As many of you may know, the base of a democracy is the elections. The place where we as citizens are required by moral duty to cast our vote on whoever we think they fit in the position of being our temporary leader.

As the most serious business in democracy, it is outrageous that literally everyone over 18 can cast their vote. Come on, you see it every election year. People hating on candidates because of their political parties, people loving on candidates because they look handsome, people fighting over which politician promised better things and etc.

In summary, not all citizens are prepared to take on the duty to vote. So? Let's include an article in the Constitution, that says that for citizens being able to vote they have to pass a standardized test provided by the state in the subjects of politics and its history. It'd take maybe months, but it is necessary.

Imagine that people are given driving licenses just because they're over 18. Come on! Our streets would be filled with dead bodies. As we take security on the roads seriously, we have to take elections much more seriously. The corner stone of a democracy should be handled by the ones that understand it only.

Also, there should be laws that seriously restrict political parties to a minimum -we can't bring Earth's serious problems in there.

One of the suggestions I have made for the Constitution is a simple, one sentence right and responsibility of every citizen, paraphrased:

You have the right to gather in self-managed groups and speak freely with others with the qualification that you are being honest and respectful to others.

This right and responsibility would prevent the situations you describe, as both dishonesty and being disrespectful would be violations of the Constitution. The requirement of reparations (like apologies, setting the record straight, and other restitution efforts) or further 'manners training' would make all parties less likely to engage in the behaviors you describe.

It's our right to vote for whoever we want for whatever reason if we made a test who's to say one day that won't be abused to silence political enimies?

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Would then the logical thing not be to ensure such "bias" and "discrimination" is absent, or at least sufficiently combated, in the "system" we deploy.

It doesn't have to be as broken as everyone else's.

Your willingness to participate in the voting process should be enough to allow you to vote. There should be no formal discriminator to enable the voting rights of every citizen. People who fail to vote also must withhold their criticisms of the leaders they refused to vote against.

Or, you could enact a state of "direct democracy" - do away with the entire facil premise of "leaders" and take responsibilty for your own decisions.

Or, you could enact a state of "direct democracy" - do away with the entire facil premise of "leaders" and take responsibilty for your own decisions.

The reason that direct democracies don't work is because there are so many things about which the vast majority of people are ignorant.

Example: We need a law regulating medical infusion devices.
How about laws constituting what can be sold as 'pig iron', in terms of quality and content?

How many people even know what these are? How can they honestly be expected to vote on something they don't understand?

That is why we have ministries, and specialists. They will write the laws as experts in their fields. We citizens simply need to make certain that the laws do not favor one party over another, nor should these laws be so ambiguous as to apply outside their area of operations.

You solve that by not deciding straight away - so little actually requires instant decisive capacity - you give time for people to educate themselves. Discuss the situation and how to handle. Those that do know can teach the others of at least drop hints on where to seek some useful informations. Some form of common consensus can usually be reached.

And I'm not particularly aware of any project that has been run via "direct democracy" failing. At least due to this.

Your process opens itself to vulnerability by those of high charisma being able to easily sway the ignorant into believing that 'their way' is better, or more truthful.

With regards to "truth" - independant research. Things are commonly easy to confirm, especially if it's "supporting evidence" for why something should be done.

With regards to "truth" - independant research. Things are commonly easy to confirm, especially if it's "supporting evidence" for why something should be done.

EyeR, you have always seemed to me to be informed and energized about self-education. You sometimes have the subtlety of a bull in a china shop, but that's just you.

Most people are not you, cannot be you, and even more are pretty damned stupid. They listen to others for their opinions because thinking is hard for them.

The stupid far outnumber the smart, so direct democracy is doomed to failure until we either have more smart people, or fewer stupid people.

Stupid can be cured - it's commonly called education, as long as there is intent for this then it's a realistically feasible solution - equally, there is nothing implicit in this model that requires participation. If it's a movement in a direction the common Asgardian cannot abide, they will suddenly become more interested but generally I'd expect participation to be more limited to those with experience, education, or interest in the topic generally. Even walking into the situation knowing nothing, a willingness to learn combined with genuine interest and surrounded by those that will minimally direct to suitable material results in rapid learning. The piece that cannot be absented is the interest - for this will give you the drive to know more. And everyone is interested in something. You want to learn to swim, jump in the deep end of the pool - you learn, and quickly. Expecting people to attempt this you can make it a lot safer. And should people not want to get wet, the water will still be there when they change their mind.

Sure, everyone isn't me - but that's not a crippling disability. Thinking may be difficult for some, but the more it is excersized the better it becomes - simply encouraging this should serve to solve the problem. Especially with those that grow up in this environment. Specifically, asking questions is an excellent method to increase knowlege on a subject, traditionally the problem was accessing the right people to ask. Now we have the interwebs. Billions of connected minds ready for raping, the problem is finding where these minds are in the mesh. We should be able to do something about this. And the best questions to be asking are the more awkward ones to answer, IMHO. Like: If the universe contains all that is, and the universe is expanding - what is it expanding into? Such a question is possible to form without a deep understanding of space, or even physics. The experiences most form of the environment they live can give rise to such - and finding out the answer to the more awkward questions are likely to assist more than one person.

Fewer stupid people over time can be engineered. If it isn't, that doesn't bode well even without a state of direct democracy.

Direct Democracy seems to work well enough in Switzerland. With regards to ignorant Citizens, the right to education and such materials kept in easily retrievable mediums (such as a hyperspeed-internet) should be enough for people to make informed decisions. However, I do admit the possibility of a charismatic character using emotional dissonance to their favor. (I'm thinking of Trump here... However, Trump actually didn't get the popular vote.)

I would propose Direct Democratic Technocracy.

Allow me to propose a situation. Tell me the solution.

Premises:

1. Asgardia will accept all persons as Citizens who agree to follow the Constitution and other documents.
2. Asgardia acts as a direct democracy, with each Citizen getting one vote.
3. A foreign nation has 100 million residents, of which 1% will follow any instructions from their government.
4. Ample time is given for Citizens to educate themselves on any given matter coming up for a vote, which gives time for outsiders to sign up and become Asgardians.

Situation:

Asgardia has a vote on something.
The foreign nation listed in premise 3 above doesn't like what we are proposing so they tell their people to sign up to be Asgardians and vote against it.
1 million people sign up to be Asgardians and vote against the measure, easily defeating the 170k people who were here originally, IF all of them even vote.
The motion fails.

Explain how to prevent, please, in a direct democracy situation. This isn't even a far-out scenario.