democracy
An interesting take on the word, from the erudite Cunning Hired Knaves.
See http://hiredknaves.wordpress.com/2014/03/21/whatever-happened-to-the-irish-democracy/
As a collective of people with a plethora of principles guiding us, we embrace the edges, the radical and the thought provoking. We are not in a dogmatic ditch.
British Knave of the Week – George ‘Give the peoples’ wealth to the Rich’ Osbourne
Carl
March 21, 2014 @ 8:37 pm
Some phrases from the post that struck me as I read it:
“Nowadays, ‘democracy’ is generally understood as an established state of affairs: representation in parliament, the right to vote every few years, the right to say what you like as long as it doesn’t get in the way of business. It is not generally understood as a multitude collectively engaged in social and political struggle, even violent struggle, for the conquest of rights and freedoms based on social equality….”
“The prevailing idea of democracy, at least if you were to listen to political speeches or read the newspapers, is little more than representation: you get to vote for the candidate of your choice, then the government gets in, and it does what it likes…accepting this idea of democracy means accepting that ‘regardless of how destructive they are of public welfare, regardless of how much wealth they transfer into private hands, regardless of how the reality of their decisions is obscured from public view’, government decisions are legitimate and unimpeachable.”
As a job description for us at Rhizome and many, if not all, of the readers of this blog you could do worse than “as a multitude collectively engaged in social and political struggle… for the conquest of rights and freedoms based on social equality”
Matthew