[Ajedi32]

> I can also vote out my government.

You can't. Not if you're in the minority. Tyranny of the majority is still tyranny.

You what you as an individual most certainly can do is stop using Roblox. Not ideal, but way easier than moving to a new country.

[brabel]

Tyranny of the majority is ... democracy?!

[Ajedi32]

Unrestrained democracy, yes. Tyranny.

People need to understand that having a majority opinion does not inherently give you the right to impose that opinion on everyone else. Such impositions must be done with extreme hesitancy and restraint.

That's why many democratic countries have a constitution which prevents the government from restricting certain individual rights even in the face of popular opinion. But ultimately, the constitution is just a piece of paper. If people are determined to impose their will on others, it can only do so much.

[fluoridation]

"Inherently give you the right"? Rights are not inherent properties of facts, they're concessions between people. Nothing inherently gives rights, rights are given by agreement. If people agree that majorities can impose their opinion, then they can.

[Ajedi32]

> Rights are not inherent properties of facts, they're concessions between people.

We're getting pretty deep into philosophical territory now, but I disagree. Human rights, to the extent they exist at all, are necessarily inherent properties of individuals.

E.g. If the majority decides people with dark skin are subhuman and therefore have no rights, the majority is most certainly not correct about that, because rights are not defined by the majority opinion. They are inherent.

The U.S. Declaration of Independence put it like this:

> We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed

I concur with this perspective; rights are inherent and inalienable, and the purpose of democratic government is to secure those rights (which already exist), not to create them.

[microtonal]

endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights [...] rights are inherent,

Only if you believe in a creator that determined these right, which is not rooted in fact, but solely belief.

Personally, I do not believe a particular ethics exist as an absolute/scientific truth. It is just that some amount cooperation is generally better for everyone and virtually all humans want to avoid pain and seek happiness.

Even though I was a convinced utilitarianist when I was young, I think Kant's categorical imperatives are more powerful now: you should act only according to principles you would want everyone to adopt as a universal law. Or Rawls' original position [1].

Even though this might sound like an off-topic philosophical debate, I think it is very relevant to democracy. Purely egoism-based democracy would trample on the rights of minorities, etc. But in a democracy based on these principles, the majority would vote to project minorities, etc.

I am not sure how you would modify democracy to align with this. I think it is for a large part of education. E.g. if everyone thinks every choice is a zero-sum game (my loss is another's win and vise versa), democracy will go in a very dark direction.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_position

[fluoridation]

>Rights, to the extent they exist at all, are necessarily inherent properties of individuals.

What's sad is that there's a formulation that's actually correct. Rights are an inherent property of societies (or stable ones, at least). Note that I'm saying rights in an abstract sense, not necessarily any specific set of rights. Not every society will value the same things the same way.

>E.g. If the majority decides black people are subhuman and therefore have no rights, the majority is most certainly not correct about that, because rights are not defined by the majority opinion.

So it's an objective fact that they're incorrect? I.e. they can be shown to be incorrect without having to ask anyone's opinion? Okay, prove it.

>The U.S. Declaration of Independence put it like this:

That's an opinion. It's perfectly fine to think these things are so obvious they don't need to be justified, but I don't agree that that's true, even if I subjectively hold the same opinion.

[iso1631]

> The U.S. Declaration of Independence put it like this:

The opinion of a few slave owners 250 years ago

> We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal

For a given definition of "men"

> I concur with this perspective

Good for you. You have an opinion, doesn't make it a fact.

[vrganj]

Everything you do affects others, unless you live in a cave in the mountains somewhere. Part of the reality of living in a society is constantly negotiating what is and isn't acceptable.

Democracy is the most fair way of doing so.

[slopinthebag]

Yes? Democracy is essentially exactly that - tyranny of the majority. The reason why successful democracies have so many checks and balances, constitutions that uphold essential rights etc is because of this fact. Really the main benefit of democracy is that it prevents the government from doing things which are wildly unpopular. To the extent that it "gives the people power", that is neutered as much as possible to prevent the majority from going "hey, we don't want these people here" and committing democratic genocide or whatever.

[theeyescanner]

The slave aristocracy of the Confederate States of America, and members only Communist Party of China are both democracies.

