[WikiEN-l] Re: Things that bother me

[Ray Saintonge]

Sheldon Rampton wrote:

> Jimmy Wales wrote:
>
>> O.k., then we're likely so far apart in political opinions that we'll
>> have a hard time agreeing on very much.  If 90% of a population is
>> white, and votes in fair and open democratic elections to impose
>> rights violations ("separate but equal" or worse) on the 10% that is
>> black, you'd consider that a morally appropriate outcome?  I don't
>> think so, but that's what I mean when I say that majority rule is
>> morally repugnant.
>
> I agree, that would be morally repugnant, but no serious proponent of 
> majority rule advocates that sort of thing. 

That sounds naive.  It's not the idea of majority rule that is 
repugnant, but it's application.  Unfortunately, people like simple 
answers, even simplistic ones.  They equate democracy with simple 
majority rule, and don't want to consider anything more complex.  The 
"serious proponents" that you mention are a minority.  This is de 
Tocqueville's tyranny of the majority.

> The standard formulation is that the "majority rules, but the minority 
> has rights." The question of how to define the boundary between 
> majority rulership and minority rights has always been difficult to 
> define, but that fundamental problem doesn't get any better if you 
> resort to the only viable alternative to majority rule, which is 
> one-man dictatorship or rule by a minority elite. 

The one-man dictatorship is often more reliable and predictable than a 
minority élite.  

Eclecticology