So yes, very undemocratic.
I did mean autocracy -- that's what China has become (once again) under Xi.
The best argument I can give for your statement is that the present US population democratically chooses as their head-of-state a person who would like the government to be more autocratic, or have authoritarian personalities, or are strongmen; between Chávez, Marcos, Duterte, Modi, and Bolsonaro, among others, you will be able to find instances where strongmen with great popular support are elected in sufficiently fair and free elections. I still consider they reflect the will of the people, even as some regard that the people suffer for that choice.
In which case, my original point still stands; I still think you want companies to want to cooperate with governmental leadership in a well-functioning democracy, and you have misidentified where dysfunction lies (if there is dysfunction) by thinking that for things to be arranged otherwise would be democratic.
Under first-past-the-post, and electoral college, there isn't that much representation even with the popular vote.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7tWHJfhiyo
> I still think you want companies to want to cooperate with governmental leadership in a well-functioning democracy
Without education, people will succumb to bias, propaganda and misinformation, often voting against their own interests. There's already a fundamental issue with capitalism favouring profit above anything else, leading to a lot of the current issues with (for example) privatization of health care. I don't think you can have a functional democracy without education. As a species we keep falling into a pattern of a wealth gap, followed by extremism, followed by wars, followed by poverty, while at every individual step we find reasons why it's perfectly fine.
You don't seem to have a problem with autocracy, but I do. I've lived in countries with those leaders - and Trump is cut from the same cloth. Enjoy it while it lasts.
> You don't seem to have a problem with autocracy, but I do.
I hadn't expressed my own views in autocracy myself. I had argued how the democratic will of the people as expressed for elections can actually be for the (future) society they live in to be autocratic; I gave examples, and you just gave Hitler as an example. So I don't think you have argued against this point. You should revise your last paragraph to read:
(The voting US majority) doesn't seem to have a problem with autocracy, but I do. I've lived in countries with those leaders - and Trump is cut from the same cloth. Enjoy it while it lasts.
I had hoped that you would be able to express that you understand that the current system is somewhat democratic, and that the current will is for the democratic system to extinguish itself. With this distinction being understood, I would have liked to discuss what institutions it would take for a society to not only be democratic, but also sustain that democracy into the future.
I would have liked to explore more nuanced notions; for example,
- you talked about companies "doing the autocratic government's bidding in controlling the population (by controlling information)", but I wanted to discuss what it means
- to shape the information environment of a voting citizen, so that they have certain beliefs so strongly autocratic that even in a democratic process their democratic will is to have an autocratic government.
- to examine the reality of the information and mass communication environment already present that is quite necessary for nationhood, that convinces someone to vote for a person that they have never spoken to personally and pretty much never heard of directly with their eyes and ears, to protect and advocate for their personal interests and rights, over someone they know from experience they can trust with for that like a family member or close friend. It is clear to a 4 y.o. that their parents are the only person they can trust for that, but as we grow up and learn about society through our information diet, we learn that we should be trusting people we never meet for it.