The Honest Courtesan

I’m seeing an increasing tendency for American writers to present “democratic” as the opposite of “authoritarian”, which it is not by any means; a “majority” can be just as authoritarian as a dictator.  The opposite of “authoritarian” is “liberal”.  If anything, an authoritarian government enacted by election is much worse than one produced by a coup, because while the latter can have little credible pretense of legitimacy, the former can represent itself as fully legitimate and claim the “right” to do whatever awfulness it wants because “the majority wills it”.  If one fights a clearly-illegitimate government, one can count on plenty of covert support (a la the French resistance).  But if one fights a “democratically elected” government, little help will be forthcoming from anyone bamboozled by collectivist nonsense about “society” and “the greater good” and “law and order“.  One who fights such rulers must assume every man’s hand will be against him, and every offer of help is bait in a trap, because 99% of everyone has swallowed the bullshit dogma of a “social contract” and/or “legitimate leaders”, and think the “duly elected” government must be respected, no matter how mindlessly brutal and nonsensical its diktats.  Tyranny generally starts by being directed against despised minorities (racial, ethnic, religious, sexual, or socioeconomic) and then expanded by convincing the Great Unwashed that the pretended “problems” posed by these minorities (from “crime” to “THE CHILDREN!” to “they’re taking our jobs!”) require giving up “just a few” of their rights, “temporarily”, until the “problem” is “solved”.  And the morons march to the ballot box to re-elect by landslide.