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Ireland women's basketball team refuse to shake hands with Israel (www.bbc.com)

submitted 9 months ago by MarcoPOLO@sh.itjust.works to c/worldnews@lemmy.ml

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[-] danekrae@lemmy.world -3 points 9 months ago

Both Israel and the US have representative democracies. Views of the government are the views of the people.

[-] DessertStorms@kbin.social 9 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Jfc what an out of touch and wilfully ignorant comment.. 🤦‍♀️

https://web.archive.org/web/20230803021951/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/08/22/american-democracy-was-never-designed-to-be-democratic

Never mind that Netanyahu has spent the past decade or so actively and successfully eroding whatever pretence of democracy existed in Israel before..

[-] magnetosphere@kbin.social 9 points 9 months ago

That would be true if we didn’t have an electoral college. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote.

[-] PowerCrazy@lemmy.ml 6 points 9 months ago

Yikes why would defend someone who sung the praises of noted War Criminal Henry Kissinger?

[-] magnetosphere@kbin.social 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

The alternative was worse. Most Presidential elections aren’t about picking the candidate you want - they boil down to who you dislike less.

Besides, I wasn’t “defending” anyone; I was simply pointing out a fact.

[-] danekrae@lemmy.world -2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

The hours everybody spends in supermarkets, picking out the things they don't want to buy, so they're only left with what they want... But the alternative is worse...

[-] exocrinous@lemm.ee 1 points 9 months ago

Let's rephrase:

Despite being appointed president for four years, Donald Trump has never been elected by the popular will of the people.

[-] PowerCrazy@lemmy.ml 2 points 9 months ago

Ok, but that has never been the way the president has been selected? The popular vote for president isn't how the American Election system works and never has. Do you get upset if in football the team with the most yards doesn't win? Or the most base hits? Or the most gold in League of Legends?

[-] exocrinous@lemm.ee 2 points 9 months ago

We're not talking about whether the US does things like it's always done. We're talking about whether it's a democracy and whether the views of the government are the views of the people. It does pretty poorly on the first one and fails completely on the second.

[-] chillhelm@lemmy.world -2 points 9 months ago

They both approximate perfect representation close enough. If the difference between one government or the other comes down to variations that are basically explained by the weather being good or bad on voting day, you can't really claim that the government isn't representative.

Just because it didn't represent YOUR opinion, it doesn't make it less representative. A truly representative government will make decisions that align with 10% of the population 10% of the time. So if 10% of the population want to bomb Canada a perfectly representative government will make it happen every 40 years or so.

[-] thebardingreen@lemmy.starlightkel.xyz 4 points 9 months ago

But with just some VERY MINOR tweaks to the system, the "views of the people" would be very different. In the US, the system is OPENLY engineered to preserve existing power structures, in ways that have accumulated over the decades (Jerrymandering, Electoral College and First Past The Post all add up...)