A while back, Chapman University did a study to determine the prevalence of paranormal beliefs among Americans. Majorities professed belief in Atlantis and ghosts.
The unstated assumption behind the poll – and all polling – is that the majority’s opinion matters. Indeed, we’re often told that a majority supports democracy, which is the notion that a majority vote determines truth.
It’s fitting, because American democracy is even more of a spook than any fanciful phenomenon on Chapman U’s list.
Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence. The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism.
Who governs? Who really rules? To what extent is the broad body of U.S. citizens sovereign, semi-sovereign, or largely powerless? These questions have animated much important work in the study of American politics.
Whether we’re discussing politics, economics, or the entertainment industry, “Who?” is the question that matters most.
And in the case of American policymaking, “who” is not the people.
The central point that emerges from our research is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence. Our results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism.
Free market Conservatives struggle to understand why car makers are all switching to infeasible electric engines and why streaming services keep churning out multimillion-dollar insults to their audience.
When you realize there are no free markets in commerce or politics, it all makes sense.
But net interest-group stands are not substantially correlated with the preferences of average citizens. Taking all interest groups together, the index of net interest-group alignment correlates only a non-significant .04 with average citizens’ preferences! (Refer to table 2.) This casts grave doubt on David Truman’s and others’ argument that organized interest groups tend to do a good job of representing the population as a whole. Indeed, as table 2 indicates, even the net alignments of the groups we have categorized as “mass-based” correlate with average citizens’ preferences only at the very modest (though statistically significant) level of .12.
Some particular U.S. membership organizations—especially the AARP and labor unions—do tend to favor the same policies as average citizens. But other membership groups take stands that are unrelated (pro-life and pro-choice groups) or negatively related (gun owners) to what the average American wants. Footnote40 Some membership groups may reflect the views of corporate backers or their most affluent constituents. Others focus on issues on which the public is fairly evenly divided. Whatever the reasons, all mass-based groups taken together simply do not add up, in aggregate, to good representatives of the citizenry as a whole. Business-oriented groups do even worse, with a modest negative over-all correlation of -.10.
… [W]hen all three independent variables are included in the multivariate Model 4 and are tested against each other … [t]he estimated impact of average citizens’ preferences drops precipitously, to a non-significant, near-zero level. Clearly the median citizen or “median voter” at the heart of theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy does not do well when put up against economic elites and organized interest groups. The chief predictions of pure theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy can be decisively rejected. Not only do ordinary citizens not have uniquely substantial power over policy decisions; they have little or no independent influence on policy at all.
We do not live in a democracy. We don’t even have a democratic republic. Instead, we are ruled by an oligarchic plutocracy presided over by an alien economic elite.
If we the people ever get what we want, it’s only in the occasions when our interests align with the elites’.
This is why voting harder – with your ballot or your wallet – is a fool’s errand. Participating in corrupt systems only gives them a false veneer of legitimacy.
The reason not to pay money or attention to companies that hate you is to avoid cooperating with evil. The same goes for voting at the national level.
When you’re playing a rigged game, not playing is the only way to win.
So, the Benedict Option, then? Build up a parallel society and prepare for the current system to collapse under its own weight (presuming they permit that to happen)? Sounds like what Andrew Torba’s talking about. Could work, maybe.
Rod Dreher mistook today’s utterly depraved sub-pagan elite for ancient Romans and even barbarians. These people have shown that they will do as many Ruby Ridges as they feel necessary with zero qualms. I disavow violence, but the chances of this leadership crisis ending peacefully are slim.
Exactly. I had a similar take from Dreher’s book.
Unfortunately, because of the particular sins of folks on our side: laziness (avoidance of political action) and cowardice (seeking a hero to do the work instead), many of us are seperating out into smaller groups, becoming easy to pacify targets. Without something to unify us, I’m not sure how our side will manage to fight back.
I keep praying for the Lord to intervene.
There’s also the problem that most people are NPCs. In the past this has been less of an issue because NPCs will still follow a great man or cause, even if it isn’t the mainstream one. But the mainstream narrative has been steadily pushing people towards complete reliance on the state. It’s gotten to the point where people can’t appreciate alternate solutions even when they are in direct need of them (ex. mocking the idea of owning physical media even as they complain about their favorite movie being removed from their streaming service, dismissing the idea of keeping stores of food as only for preppers even as their grocery store runs out of foods they want to buy.)
If things keep going as they are, then in 10 to 20 years NPCs will be at the point where if they stray from the company line at all they can have their jobs, food, shelter, and even ability to make purchases stripped away. At that point you might get them to agree with you but they would not be able to afford supporting you.
The silver lining is that the infrastructure is failing and probably would fail even if the elites were trying to fix it (and they aren’t.) So this level of dependence will not last forever.
The most surprising thing to me is that bigfoot belief is lower than aliens or ESP. Maybe they were checking for positive belief instead of plausibility?
Most people have been funneled into believing bigfoot is simply some mistaken bear or misidentified creature instead of the idea that it isn’t an animal at all.
“The most surprising thing to me is that bigfoot belief is lower than aliens or ESP.”
That shocked me, too. It’s the one with the most physical evidence.
