this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2023
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There's a famous Churchill quote about democracy that is almost always misquoted:
To me, the key words that are often left out entirely are: that have been tried.
For the Aztecs in this picture, it may actually be true that their system was the best one they'd tried so far. Maybe ritual sacrifice of a tiny minority was a small price to pay compared to what they'd experienced until then. Representative democracy with voting rights for all citizens over the age of majority might be the best system we've tried so far. Kings willing to devolve some power to their barons in the Magna Carta was the best system for England so far.
We shouldn't stop trying to make things better. Otherwise we're like these Aztecs.
Where? Closest thing I see is a "Rule of representatives elected by representatives elected by less than half the citizens over the age of majority" thing.
I believe that's the point being made. "Representative Democracy", or at least the pretense of which some live under at this time, is the best we ("we" referring to a particular group of people, not humanity as a sum) have found so far.
I get the point. My point is that we're still far from trying an actual "Representative Democracy" for any largish group of people, and that the Democracy of ancient Greece, with all its glaring flaws, was more Democratic than anything we have right now.