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this post was submitted on 22 Oct 2023
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Advertising is how you biy the votes of people who don't really care. If they wont read up on it, then you tell them such-snd-such bill is bad for them, just like attack ads about candidates today.
I'm not saying direct democracy is intrinsically bad, I'd love to use it more. A few yes/no questions alongside a normal vote could be useful. I'm saying direct democracy isn't a drop-in replacement for representative democracy, especially a 100% direct version.
Direct and representative have shared weakpoints, and their own weakpoints, and we need to use each to cover eachother. Perhaps using a direct veto over representitive decisions, or direct decisions over representitive oprions.
With full direct democracy, laws won't mean anything anymore, and it's just mob rule. Controversies will get people executed, bad studies will get people killed, entire peoples and regions will be exiled, if not lynched. If you can whip enough people into a froth, you can control the whole country. Lots of people will listen to orhers for guidance anyway, basically recreating representitives but this time with no risk of responsibility on them; they can't lose their job for giving bad advice, as long as their following likes them.
And that's the problem I have with large amounts of direct democracy. We need more responsibility and accountability now, but removing representatives will give us less. If we can use direct democracy to hold representatives accountable, then sure, but who takes accountability for the majority when everybody pays?
Ultimately, I think a certain amount of funds should be set aside for social science experiments, where whole towns get their laws changed in radical ways for a decade, to see if something works without risking an entire nation. I've always be frustrated by how laws are rarely tested before applying to millions of people.