Contrary to elitist opinion, most people are not idiots. Even in the USA. The majority oppose war, are in favour of doing something about the environment and support universal health care. In most countries the majority favour de-criminalization of cannabis. True, this majoritarian intelligence may not have always existed, as witnessed by the lemming-like rush to war in 1914. But a discussion of the masse's learning curve should be saved for another time. What concerns us here is how people are today, not fifty or a hundred years ago.
Governments and the media who shill for them, must work full time to keep the intelligent majority from having any political impact. There are a number of methods employed. A favourite is to pretend to address the wishes of the majority. Even the most vile of developer-types now bleats about "sustainability." Reactionary policies turning back the clock to Dicken's era of low wages and horrible working conditions are hyped as "reforms." Ideologues who demand the suspension of our liberties are touted as "rebels against authority." Poor Orwell, spinning in his grave at this most despicable Newspeak!
Most people see through this propaganda screen. The corporate state's policies are supported by a minority, but it is a strong minority, roughly one-third of the population. This minority can be depended upon to support any corporate state policy no matter how corrupt, cruel, criminal or retrogressive it might be. With this strong base of True Believers In Infamy, the corporate state need only deceive or disinform a minority of the majority (the waverers or borderliners) to support them, and they have cobbled together a majority. This is easy to do in a "First Past the Post" electoral system, which is why the elite prefers it to the more democratic proportional system. Less than 40% of the vote gets you a government which can then bully the remaining 60% to its hard heart's content.
The "borderline population"? These consist of people who take an enlightened stance upon some issues, but not on others. They can be manipulated into supporting reactionary policies through targeted campaigns. For example, anti-war, anti-abortionists might support a pro-war party because it trumpeted about the evils of abortion. A certain number of Canadians who opposed the US attack on Iraq, favour intervention in Afganistan to "defeat the Islamofacist Taliban" or to "support our troops." Pro-environment, union-haters might endorse a government that talked green yet undermined workers' rights.
Back to the True Believer minority. This is basically a united front of the psychos and the stupid. Theoretically, more than a quarter of the population are well below average intelligence. I would not reduce the stupid True Believers to the mentally challenged, however. Many supposedly "slow" folks are very self-aware, and many average or above average are, in actions and beliefs, as dumb as posts. One of the clearest examples of stupidity is the reduction of every issue to black vs. white dichotomies. Most of the stupidity of which I write is of environmental origin. Being raised a in a mind-numbing religious cult is but one example of this manufactured stupidity. Abused children often lack curiosity and turn to rigid, obsessive, ritualistic behavior, which later in life may result in favouring reactionary political and social opinions.
About 5% of the male population are sociopaths. I have no stats on the number of narcissists, but don't think they are any fewer in number than the socios. The latter are noted for their lack of empathy and love of heirarchy, domination and authority. Such individuals are found on the center-right-far-right of the political spectrum. Narcissists also lack empathy, but not to the degree of the sociopaths, but like them, are unaware of (or don't care about) the social apects of existence that make their darling lives possible. A narcissist would typically think, "To Hell with Global Warming, I must have a Hummer!" Both deviants engage in forms of sociopathic inversion, blaming others for their problems. (1) Hence, Jews, communists, Muslims, Aboriginal People, anarchists, socialists, immigrants, Black People, women, gays, trade unionist, environmentalists etc. are chosen as scape goats for real or imagined problems.
The "psychos" become the leaders and the stupid the followers. (But do not think of the mass base as one docile mass. There are a host of lower-level leaders – goon squads, trolls, hate radio spouters, hack writers, etc.)
We will remain dominated by this United Front From Hell as long as we have a political system allowing a minority to rule over us, thus preventing the average citizen from making the decisions about his/her life in all areas of concern. Political power must be decentralized and decision-making must be done with face-to-face direct democratic procedures. Only then can the Peoples' Will prevail.
1. Serial killers/rapists, the most extreme manifestation of the sociopath, typically place the responsibility for their crime upon their victims. The classic example of ideological sociopathic inversion is found in the Bible, where the evils of the world are laid at the feet of women. Aboriginal people everywhere have had similar treatment as "savages" for fighting back against their genocidal colonizers.
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