[stcredzero]

It's a good thing, when a republic is constructed so that a minority still has a voice. One might perceive them as the "wrong" minority today, in the current context. In the future, they might well be the "correct" minority.

(That said, I think Sweden of all places in the west, have had the best, most sane reaction to the pandemic.)

[oblio]

And do you think that in Sweden of all places, minorities don't have a voice?

They have more of a voice, because they don't have a two party system. If you are American, please check out some European political systems. You'll find that politics in Europe are a lot more nuanced and minorities in general are much, much better represented.

[stcredzero]

And do you think that in Sweden of all places, minorities don't have a voice?

I don't know if you intended it that way, but the above feels like you're trying to put words in my mouth to that effect. No, I don't think I said that minorities are voiceless in Sweden.

They have more of a voice, because they don't have a two party system.

Right. Again, as Matt Easton says, "Context!" If the US were to go fully democratic, with our two parties, no electoral college, and everything done proportionally, things in the US would suck for constituencies smaller than 50%. Particularly with discourse being what it is in 2020.

However, if you know of a way to do away with the US two party system, I'm all ears.

Also, when I read your comment above, I tend to read it in my head as sounding angry and patronizing. Hopefully, you didn't mean it the way of, "What, you ignorant fool, do you not know...etc...?"

[int_19h]

The system as it is sucks for more than 50% of the population, though. With a two-party system, you're either going to have tyranny of the majority, or tyranny of the minority. Neither is good, but the former is preferable.

[stcredzero]

Neither is good, but the former is preferable.

This is why being gay before 1950 was so great: because the majority of society got its way. That's why there was segregation in many places in the US back then: because the majority of society got its way. It took the Civil Rights movement of the 1960's to get the in-built principles and mechanisms which are there in the US system to protect the minority to really apply. And yes, it was in part the action of the national majority which got that to happen.

The usual reason why people say the majority should get its absolute way, is generally because they are in the group who would come out on top. That's a shortsighted view. Even the majority is human and gets it dead wrong sometimes. This is why certain human rights need to be inviolate. This is why every government needs some sort of mechanism which gives the minority out-sized power. The US just does it in this particular way.

[int_19h]

The examples you give are of a kind that give minorities rights that cannot be overridden by voting.

EC and Senate are a very different arrangement - they don't protect any rights as such, they simply give some people more votes than others. Which means that not only those people can then veto majority decisions (even when they don't actually infringe on their rights) - but they can impose legislation that curtails rights of the majority.

As for it being a short-sighted view that majority should generally have its way, well, here's Federalist #22, for one:

"Every idea of proportion and every rule of fair representation conspire to condemn a principle, which gives to Rhode Island an equal weight in the scale of power with Massachusetts, or Connecticut, or New York; and to Delaware an equal voice in the National deliberations with Pennsylvania, or Virginia, or North Carolina. Its operation contradicts the fundamental maxim of republican Government, which requires that the sense of the majority should prevail. Sophistry may reply, that sovereigns are equal, and that a majority of the votes of the States will be a majority of confederated America. But this kind of logical legerdemain will never counteract the plain suggestions of justice and common sense. It may happen that this majority of States is a small minority of the People of America; and two thirds of the People of America could not long be persuaded, upon the credit of artificial distinctions and syllogistic subtleties, to submit their interests to the management and disposal of one third. The larger States would after a while revolt from the idea of receiving the law from the smaller. To acquiesce in such a privation of their due importance in the political scale, would be not merely to be insensible to the love of power, but even to sacrifice the desire of equality. It is neither rational to expect the first, nor just to require the last. The smaller States, considering how peculiarly their safety and welfare depend on Union, ought readily to renounce a pretension, which, if not relinquished, would prove fatal to its duration."

Was Hamilton short-sighted when he wrote this criticism? You can argue that it was originally aimed at the Articles of Confederation, not EC and Senate. But it's clear that this is a rather generic criticism, and it's applicable whenever "larger States ... receiving the law from the smaller" becomes commonplace - which depends on how many states there are, and their relative sizes, which have changed a lot since the original 13 colonies. Looking at the outcomes of the presidential and parliamentary elections in the past 20 years, I'd say that this condition is already fully in force, and so is the warning.

[Mc_Big_G]

What minority are you even talking about?

[stcredzero]

What minority are you even talking about

Any of them.

Some of them, I'm in. Some of them, I'll never be in. The principle is universal: A just society protects the minority. Any of them.

[sundaeofshock]

It’s one thing to protect the minority from the majority; it’s another to allow the minority to constantly overrule the majority. At some point the US will come apart because of our current political dynamics.

[stcredzero]

it’s another to allow the minority to constantly overrule the majority

That's the whole point of protecting the minority. Otherwise, if the majority always wins, and the minority has to be satisfied with the crumbs left by the majority, the minority has effectively zero power. It's like writing an API. You know you're doing it right, when things mostly work, but there's someone, somewhere sorely dissatisfied with not getting their way.

In the words of one fictional British gentleman, "You don't have it. I don't have it. That's detente, comrade!"

[losteric]

Any of them? Including groups that want to oppress others?

[stcredzero]

Including groups that want to oppress others?

Of course. Rights have to be universal, even for people with such desires. Otherwise, whomever has the power to adjudge what others are "actually" thinking have the power to remove people's human rights.

The dynamics where accusation is enough, guilt is assumed, and no proof is needed are often abused to have power over others. If there was ever a time when this should be obvious, it is 2020, present day.

In fact, all of the above is the whole point of the Bill of Rights and the Magna Carta.

[JoshuaDavid]

"Protects" is not equivalent to "grants the political wishes of". For example, people who want to abolish free speech still have the right to argue for the abolition of free speech.