Comments on: Open Society (II)

by: Rick M

Mon, 04 Jun 2007 16:24:13 +0000

Good points, scriblerus and cyrus. I think that the leftists use the word democracy in a crafty way. They want to impose secular humanism,not just the one person-one vote formula, on societies. Their major concern is social transformation, not a change in the political process. They essentially want to use an invigorated state as a weapon against those who hold traditional values in whatever society leftists wish to transform (in Muslim societies this means devout Muslims; in American society this has meant traditional Christians and unreconstructed southerners).

by: cyrus

Mon, 04 Jun 2007 14:03:35 +0000

scriblerus:
In practice, “democratic values” maintained by enlightened administration take precedence over mere democracy, which has a tendency to result in policies that aren’t sufficiently “democratic.” Democracy now really means leftist theocracy. Enough attention is paid to the origin of the term that the holding of elections is considered necessary, but it is crucial that those elections not be able to change very much. It would endanger “democracy,” you see.

by: scriblerus

Mon, 04 Jun 2007 13:49:13 +0000

A lot of lefties who equate a just society with democracy tend to make a rather subtle shift from democracy as a political regime to democracy as a culture or way of life. John Dewey’s work on education and science is a classic example of this. So, not only must democratic political institutions be established and extended, but basic social institutions like the family, religion, schools, etc. all must be drastically reshaped to reflect “democratic values.” It sounds innocuous, but it’s basically the license for all sorts of social engineering projects.