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Chapter 11
Membership in the Demos, Privilege Verses Obligation

It would be a requirement that every of-age, mentally-competent citizen must be an actively voting member of the demos. Being a member of the demos could not be a privilege but would have to be a civic obligation. Participation would bring a significant reward, and non-participation would bring a significant penalty.

This requirement would be absolutely necessary for the demos to function properly. It would only be by every adult member of the society actively pursuing his or her own self-interest in the demos that the demos could arrive at a true consensus on the demos issues. Only partial participation by the electorate would skew the consensus of the demos away from the interests of those in the electorate who did not participate.

The wide-ranging apathy and lack of voter turnouts in American elections today have several causes. Millions of people don’t vote as a protest against the current system. Millions of people correctly believe that the game is a rigged scam anyway. No matter who gets elected they will go unheard, and the rich will just get richer. They have not dropped out as a protest. They have just thrown in the towel. Millions of people are simply working too hard and racing about too fast just to survive to muster up the time and will to vote. Many people find the process of traveling here and there at different times and standing in line for registration and later for voting to be difficult and tedious. Many people find cunningly-worded referendums to difficult to understand and find it difficult to vote for candidates they really don’t know or want.

In a previous chapter it was asked, how does the wealthy minority manage to win elections? The answer provided then was that it plays on the fears and divisions of the people like a violin, using them for its own political purposes. It actively manipulates the hatred, anger, and fear of the populace. It works to keep the populace politically asleep, distracted, and divided. The party of the wealthy promotes itself as a large tent, tossing bones to religious fundamentalists and other fear and hate-filled people by cynically embracing and keeping the populace focused on lesser issues while avoiding the public discussion of how much of our nation’s wealth the wealthy hoard and Wealth’s incessant class warfare against the many.

To these orchestrations and manipulations we now add the elite’s most cynical and important tool of all: When it comes to the millions of people who do not vote, do nothing. Let sleeping dogs lie. Perhaps say a few empty words about voting to look good, mostly encouraging those people whom Wealth wants to vote, but never make voting an obligation for everyone. That would be an abomination, political suicide. The wealthy, powerful few well know that it is mostly the poor, the uneducated, the dispirited, and the disfranchised who do not vote. And these are precisely the people who, if they ever did vote, would vote against the interests of the elite who own and populate our government. This is one Pandora’s Box—the millions who do not vote—that throughout our nation’s history the elite has definitely wanted to keep closed. By these methods—by the wealthy minority itself faithfully voting, by manipulating enough misguided fear and hate-filled others into voting for Wealth’s candidates and interests, and by simply letting the millions of sleeping others, who would almost certainly vote against wealth’s interests anyway, continue to sleep—the wealthy, powerful minority manages to win elections.

To those among the economically weak and downtrodden, to those among the dispirited middle class, and to all right-minded others who have abandoned the political arena, it is quite understandable, your turning your back upon and walking away from a political-economic process the power of which is set so overwhelmingly against you. It is understandable, your withdrawing into your own cocoons and burying your heads into the sand saying, “I know the world is unjust and corrupt, but it’s too large a problem for me to fix. I can, however, create my own little world, achieve at least some of my dreams, help in my own way, and create a little pocket of sanity.” Well and good.

But in neglecting and avoiding the political arena you have abdicated your power and your responsibility as an American citizen and as a citizen of the world. As Edmond Burke wrote, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” It is time for you to pick up the ball again and to reenter the game. Please give this work serious consideration. It offers a new way and a new hope that have never existed before in your lifetime. While participation in the current system may seem meaningless and fruitless, the new system offered in this work brings to you new and real political and personal power. Learning and then teaching what is really wrong with America and working to bringing true democracy to America is worthy of your support and participation.

A newly implemented demos would die a quick death in the face of today’s widespread apathy. It would degenerate into merely another plutocratic branch of government, just like the current three. Understanding which side their bread is buttered on and the importance of voting, the wealthy would vote while too many others would not, skewing the demos consensus in favor of the wealthy. It would take time for people to realize that the demos represented a whole new ball game, that within the demos their votes really counted and had a real effect on the social contract and the resulting society in which they live. They would soon learn not only to cherish their right to vote but also learn how easy it is to vote and to voice themselves concerning issues within the demos.

Merely saying that participation in the demos is an obligation would not be enough. There would have to be significant reward for participation and significant penalty for non-participation. There would have to be both a carrot and a stick. A reward, the carrot, could be that each member of the electorate in good standing received one hundred dollars each year. One hundred dollars might mean little to wealthy people, but mostly they are not the ones who need to be motivated. The penalty, the stick, would not have to be draconian. People would not have to be hung on dungeon walls by their thumbs. The penalty could be that no government entitlement or handout would be granted or license for this or that issued to a member of the demos whose votes were not current, i.e., one had not recast one’s votes sometime during the last year. Since voting terminals would exist everywhere including virtually every government office, a voter could quickly remedy his or her negligence right on the spot and receive the entitlement, license, etc. without delay.

There are those who may object that making participation in the demos an obligation rather than a privilege is a decidedly pushy proposition for a work dedicated to maximizing personal freedom. There is a bit of truth to this argument, but this truth is less important than other considerations: 1) By placing this small requirement upon ourselves we, ironically, would gain a large measure of true democracy and personal freedom. 2) Put into perspective, voting in the demos would be an imposition the magnitude and character of which is in the realm of paying one’s taxes or getting a driver’s license, a fishing permit, or a building permit. 3) A free spirit such as a wild wanderer or a religious recluse would remain unburdened by simply shrugging off the small sum of money and unneeded licenses and permits. 4) Without voting being a civic duty a demos would degenerate into just another plutocratic branch of government.

How could such a tiny objection overrule such a wonderful result? It would no doubt be the elite, who are themselves the most reliable voters and who have the most to gain by others not voting, that shout the loudest for some supposed “right” to not vote.

In a very short period of time, the demos would come to be understood and cherished by all. People would become strongly self-motivated to vote. And a penalty for not voting would become a rarity.

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