Here’s a truth no one likes to admit.
Being a citizen in a democratic state is much harder, and takes much more work, than being a citizen in an autocratic state.
You need to think about things that may not matter to you. You should vote. If called upon, you have to drop what you’re doing and be a juror. Even if it takes weeks.
It’s a lot easier to just complain about government and keep your head down than take public affairs seriously. You have a life. You’re just trying to get by. Democracy, if you’re poor, comes off as a middle class affectation. Most people in this world are poor. Very poor. Even wretchedly poor.
This provides power to autocrats. Wealth is concentrated in very few hands and wants to control those without. Soldiers have a monopoly of force they want to maintain, families they wish to provide for handsomely, and egos that want the massage of honor. Religious leaders want everybody’s soul.
These are the three legs of the Fascist Triad. Wealth. Power. Faith. They hold sway over most of the world. They’re on the march here because we’ve been too lazy to fight back.
We haven’t been doing our jobs as citizens in a democratic system.
As a result, our jobs become harder.
Now you don’t just have to vote. You must argue your positions in the public square. You must organize around those positions and participate in alliances with like-minded groups. Sometimes you must get on the streets and protest. You may have to risk your life for democracy when it’s under threat, not just against foreign enemies but domestic. That’s in the oath our leaders take. “All enemies foreign and domestic.” In a democracy, everyone is under oath.
Doing the right thing can be hard. If it were easy there wouldn’t be a choice to make. In a democracy, citizens must make choices every day. We must listen carefully to the news, filter it through our perception, come up with answers, defend the answers, then act upon our principles, and accept the results.
Being a citizen in a democratic system takes a lot of time, a lot of energy, a lot of money, and it sometimes entails risk.
But it’s better than every other system ever devised for government among people. It’s better for creating prosperity, in the form of a thriving middle class. An elected legislature, an executive with limited powers, an independent judiciary. All must be defended, every day, if democracy is to survive.
Autocrats expect us to give up. They expect us to give them all power, accept their chosen faith, and give their favored oligarchs all our money.
These are easy choices to make.
Democracy is the harder road. It’s something we need to accept.
