Democracy is something you always hear a lot about. We always praise it as something fundamentally great and amazing. The crown jewel we’ve carried with us since Ancient Greece. We talk about it, as it is the best thing to ever happen to humanity, whilst always complaining about what the government is doing and how politics are always so bad. There seems to be a fundamental disconnect between these two trains of thought.
I think we are still high on the original idea of democracy, whilst not living up to it in reality. I feel like democracy doesn’t represent the people anymore. A lot of the people don’t vote, and the politicians who do get voted into government by a minority of the population are controlled by their parties, interest groups and funders. And let’s not get started on the Shining Beacon of Democracy that is the United States. From gerrymandering to caucuses and voter suppression laws, add on top that big money controls all levels of government, it is anything but democratic. Whilst still claiming to the land defending democracy at all cost.
The reality we live in does not match with the ideas that democracy represents. We need to start looking a lot more critically at the world we live in and try to make real changes before they become too deep-rooted in our systems to change.
By Hanna Helena from Estonia
