[spaceman_2020]

I don't understand why Americans continue believing that democracy is the only way for every population in the world

Why would Russians want democracy? Or the Chinese, for that matter? There have been zero democratic impulses in their societies across hundreds, even thousands of years.

The west needs to rest its democratizing mission and accept that every society is fundamentally different

My country (India) got a "thriving" democracy, but because there is no real democratic impulse in the society, everything on the ground has devolved into what the society was always like - quasi-feudal bureaucracy

[akmiller]

> I don't understand why Americans continue believing that democracy is the only way for every population in the world

They don't! The majority voted for the guy who wants to, admittedly (multiple times), be a dictator and is huge fan of other dictators. If he finds a way to stay for a 3rd term his most loyal followers along with all the republicans in Congress will be just fine with it.

[hootz]

>I don't understand why Americans continue believing that democracy is the only way for every population in the world

Well, ideology. I believe my way is the only way for every population in the world too, and I fight for it to happen. Of course, each place adapts to their own condition, but I believe my core ideology is the way for humanity as a whole, and I believe it is the same for people who defend western american-style democracy.

[spaceman_2020]

What part of "defending western american-style democracy" involves imposing it on other countries and being mad when they don't adopt it?

[sofixa]

> I don't understand why Americans continue believing that democracy is the only way for every population in the world

It's not Americans, it's educated people who believe in personal liberties.

> Why would Russians want democracy

Because they would have a choice if they want to be robbed blind by a bunch of oligarchs, and if they want to be sanctioned off from the world because the supreme leader decided he wants to kill and maim a million Russians to achieve nothing more than killing Ukrainian civillians.

> There have been zero democratic impulses in their societies across hundreds, even thousands of years

Absurdly bad historic revisionism. Russia had democratic impulses in 1917 and 1990, both hijacked and went nowhere. China's 1911 revolution was also overtly democratic in nature, but was also hijacked.

[spaceman_2020]

> It's not Americans, it's educated people who believe in personal liberties.

I find this attitude deeply parochial and colonial. Who are these so-called "educated people" (most of whom would be in western developed nations) to decide what sort of governance system a country should have?

The democratic revolution in America and France came from its own people. If the Russians or the Chinese want democracy, they'll get it on their own

Western hand-wringing about the "lack of democracy" in foreign (usually poorer) countries is just concern-colonialism. I think most of these educated people should focus on their own countries and let the rest of the world be

[sofixa]

> I find this attitude deeply parochial and colonial. Who are these so-called "educated people" (most of whom would be in western developed nations) to decide what sort of governance system a country should have?

Do you think only people in western countries want a democratic system of governenance for their country?

> If the Russians or the Chinese want democracy, they'll get it on their own

Both of them tried it, but were denied.

[wiseowise]

> If the Russians or the Chinese want democracy, they'll get it on their own

There's literally a saying about USSR (which by proxy now applies to Russia) which roughly translates to: half the population in prison and another half as guards. You can't get it when army, police and whole government apparatus is aimed against it. Times have changed, people are not willing to die en masse for a change when one single cop can kill a crowd.

They literally killed 132 hostages during a saving operation [1], how many do you think will die when they start shooting the crowds?

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_theater_hostage_crisis

[nailer]

> Or the Chinese, for that matter?

The marched for it en masse in 1989?

Russians and Chinese are also people. They deserve to rule themselves.

[jyscao]

An ideologically driven subset of urban educated youths that was proportionally a tiny subset of the entire Chinese population marched for it in 1989. FTFY.

They are ruling themselves in the sense that their governing systems are emergent consequences of their own cultures. All peoples ultimately deserve the governments they have.

[breezybottom]

You could say the exact same thing about the cultural revolution.

[jyscao]

Yes, so what's your point?

[nailer]

That your point about support for Chinese democracy, could also be applied to Chinese communism - was that not obvious? Also in the Chase of Chinese communism the cult was facing a KMT that had suffered from just defeating the Japanese.

More of the point though they support for Chinese democracy was broad enough to the Beijing army could not be used to suppress the protests. The tanks and the people that killed the students had to come in from outside the city.

[jyscao]

Ironic then that most of the students throughout China who supported and even participated in the Tiananmen protests would later admit that Deng acted correctly in squashing it, and that China is better off today for that. This is a sentiment most Chinese living in China today share.

Could things eventually go south with the CCP in charge? Of course, and given long enough time, that's almost a certainty. But even when that day comes, it still does not directly imply a liberal democracy was the better governing system for the Chinese people, as your original comment strongly implied.

[jyscao]

>That your point about support for Chinese democracy, could also be applied to Chinese communism

Incorrect - my point about Chinese democracy does not apply to the current governing body of China (whether you choose to view and harp on them as communist or not is irrelevant).

The Cultural Revolution, which the previous commenter presented as a gotcha, is widely regarded as a dark period and unequivocally a mistake by the majority of Chinese today. But Chinese communism today is both much more and much different than Chinese communism under Mao.

OTOH Tiananmen is much more emblematic of "Chinese democracy" than the Cultural Revolution was of Chinese communism. And as already stated, the way Tiananmen was handled is deemed to be correct by the majority of the Chinese populace today.

And so once again, this goes back to my original point: peoples of different nations choose their own government, including the form of that government, and not just in the narrow sense of who their next public-facing leader should be during the next several years. The Chinese already does exactly that.

[spaceman_2020]

The Americans marched en masse to get rid of ICE, right?

Guess the Tiananmen square tank man is a victim, but Alex Pretti and Renee Good are just statistics

(The tank man wasn't even run down by the tank - Good was shot for merely turning the wheels in the wrong direction)

Americans really need to shut up about any democratic values or humans rights and clean up their own mess before preaching to the world

[MiiMe19]

Because a government has no power to tell the people what to do if the people did not vote for it to be there. There is no alternative.

[8note]

people might not be excited about democracy, but they are about individual rights and freedoms

people can tell when their rights are being unjustly infringed upon, even without the verbiage.

democracy is just a handy way of working with individual rights

[wiseowise]

> Why would Russians want democracy?

Could be something to do with almost 400 years under czar heel and then 70 years under commie repressions and mismanagement that yielded one of the worst crises in the history of the country that is still being mentioned with fear (90s, brrrr).

> There have been zero democratic impulses in their societies across hundreds, even thousands of years.

> Russia

What the am I even reading. Educate yourself before making such claims. Decembrist movement, 1905 revolution, 1917 provisional government, constant unrest after the death of mustached cunt, perestroika. Navalny recently died in prison for fighting for democracy, ffs. The only reason why we're having current Russia is because the West royally fucked up by not economically supporting them in 90s and allowing oligarchs to usurp vast soviet empire resources.

[konart]

Not to mention Novgorod Republic and its history.