I don't think I understood a single word in that paragraph. Well done!

Hmm, I would say that it's incorrect to translate "sens commun" (according to your definition) as "common sense". I'm not sure what to suggest as a translation, but I think that translating "sens commun" to "common sense" is nothing more than a case of the false friend effect. Your definition of "bon sens" sounds like the meaning of "common sense".
Phew.

Agreeing with Sir Primalform. A better translation of sens commun would be "common knowledge".

Oh, yeah. "Common knowledge" is what I hear each time someone refers to "common sense" (because of "sens commun"). I'm still creeped out because of the implicit legitimizing value attached to this "common", which makes "common sense" pretty close to "common knowledge" (plus, the sense/knowledge opposition does seem to validate collective ways-to-think while allowing only collective beliefs to be relativized), but that's nippicking. On the whole, I'm significantly decreeping out.

Like... isn't that the value in Democracy?

You mean populism is the value in democracy ? If by "value" you mean "currency", maybe.

Equality :) One man one vote is a kind of currency, sure...

At your trademark superficial level, it works lke that.

In an actual functionnal democracy, 51% of the population cannot decide the extermination of 49% of the population.

Nice Godwin's law... pretty fast as well huh?

Anyway, democracy (process = one man one vote) does work like that from top to bottom. You are now conflating democratic values with democracy as political process. Shifting the goalposts hmmm?

And I'll PM you the rest.

Trademark superficiality in all its glory again. Make a list of exemples that shouldn't be pointed at, and trim the world of everything that doesn't match your point.

The point is, "democracy" isn't just the "majority votes" principle behind which populists love to hide. Its logic would lead to... well, to all that you refuse to consider because annoying arguments are invalid. In reality, democracy is a complex system that includes, amongst other things, the protection of minorities (against the majority). You could say that the political system of democracy is "anti-democratic" if you use "democratic" in the superficial "common knowledge" sense that is so handy to instrumentalise by all sorts of bastards (nowadays the "international human rights is not democratic" crowd).

Not to mention that votes are supposed to be based on knowledge, and knowledge isn't democratic. If people vote based on crass ignorance (islamophobia and homohobia being just two exemples that shouldn't be mentionned here because everything touching ignorant discriminatory fantasies belong to your personal blacklist of "mean arguments"), then the results are catastrophic. This give to populists (assholes capitalizing on ignorance, encouraging and validating it through cheap dumbing-down prejudice-confirmation rants) a headstart that would completely hijack the democratic process if there wasn't some hinderance to that (such as limitation of hate speech, some elitist weight given to expertise, post-ww2 international regulations, etc). Because, again, if 51% people believe that witches exist and cause diseases and must be burned for that, it would not make it true. The wikilogic of "we are many to share this belief" does not define objective realities, independently from the inner rationality of the decisions taken on the ground of these beliefs.

But yeah, whatever. Braindead "democracy = vote of everybody no matter what" is, like all populist discourses, super easy to swallow, to retain, to chew on, and to use to validate any position. The most ignorant fringe of the population, alarmed by the progression of societal self-awareness (see gender studies, or add this point to your blacklist) will do its best to justify global policies based on the traditional "common knowledge" that turns out false - that is, will fight both against knowledge (populist anti-intellectual propaganda) and for policies not taking it in account. Because, "common = democracy, durr".

Thankfully, political processes are designed to compensate (to some extent) these perversions of the democratic system. Limitations to "freedom of speech" (against racist propaganda), compulsory education (regularly updated despite the conservative outcries), attempts at maintaining press diversity and media contents not solely based on viewing rates, complex barriers to votations, etc... Without these, heck, we'd still be in the 30s. But don't lose hope, it won't prevent us to slide back to that era for long.

Human stupidity is a stronger force than all the dams we can build to contain it.

Yeah, why don't you read what I PMd you from before you posted this wonderful proof of how far your perception of me and the reality of me actually are. Like the things you think we disagree over... amazing.

Edit: I'll now proceed to edit in some replies to the most blatant misunderstandings.

You conclude your rant with examples of how public institutions such as education or media compensate for the populist ethos of democratic politics. No disagreement on that from me, in fact you are just ignoring my fundamental point (implicit from other threads) that having those public institutions homogenized (be it by government regulatory standards or by the new social justice moral ostracism) is likewise "problematic". Put another way (warning: hyperbole incoming), you are the representative of the new tyranny of the majority, whereas I am the representative of the new represssed minority. And the thing is, unlike you, I don't think my "victim status" is determined subjectively. Objectivity as ethical principle. Get it? I think it's easy to actually, you know, measure how many people "vote" for hate speech to be illegal (who defines hate?) and how many agree it should be tolerated in order to prevent democratic abuse of power. Of course, just because I don't want "haters" to be "lynched" I'm sure you'll think me a "hater"-lover. Yes, I can also use charged rhetoric. It's easy Telika. It's very easy. It's "populist" as you so aptly put it. It appeals to the lowest denominator. But you don't see your logical inconsistency in that do you? You think your rhetoric is pure, because your intent is pure... as if every single tyrant didn't think exactly the same...

Now, you will again try to argue I lack authority because I am a privileged male or some such. Ignoring your own ideology of how the axis are orthogonal... One can be a minority "this", and a majority "that". As you should know, life is complicated. Which brings me to your initial point (with which you implicitly advocated for intolerance in the past) that I don't want to discuss racism, which is your personal bete noire. This is basically what you are saying in your first paragraph, where you shift the goalposts (again) from what could be a discussion about political process, into a discussion of political outcomes. I disagree with you on the process but I agree on the outcomes. It constantly amazes me that the disagreement on process (the ends DO NOT justify the means) is enough for you to completely ignore my repeated assertions that you're strawmanning my intent.

Or to put it more bluntly, your example of extermination had nothing to do with the argument I made. I just said equality is a democratic value, exemplified by universal suffrage. The fact that was enough to trigger a Godwin is in itself quite revealing, just like calling for universal tolerance (of speech, not of violence - because you will again purposefuly miss the point) was enough to trigger you previousy. I NEVER advocated for populist democracy, let alone for racism... it's all in your mind...


The above are my main replies. Let's proceed to highlight a few of your other pearls of "wisdom". (rather of prejudice)

You say democracy requires informed voters in a perfect display on not just anti-populism, but blatant elitism. Who defines sufficient information? Do you defend some form of suffrage limitation based on testing? In what language would the testing happen? See how close I can get to strawman you into an anti-immigration proponent? More likely, you didn't think it through and are just being a populist demagogue, saying what sounds nice, regardless of pragmatic considerations.

You speak of witches. If 51% decide witches should be burned, it IS true that "witches" will be burned. History proves it took much less than 51% to get the stakes going. Just because you want to focus on the fact it's false they were witches, and I want to focus on the fact they were burned and SHOULDN'T have, does not prove either of us wrong. Accept the difference of focus will you? If I get what I want it does not matter whether 90% believe them to be witches... they WON'T get burned, they will be tolerated- democratically. ;)