Comment by gman83
5 days ago
At least at the time, we thought it could be a tool for populist uprisings in authoritarian countries. Now it seems like they just want to promote populist uprisings in democratic countries.
5 days ago
At least at the time, we thought it could be a tool for populist uprisings in authoritarian countries. Now it seems like they just want to promote populist uprisings in democratic countries.
I'd argue it's a tool for extremism and populism everywhere; the weakest Arab governments simply crumpled first, however the same pressures are applied to all governments.
Isn't there a common theme though whether authoritarian or democracy? That's the tension between those in charge who think they know better ( and may well do ) and the populace.
In my mind, the failure on the democracy side has been the rise and rise of managing the message, and the fall of free speaking politicians - modern political comms is positively Orwellian - in part in response to the overwearning power for certain media groups to run a negative campaign to get what they want. Politicians were cowed.
If you look back at historic TV footage of politicians from 50 years ago - the level, subtlety and honesty of debate is much better.
Not sure how you fix it - the money+internet allows anybody to try and control the democratic process - but part of it has to be politicians being braver in speech and deed.
In speech, for example, Bernie Sanders didn't shy away from owning the word socialist - when he first came to prominence it was used as an unthinking label that the media thought should instantly disqualify him - but instead he took the opportunity to re-define it.
In deed - rather than clamp down on the voices of the many, the government should be looking to curtail the power of the few - Elon Musk is currently dismantling government and while I'm sure there is lots to fix, the reason democratic governments and laws exist is to challenge and constrain the power of the few ( every one is equal before the law ).