Jason Kuznicki on Sep 22nd 2009
Iowans are almost evenly divided about whether they would vote for or against a constitutional amendment to end marriage for same-sex couples, according to The Des Moines Register’s new Iowa Poll.
Forty-one percent say they would vote for a ban, and 40 percent say they would vote to continue gay marriage. The rest either would not vote or say they are not sure…
The overwhelming majority of Iowans – 92 percent – say gay marriage has brought no real change to their lives.
Democracy makes it trivially easy to interfere with the lives of others. One could hardly find a better example than the above, in which a significant number of Iowans apparently believe that harming others is perfectly fine, even when it brings no real benefits to themselves. It’s voted on, see, and I guess that makes it all okay.
How’d things come to this? I have a theory.
The median voter can’t be expected to care much about the rights of minorities, because by definition the median voter doesn’t ever belong to a minority. Whenever a binary question comes up for a vote, the median voter is in the majority. At best he will therefore be indifferent to the interests of the minority. This doesn’t bode well for minority rights of any kind whenever such questions come up.
Yet sooner or later, every median voter ceases to be a median voter. He becomes a minority on some other issue, and his rights will be decided on by a different voting coalition, headed up by a different — but likewise indifferent — median voter.
Today it’s same-sex marriage. Tomorrow it’ll be owning a pit bull or eating foie gras. We’re all in a minority sooner or later, and we will all face that coldly indifferent median voter who can’t see what the fuss is about, and who views deciding on our rights as something very important, even as something sacred, rather than as something repugnant and shameful. Maybe his sacred duty will tell him to take away our rights, and because it’s called democracy, it’s all good just the same.
That is what’s wrong with democracy.
Jason Kuznicki on Sep 22nd 2009
Iowans are almost evenly divided about whether they would vote for or against a constitutional amendment to end marriage for same-sex couples, according to The Des Moines Register’s new Iowa Poll.
Forty-one percent say they would vote for a ban, and 40 percent say they would vote to continue gay marriage. The rest either would not vote or say they are not sure…
The overwhelming majority of Iowans – 92 percent – say gay marriage has brought no real change to their lives.
Democracy makes it trivially easy to interfere with the lives of others. One could hardly find a better example than the above, in which a significant number of Iowans apparently believe that harming others is perfectly fine, even when it brings no real benefits to themselves. It’s voted on, see, and I guess that makes it all okay.
How’d things come to this? I have a theory.
The median voter can’t be expected to care much about the rights of minorities, because by definition the median voter doesn’t ever belong to a minority. Whenever a binary question comes up for a vote, the median voter is in the majority. At best he will therefore be indifferent to the interests of the minority. This doesn’t bode well for minority rights of any kind whenever such questions come up.
Yet sooner or later, every median voter ceases to be a median voter. He becomes a minority on some other issue, and his rights will be decided on by a different voting coalition, headed up by a different — but likewise indifferent — median voter.
Today it’s same-sex marriage. Tomorrow it’ll be owning a pit bull or eating foie gras. We’re all in a minority sooner or later, and we will all face that coldly indifferent median voter who can’t see what the fuss is about, and who views deciding on our rights as something very important, even as something sacred, rather than as something repugnant and shameful. Maybe his sacred duty will tell him to take away our rights, and because it’s called democracy, it’s all good just the same.
That is what’s wrong with democracy.
