What IS a Cosmetic Democracy?
Wednesday, November 7th, 2007A line of light silt and dust is pushed off the stage by a wide broom leaving traces behind, then scooped up into a pan, then dropped unceremoniously into the plastic can in the corner.
Lights come on brighter as players take their places, shuffle papers, check their mike units, and look nervously at their watches. The show is about to begin.
Debates, televised across the nation, polls, running totals of donations, swing states, tv & radio ads, candidate visits, the approaching election dates. The required essence of a democratic society. Right? With all the players and pieces in place, the show goes on.
Is that what democracy is (or what it’s become)? The ingredients of a prolonged electoral show? Or is it something else? Is there something missing, perhaps forgotten?
While some of those recognizable elements may be important in the carrying out of the process, the true essence lies elsewhere for sure. It’s an invisible spirit, a shared belief and desire for the best in us as humans to come forth from our minds and hearts and find sufficient common ground to move forward together in fairness, and not at each other’s throats like cave dwellers fighting over a scrap of meat.
Sad to say, what we have in America today is much more of the show than the substance. Those in positions to lead (or at least give orders and wield power) are more than happy to content themselves with promoting the two-dimensional cardboard cut-out of the figments of democracy to substitute for the real thing. It is a far easier task when one has near total dominance of the means of public communication to produce the look and feel show of democracy than have to contend with messy thoughts and desires of actual people who may in fact hold ideas very different than those producing the show do.
As long as at least some of the public are willing on selected dates to line up and deposit what they believe are their choices into some device, it’s enough to present something for the world to see. Candidates. Electoral Calendar. Speeches. Fundraisers. Campaigns. Are any of the deep concerns of the citizens being discussed or debated? Perhaps. It’s not a prerequisite in a Cosmetic Democracy.