people seem to like basic character stories best, therefore let's' do a character-focused good vs evil story) and tendency to follow established tropes.
And if you feel that fiction "has already pinned down the future", I feel like I should warn about generalizing from fictional evidence, but I guess at this volume it's more of a self-fulfilling prophecy now. Everyone dreading but also expecting a dystopia is a sure way to walk straight into one.
> America's time is coming to an end. Crowds just aren't able to combat propaganda and other tactics from focused groups.
Could this be a maintenance issue? Most citizens - in the US or elsewhere - are just users of democracy, understanding it even worse than they understand phones and computers. It's not an easy system to grok - it's unstable on its own, and requires feedback control to function long-term. Most people never learn a good mental framework to understand such concepts - so perhaps putting more effort into teaching people not just history and political sciences, but actual control theory (or some handwavy simplification) would enable more people to both appreciate the system and help resist its subversion?
I'd like to think it would, but then the last few years have dispelled the illusion I had, that broad knowledge, proficiency with complex mental models, and good epistemic hygiene, are qualities that make people less likely to spew obvious bullshit in favor of their preferred political ideology. I suppose you can't easily teach people to treat intellectual honesty as a virtue.
It only takes a few hundred/thousand people in key places in a government to lower their standards or get scared about something and they can easily drag/persuade the entire country to come with them.
The real question is how to keep the checks and balances strong and stable instead of having them erode over time, as has been happening e.g. in the US.
We need a system that can consistently inhibit a privacy-eroding response to a 9/11-type event.