While none of us were precisely born as liberals, the vast majority of us were raised as such.
If you could reach back in time to the past version of you that remained under the illusions of liberalism, what would you say?
While none of us were precisely born as liberals, the vast majority of us were raised as such.
If you could reach back in time to the past version of you that remained under the illusions of liberalism, what would you say?
"a liberal democracy will lead to the best outcomes for everyone, because it means everyone has a voice and can participate in decision-making" – that's a causal claim, you are claiming "if A, then B will follow" – and therefore it can be investigated empirically
but we have lots of examples of so-called democracies where poverty doesn't get solved, so the causal claim must be wrong
people think liberal democracy is the system that empowers the people. ok, well, look at liberal democracies, are the people thriving materially? are they able to effectively use the democratic system to get bread and healthcare?
Additionally, the realization that democratic rights in liberal democracies are limited: democracy isn't allowed in matters of private property.
People are free, decision-making is democratic. Ok, so can we vote Rockefeller's wealth away from him? No, don't be ridiculous.
Sure, it's great to have democracy for municipal services, taxes, etc., but let's also have it for the means of production like they have in Chiapas.
I've always thought poverty is the biggest problem in the world. Sure human rights issues are bad, incurable cancers are bad, but Poverty, that's the 800lb gorilla of human problems. Road traffic accidents are bad because they cause 2% of deaths. Poverty causes 50% of human deaths. So the fact that material wealth is non-democratic, oligarchic, that's a big deal. You can't say, "Ah well, it'd be nice to have fair distribution, but at least we have free speech for all". That's a much lesser right. Material wealth is the most important right.