Everything wrong with the Republic (the book and the government)

So here it comes again.

After decades of confusion between democracy and Republic, Trump's team is pushing the word Republic over "representative democracy".
Spoiler : representative democracy is just the middle step from shifting from democracy to Republic.

I have been told: yes in the old days it mattered, but for the same reason it does not matter that liberal are in total opposition with the historical movement of liberalism we should not care. Republic and democracy are kif kif bourricot.

I dare oppose.

The Republic was primarily the first campaign of fake news pushed by wealthy persons to destabilize a democracy. None other than the first one : Athens.

Context: in order to have a truly representative government Athens had evolved toward non (too) biased random picking of its representatives. It was forbidden to refuse being picked up.

Any statisticians will tell you, given a big enough sample (that does need to be as big as our intuition figures) you can have a representative sample.

Democracy is simply the system most likely to represent the people. There is no way to do better.

Then, people who thought they deserved the power were pissed. They were rich immigrants that fled their country because they thought their local government where taking too much of their money, like french people on Le Plateau in Montréal.

And no one listened to them. So they hired a troll, whom they invited to their banquets to amuse them, and convince him into spreading their ideas. We owe them the paros library, but also all the techniques for arguing without logic : the fallacies.

Seeing he was gifted in bullshitting the people they invested him with a mission: find a way to promote a system to favour the happy few that were rich and denied to rule the country in regard to their success.

So The Republic was written. It advocates: censorship based on religion, mass control and denying privacy, breeding citizens like animals to make them stronger (eugenism), and a cast society based on people, guardians and the wisest among us.

The guardians are just like a police or an army that are raised to believe they have privileges thanks to their merits. But the book say that convincing random persons will do the job.

The people are you and me, they are bad.

The wise, they are just born wise. Touched by the Finger of God, their success and brightness just prove by itself they are wised. Today it could be any successful actress or business men.

To put it bluntly this book is advocating an aristocracy (being ruled by the best). A college of person coopting their peer to rule the government in the shadow.

Normally, most of you who have followed their humanities must have their blood boiling: it is not what I read or what I was taught it was all about.

Guess what, you probably read it the same way, but decades of brainwashing thanks to the Church have made the education system tell you over wise.

The teaching of this book is delivered in the opposite direction of the book.

Nietzsche made a book on the topic (How to Philosoph with a Hammer)

Basically the priest loved the idea of the Republic, because, all religious persons think they are wiser than the agnostic people that are not wise. And priests are the one who founded the teaching of what they call philosophy.

And well monarchy, tyranny had a conflictual history with Church (popes have been having some forced residence in Chateauneuf du Pape which has left us a great wine). So basically Church not only formalized the fallacies in the livret de Port Royal written by the Jesuites in order to know tricks to convince people, they also took care of teaching thinking the right way. (Artistocles fantasy)

Look, there is not need for Republic if the assumption that people are naturally bad falls. You need Republic, if and only if you can say human are naturally bad.


French revolution did not started in the optic of over throwing monarchy for instance. The first project was to go for a representative monarchy like in the UK. Since nobility and bourgeoisie were leading the revolution and were attached to traditions they were pretty keen to have the best represent the people. Them. So after some murders, the Republic won.

On the other side of the ocean, the americans were fed up with the aristocratic system infeoded to the catholic church so they prefered a more fuzzy system that was closer to a federation of do what the fuck you want. A system that would on the national level though aim at looking representative. The founder father were kind of Republican but sneakily.

However in the XIXth 3 ideologies have been born: liberalism, socialism, communisms.

The 3 of them where assuming the people are naturally good. Hence the need for ruling their birth, privacy, expressions and actions is not required.

Okay, communism and socialism have a small bemol : you may need to educate people to make them good.

In the big picture I totally agree with the optimism on Human Nature, and thus am believing in democracy. Being a fan of pink floyd I totally disagree for the need of education like it is done nowadays. But that is just to clarify my personal bias.

What has to be understood behind the democracy/Republic dialectic is whether or not the government should aim at representing the People or should be given to the best among us.

I am gonna assume that I don't believe in Humanity. Just for the sake of exposing Republic's great weakness.

Who says someone is wise?

Being suddenly pessimistic, some people claim they are the best. People who want to deny me of privacy on the ground I naturally am a criminal, but pretending they have success by being good.

Being a paranoïd pessimistic, I now wonder, wouldn't it be possible, they succeeded because they were crooks? Hence, to trust them I need to be able to have access to their past with a big scrutinity.

The problem with Republic is the wise men are encouraged to live in the shadows.

Which does not make me want to trust them. And the original pamphlet regard any scrutinity to the powerful as being bad.

Seriously?


The Republic in its original exposition and historic implementation is naturally a call for corruption.

I don't want any wisest men to rule me if I can spot how easily it can get corrupted. It can start good, it is bound to end badly. Corruption is the enemy of any government.

And thus, I cannot hold anyone defending Republic as being wise, but much more a crook that want to own my ass with my consent.

I don't have the (self) rape culture: Republic is not for me ; I want democracy.

Just for the record, just after Athen became a Republic it became a tyranny ruled by a few wealthy people that became imperialist, oppressed their own, oppressed they neighbours, went in military campaign to force their advantage in trading agreements, they set the Peloponese on fire and ultimately become the cause of the fall of the greek civilization as a whole.

History have hiccups, reading the paperspace nowadays maybe a good idea to forge your opinion.

I recommend: the Peloponnesian war, The Republic, How to philosoph with a Hammer, The wedding of Figaro, Epicures, The life of Diogene Laerce, The Element of Euclides (this one is about geometry, but I love it).