So in your opinion, there was a "right" choice to make, and a wrong choice? Why let people vote, then? The fact that a group I'll name "L." thinks they're plain right and the others are plain wrong worries me at the highest point.
> trusting the evidence
Can't you just absorb that older people voted rationally, based on evidence and distinct life choices that aren't necessarily stupid? In another world where their vote would match your vision of "right", you'd praise the elderly for having more 70 more years of experience, saluting their knowledge, etc. In the present situation, the "L." group presents older people as too senile to make "the right choice". You belong to this L. group.
One point which tips the votes is the "L." group is so dictatorial about their vision of right, and that makes a huge group tip for the alternative, the Trump/Brexit vote. The L group generally uses the "right-vs-wrong" attitude, like you just did, but also weighs the supposedly "correct" vote with plenty of dubious things: If you vote Remain in the brexit, you also vote for a huge increase in London's size which is against countryside's interest – Maybe people don't want that? Maybe a huge London also increases inequalities? If you vote Democrats you also vote for plenty of leftish/liberal laws which aren't right at all (including bribes and murders at the highest level of the government, including plain war and suffering of kids in the Middle-East using blind drones and pure horror, including the militarization of US police). Neither the Democrats nor the Remain planned to do things that convinced most of the population.
Definitely, there wasn't a right and wrong choice in Brexit and Trump. There's just a democratic choice, and people like you, at the end of the year, who still are in denial that their opponent might have a rational reasoning. Which is exactly the lack of listening that is killing our democracies. The ball is on your side.
> So in your opinion, there was a "right" choice to make, and a wrong choice? Why let people vote, then?
Of course in my opinion there was a right and a wrong choice. If I didn't think that, I wouldn't have an opinion, would I? The "better" was in quotes because I appreciate that it is subjective. I can't say with absolute certainty that one option is better than another because I don't have perfect information.
We prefer democracy because in general it leads to far better outcomes in general than the alternatives that have been tried. That doesn't mean I don't think we often vote badly in individual votes.
> Can't you just absorb that older people voted rationally, based on evidence and distinct life choices that aren't necessarily stupid?
No, I cannot. No one votes entirely rationally, and I certainly include myself. People tend to vote according to their emotions, and because of a range of cognitive biases. A case in point:
> One point which tips the votes is the "L." group is so dictatorial about their vision of right, and that makes a huge group tip for the alternative, the Trump/Brexit vote.
Casting a vote because you are annoyed at your political opponents being confident about their views makes no sense logically. This is an emotional reaction rather than a sober assessment of what is best for yourself, your country and the world. Surely the questions of jobs, climate change, scientific research, health and so on are vastly more important than punishing a certain group's mindset?
I feel that the Trump/Brexit campaigns won because they were far better at manipulating these kind of reactions than because they presented better arguments. I think any objective assessment of the respective campaigns would conclude they or their supporters spread more misinformation. That doesn't mean they were with certainty the wrong choice, just that I don't like how we got there.
> Which is exactly the lack of listening that is killing our democracies.
I have the opposite opinion. The increasing emphasis on making decisions by emotion as in "our opponents aren't listening to us enough" is doing more harm to democracy. Less reliance on personal experience and more reliance on logical argument and facts please.
What I find funny is that I only ever see this argument:
"Why can't both be right?"
Because if there is a right and a wrong, it is a binary.
What I never hear is an actual argument or fact based reasoning as to why that group (which I'll call R. or A.R.) is right. It's always "My opinion is worth just as much as your facts".
Well, if someone has an opinion about the right choice on an issue, it sure makes a lot of sense to judge the rightness of voters based whether they vote that way. There's basically no other way to do it, right?
Like.. no one votes for something they don't think is right. The whole point is a difference of opinion about what right is.
So in your opinion, there was a "right" choice to make, and a wrong choice? Why let people vote, then? The fact that a group I'll name "L." thinks they're plain right and the others are plain wrong worries me at the highest point.
> trusting the evidence
Can't you just absorb that older people voted rationally, based on evidence and distinct life choices that aren't necessarily stupid? In another world where their vote would match your vision of "right", you'd praise the elderly for having more 70 more years of experience, saluting their knowledge, etc. In the present situation, the "L." group presents older people as too senile to make "the right choice". You belong to this L. group.
One point which tips the votes is the "L." group is so dictatorial about their vision of right, and that makes a huge group tip for the alternative, the Trump/Brexit vote. The L group generally uses the "right-vs-wrong" attitude, like you just did, but also weighs the supposedly "correct" vote with plenty of dubious things: If you vote Remain in the brexit, you also vote for a huge increase in London's size which is against countryside's interest – Maybe people don't want that? Maybe a huge London also increases inequalities? If you vote Democrats you also vote for plenty of leftish/liberal laws which aren't right at all (including bribes and murders at the highest level of the government, including plain war and suffering of kids in the Middle-East using blind drones and pure horror, including the militarization of US police). Neither the Democrats nor the Remain planned to do things that convinced most of the population.
Definitely, there wasn't a right and wrong choice in Brexit and Trump. There's just a democratic choice, and people like you, at the end of the year, who still are in denial that their opponent might have a rational reasoning. Which is exactly the lack of listening that is killing our democracies. The ball is on your side.