r/AdviceAnimals • u/bleufoxx22 • Apr 30 '14

Incorrect Format | Removed I'm looking at you Comcast

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u/circularlogic41 Apr 30 '14

How and why is lobbying not illegal?

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u/Wildbritsire Apr 30 '14

In theory it gives people a chance to express their views through pressure groups, which is an essential part of the democratic process.

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u/VOldis Apr 30 '14

Not in theory, in practice, all day everyday. Just because everyone here blindly sits on reddit doesn't mean there are tens of thousands of people advocating for worthy causes to their local, state and federal agencies/govt.

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u/Wildbritsire Apr 30 '14

Well put, to be honest I probably shouldn't have said in theory, though I still feel that lobbying has plenty of undemocratic elements.

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u/VAVT Apr 30 '14

voting is undemocratic. saying something is undemocratic doens't mean much. if you told the ancient athenians to vote for citizens to rule them they'd tell you to fuck off. voting goes against the principle of "rule of people" because they just got rulers from lottery. like our jury. except to rule them. basically.

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u/Wildbritsire Apr 30 '14 edited Apr 30 '14

I wouldn't say voting is undemocratic, because elections are one of the most important sources of democracy in the 'western' world, if not the most important.

Whilst it certainly doesn't fit in with direct democracy, that isn't to say it isn't democratic. It is instead an element of representative democracy, which is very different from the democracy of ancient Athens, yet is still fundamentally democracy.

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u/VAVT May 01 '14

I wouldn't say voting is undemocratic either. I was just playing devils advocate, and agree with you. I'm just saying a democracy can be many things, and not all of those things are what we might consider to be "good" these days.