more from this thinker | more from this text
Full Idea
It is a painful fact that the ordinary voter, at any rate in England, is quite blind to insincerity.
Gist of Idea
Unfortunately ordinary voters can't detect insincerity
Source
Bertrand Russell (Political Ideals [1917], 3)
Book Ref
Russell,Bertrand: 'Political Ideals' [Spokesman 2007], p.51
A Reaction
Gor blimey yes! Well said, Bertie. Even in the age of television, when you can examine them in closeup, people seem to confuse superficial charm with genuine positive convictions. Why are people better at detecting it in private life?
22575 | Ultimate democracy is tyranny [Aristotle] |
5895 | If one despises illiterate mechanics individually, they are not worth more collectively [Cicero] |
13557 | Unfortunately the majority do not tend to favour what is best [Seneca] |
19828 | Democracy leads to internal strife, as people struggle to maintain or change ways of ruling [Rousseau] |
19835 | When ministers change the state changes, because they always reverse policies [Rousseau] |
22394 | Democracy diminishes mankind, making them mediocre and lowering their value [Nietzsche] |
18331 | Democracy is organisational power in decline [Nietzsche] |
23166 | In democracy we are more aware of being governed than of our tiny share in government [Russell] |
23169 | Democratic institutions become impossible in a fanatical democracy [Russell] |
21526 | Unfortunately ordinary voters can't detect insincerity [Russell] |
21527 | On every new question the majority is always wrong at first [Russell] |
23842 | Party politics in a democracy can't avoid an anti-democratic party [Weil] |
7594 | Democrats are committed to a belief and to its opposite, if the majority prefer the latter [Scruton] |