What we consider democracy went through a LOT of iteration, and continues to this day. Representative first-past-the-post is a form of democracy that can have the unfortunate side effect of the minority of the electorate establishing a tyranny of the majority. There is a lot of scholarship on how to make democratic systems more democratic.

[hnisnotbenign]

> The slave aristocracy of the Confederate States of America

And the northern states--they had slaves too.

Ulysses S. Grant, when asked why he didn't free his slaves until some time after the war, reportedly said something like "Good help is hard to come by these days." It's not easily verifiable in today's world of useless search engines and confidently wrong and/or lying AI, but this quote is, in one form or another:

"The sole object of this war is to restore the Union. Should I become convinced it has any other object, or that the Government designs its soldiers to execute the wishes of the Abolitionists, I pledge you my honor as a man and a soldier I would resign my commission and carry my sword to the other side."

- General Ulysses S. Grant, USA, in a letter to the Chicago Tribune, 1862

"My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union."

- Abraham Lincoln, responding to Horace Greeley at the New York Tribune

[hnisnotbenign]

I found the origin of that second Grant quote, and well as a boatload of other very interesting facts which one is quite unlikely to get from Google or AI these days, in "The Democratic Speaker's Hand-book" compiled by Matthew Carey, Jr., 1868.

https://archive.org/details/democraticspeake00caza

From page 32:

> Grant as a Talker

> He threatened to resign and cast his lot with the South.

> The editor of the Randolph Citizen recalls some interesting reminscenses of the great Reticent. He had a tongue at one time, it would seem:

> In the summer of 1861 General Grant, then Colonel of the Twenty-first Illinois Regiment of Infantry, was stationed at Mexico, on the North Missouri Railroad, and had command of the post. He remained several months, mingling freely with the people, regardless of the peculiar shade of any one's political opinions; and as the distinguished Colonel had then no thought of aspiring to the Presidency or a dictatorship, no occasion existed for the reticence to which latterly he owed the greater part of his popularity. Ulysses the Silent was then Ulysses the Garrulous, and embraced every fair opportunity which came in his way to express his sentiments and opinions in regard to political affairs. One of these declarations we distinctly remember. In a public conversion in Ringo's banking-house, a sterling Union man put this question to him: "What do you honestly think was the real object of this war on the part of the Federal Government?"

> "Sir," said Grant, "I have no doubt in the world that the sole object is the restoration of the Union. I will say further, though, that I am a Democrat--every man in my regiment is a Democrat--and whenever I shall be convinced that this war has for its object anything else than what I have mentioned, or that the Government designs using its soldiers to execute the purposes of the abolitionists, I pledge you my honor as a man and a soldier that I will not only resign my commission, but will carry my sword to the other side, and cast my lot with that people."

It's really quite remarkable that the victors of that war succeeded so marvelously in convincing people years later that it was about slavery--that the racist white people of the North went to war and died by the hundreds of thousands to free black slaves--and they have people utterly convinced of that to this day.

Lots of other enlightening stuff to be found in that book, and in other original sources. Get the facts now while you still can, and preserve them.

"This is only one among the many proofs I had witnessed of the fact, that the prejudice of color is not nearly so strong in the South as in the North. [In the South] it is not at all uncommon to see the black slaves of both sexes, shake hands with white people when they meet, and interchange friendly personal inquiries; but at the north I do not remember to have witnessed this once; and neither in Boston, New York, or Philadelphia would white persons generally like to be seen shaking hands and talking familiarly with blacks in the streets."

- James S. Buckingham, abolitionist

[chrononaut]

Not necessarily.

You can democratically trample the rights of minority groups.

Since it hasn't been linked in the tree of replies here, I'll add this for others: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority

[tarruda]

> You can't. Not if you're in the minority

Is that a bad thing?

[Ajedi32]

Compared to multiple competing privately run systems, which you can opt out of even if you're in the minority? Yes.

[vrganj]

> Not if you're in the minority. Tyranny of the majority is still tyranny.

> you as an individual

I understand. Such is living in a society. No man is an island.

> Not ideal, but way easier than moving to a new country.

I've moved countries five times. I still haven't been able to get rid of my dependencies on Big Tech.

[slopinthebag]

Most people can't move anywhere because getting citizenship is difficult.

Meanwhile, all you need to do to get rid of a dependency on big tech is to log off.