Democratic Participation, Part I

In the likely case that you are currently existing within the contiguous United States of America, you live in a Democratic Republic, one that does, even if sometimes they feel retracting, affords you extraordinary freedoms.

Your price for those freedoms is two fold: allowing others to be shaded under the umbrella of democracy that protects you (there is space enough for all) and participation in that democracy.

Democracy doesn’t die in the dark. It does when no one living within it believes in it and stops participating in it. It dies when no one cares.

When everyone shows up and participates, democracy thrives.

Democracy is like a plant that we all share. Everyone agrees to water it. So it stays watered. But if people start thinking, “well, other people are watering it, so I don’t have to worry about it,” or “clearly the water that I am contributing isn’t having an impact,” then one by one, people stop showing up to water it. Then people think, “Hey, other people aren’t doing it, so why should I? Why is it my responsibility to water the tree?” Then no one waters the tree at all. And so slowly the tree dies. And then any asshole can come along and chop it down and walk off with the wood and no one will care at all. It wasn’t there three. But then there’s no shade, no protection from the sun whatsoever, and everyone realizes why the tree was important.

Your job, living within this shade tree of democracy, is to participate and contribute. You benefit from its shade, so you have to let others benefit too. And you have to water it when it’s your turn. We all do.

Democracy is the representative voice of the people determining governance. It is built on the foundation of an engaged population.

Everyone should have an opinion. Everyone should have that opinion heard within public and civil discourse.

We all need to engage. And Twitter fights and Reddit subpages don’t count.

We need need organized communities again. We need places where people show up and hear from their leaders. Where we can voice common frustration and ask questions. We need public spaces and a reintroduction of the infrastructure of civic life.

I don’t really know what that looks like in contemporary society. Maybe there are examples we can look to from the past.

But, what I do know is that the version of civic life provided to us through algorithmic social media and the internet age simple drives us into ideological corners and pitches us against each other. It is contributing to our collective disinterest in the tree. We’ve run to opposite sides of the field to complain about each other. We don’t want to hear from each other or see each other.

And so, in the background of both of our sad little camps of angry people, opportunists are cutting down our tree.