Taki Taki

High life | 18 July 2019

Athens

Standing right below the Acropolis, where pure democracy began because public officials were elected by lot, I try to imagine if random political selection would be a good thing today. The answer is a resounding yes. Both Socrates and Aristotle questioned fundamental norms and values, and if they were alive today they would certainly question our acceptance of career politicians who have never had any other profession. (Corbyn, Biden… I could go on.) Socrates was sceptical about many things, especially the arts, because he believed they led us away from the truth. Yet nowadays so-called ‘artists’ influence public opinion as never before. The fact that even numbskull rappers have a say and can affect public opinion means that election by lot should be a must. Old Socrates was obsessed with the truth, and politics is all about the propagation of falsehoods. Aristotle believed that many people are slaves by nature, and the proof of that proposition lies in the blind obedience of those hatchet-faced people in hock to leftist dogma who scream abuse on TV. (Aristotle would not get invited to chic parties were he around today: he opposed homosexuality, believed women to be biologically inferior and despised rule by the many.) The ancient Greeks may have invented everything useful, but they did not invent socialism, the system that makes theft legal. They were too smart to fall for its Siren-like attraction because they knew it would eventually kill all initiative. Yet politicians today demand more socialism, even after what happened in the Soviet Union, Cuba and Venezuela. Go figure, as they never said in old Athens. I suppose it has to do with human nature. The politician who accepts power reluctantly and uses it sparingly is to be found only in Greek myths and in Shakespeare. Casting power aside without regrets is unheard of in real life.

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