Canada votes
The triumph of Vulgarity and Ignorance — of the “mass man” as that learned Spaniard, José Ortega y Gasset, described him — or “progress,” as the vulgar and ignorant call it themselves, might also be considered, in conjunction, to be the pre-eminent sign of the times. Except, we must add Stupidity, which is its more active and interfering force. But within this revolutionary triangle of modernity — not liberté, égalité, fraternité, as it proclaims, but rather vulgarité, incapacité, stupidité — is the structure of our political life, of our democracy. The people are not satisfied with anything they have. They cannot rest until they have made “the environment” — and everything in the world around it — over again in their own dull image.
It would be very easy to avoid wars of all kinds, and while doing so also avoid every universal social problem, including most malnourishment and disease. This would require the majority of persons to simply mind their own business, and not try to fix anything — especially by voting. Something approximating to a paradise on earth could soon be achieved, on the reactionary principle of letting things be, and not getting started. Of course we would still have death, and some unavoidable pain, but these become much easier to cope with when political distractions and systematic “cures” are not proposed.
Sometimes one may find trouble without having looked for it, I grant. For politics is not the only game that attracts psychoticks, and other ticks. But elections are a sure way to encourage them. However, this is the exception. Trouble is normally the product of one’s own Stupiditas, when this has been (devilishly) mistaken for cleverness.
So, the paradox, that we need laws to protect the citizen against professional busybodies (i.e. “liberals”) who would homogenize them. As Ortega y Gasset said, a human society must be necessarily aristocratic, what is not aristocratic is not an actual society. Equality is bullfeathers.
The true, and the most wicked, enemies of mankind, are the people who think they know what they are doing. They should be spotted, tried, and condemned. For, the beginning of political wisdom is to know, with holy certainty, that you don’t know.