Nihilism/Democracy
In Revolutionary Characters–What Made The Founders Different, author Gordon Wood says the following about Thomas Jefferson—
Jefferson’s faith in the natural sociability of people…lay behind his belief in minimal government….Jefferson would have fully understood the Western world’s recent interest in devolution and localist democracy….For Jefferson, there could be no power independent of the people, in whom he had absolute faith.
I find myself tending more in a belief in democracy for its own sake. People must have a say in how they are governed. I don’t know to what extent the root of my belief in democracy is faith in the people. I don’t find I need that faith to believe in democracy.
There is a strain of nihilism my view. The people must govern whatever the outcome. Safeguards must exist for the protection of minority groups in society. But in the end, if a society as a whole pursues policies that lead the end of that society, so be it.
People are born to be free. What they do what that freedom is another question
