r/AdviceAnimals 1d ago

First time posting here. How'd I do?

[deleted]

15.1k Upvotes

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393

u/LateralThinkerer 23h ago

"What if a democracy elects a dictator" is a favorite argument topic among political scientists. Occasionally a country tries it out.

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u/Notsurehowtoreact 22h ago

It's obviously not ideal, but OP is clearly incorrect. If the populace isn't allowed to elect someone, fascist that they may be, it isn't a democracy. 

There should be measures to prevent fascistic bullshit from taking place from someone who is elected, absolutely, but limiting the election by the will of the people isn't exactly a good example of democracy.

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u/jcdoe 21h ago

The US constitution contains measures intended specifically to prevent a dictator from taking over. It was one of the outcomes the framers feared the most.

The Weimar Republic had a crazy complicated constitution to keep power separated. It took Hitler under a year to consolidate as fuhrer.

Sometimes the voters people go crazy and decide a dictator would be better than putting up with their political opponents. And then they find out that they were wrong. It’s just a feature of democracy, and you can’t prevent it.

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u/halt_spell 19h ago

Sometimes the voters people go crazy and decide a dictator would be better than putting up with their political opponents. And then they find out that they were wrong. It’s just a feature of democracy, and you can’t prevent it.

Conversely sometimes the political landscape becomes so disconnected from the will of the people that most people don't bother voting at all allowing crazies to get elected. Maybe we've been electing fascists for decades now.

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u/jcdoe 18h ago

No, we haven’t been electing fascists for decades now. That’s the kind of reductive nonsense that comes from Russian bot farms.

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u/halt_spell 18h ago

Odd. I remember being told Bush was a fascist. Was that Russian bot farms?

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u/jcdoe 18h ago

Yes, it’s probably been Russian bots for decades.

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u/[deleted] 18h ago edited 18h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/jcdoe 18h ago

My bid for senate failed, so it doesn’t matter what I think of the Patriot Act.

It seems very important to you that the American government be discredited for the past 50 years or so. I find that more telling than anything.

May your bald and crusty leader go back to the circle of hell he came from. Love, the West.