Not only the physical evidence, but the fact that it doesn’t require any believe in the supernatural or interstellar travel.
I live in an area of the country that has frequent bigfoot sightings, by the way, though it is not the PNW. My father has had two strange encounters while hunting in November and we have a hiking trail about 10 miles from my home that people who know the area refuse to hike alone because of the number of strange and downright menacing encounters with either bigfoot or something else that doesn’t like people in those woods.
Tell us more!
Wall Of Text Incoming! My apologies in advance.
I live in the Adirondacks, where The Last of the Mohicans story takes place* and we’re almost on the NY/Vermont border.
There is a mountain nearby that has two marked hiking trail approaches, one on the lakeside of Lake George from the west, the other from the east. The east side trail, the “backside” trail as it is sometimes called, is well known in the area as a place where bigfoot sightings happen frequently. They’re usually accompanied by strong, off-putting smells. As strong as a skunk smell but not quite as offensive. This is the trail that locals don’t like to hike alone. If locals hike this mountain, they almost universally prefer the lakeside approach. I have not heard of anyone ever being overtly threatened but I have heard numerous stories of what might be called menacing behavior; sightings and sounds where the sounds follow the hikers, as well as the ‘eyes on the back of the head’ sensation. Nearby Vermont has a tons of these encounters rumored as well. A local place called Whitehall, NY, right on the border, has a reputation for sightings and a couple of the local cops and deputies I know have responded to reports of creatures.
Our DEC always chalks them up to black bear sightings. But our NYS DEC has a history of lying to us about other animals, particularly wolves and mountain lions. They claim officially that NYS has no population of either animal, wolves and mountain lions. But Canada has them, Vermont has them, and Pennsylvania has them and we’re supposed to expect the animals respect those surrounding borders. I am an experienced hiker and former SAR volunteer (I was a whitewater/swiftwater and high angle rope rescue specialist) and have the sign of wolves many times. I know many people who have seen them and photographed them.
While bears can walk on their back legs, and they can run on all four faster than a horse, they generally can’t move that fast on two legs, at least that I am aware. This leads me to my father’s encounters.
My father used to hunt in the same region where Thomas Messick went missing. He was the 82 year old man featured in David Paulides’ Missing 411: The Hunted documentary.
The first encounter was a typical sighting: at first he thought he was looking at a bear. But it was walking quickly on its hind legs and then he thought it was man, due to the way it swung its arms. It was very man-like that way, but not bear-like.
The second encounter: My father was also an expert marksman in the military, who won three awards for his ability. But he never shot a deer. And I always wondered why this was when I was a kid, since his friends all said he was better with the rifle than they were. It wasn’t until later a friend of his told me that my dad went hunting to hang out with his buddies, get some solitude away from work, and read a book. He would stake himself out by a comfy tree, read a Tom Clancy novel, eat some candy bars that my mother wouldn’t allow in the house, and sometimes fall asleep with his book and rifle on his lap- very similar to the situation Messick was in, by the way (though my dad’s encounter was in the 80’s.)
One hunting trip, he got comfortable and nodded off. When he woke later, he discovered all his candy bars missing, only to find two wrappers discarded about fifty feet away. The wrappers were torn apart and a mess of chocolate. Not like a human opens them. Could it have been a bear? I guess anything is possible. Could it have been a friend, playing a joke? Sure. Maybe even likely. But my father never hunted in that area ever again. It shook him. I heard the story from my uncle. My dad told his little brother and my mother about the encounter but no one else. My uncle said it scared the crap out of my dad, so much that he was ashamed of it. He was a Navy veteran of the Vietnam War who served on a PBR. Very little scares my father.
So, there are my stories, Brian. I hope you enjoy them! Strangely, with all the time I spend in the woods- I am a NYS High Peaks 46er and I guide hikes year round- I have never encountered anything like my father has or the other sightings.
*Where The Last of the Mohicans story takes place, but not where it was actually filmed. All the locals get a kick out of the movie, since we don’t have forests of giant rhododendrons up here, and you can’t row a canoe from Lake George to the Hudson river. Still a good movie though.
Thank you for sharing, Luke! Mind if I repost your comment?
I don’t mind if you post them at all. Feel free.
Also, this is admittedly irrelevant, but I really don’t know where else I could turn for advice. This Monday, I heard some awful news, the Franciscan Friars in my hometown are, due to a lack of vocations, closing down the local Friary and leaving town, even though they’ve been here for over 700 years. These men were a great spiritual aid to me, and their willingness to offer the sacrament of Confession almost every day of the week was and is an enormous boon to me, since I struggle with temptation a lot. It should still be possible to receive the sacrament somewhere in town, but it will be a deeply distressing and unpleasant change, and, well, I’m just sad. I am, however, trying to offer this up as the Lord’s Will, knowing that what He desires will be done and will always work out for the best in the end. I’m also trying to avoid getting excessively down in the dumps, as is my natural wont; the unfortunate fate of the West is ultimately a judgment that, God willing, will end in redemption. Still, it’s one thing to talk about such things, and another to have it impact your life personally. Please pray for me, and for them.
You and the friars are in my prayers. Take consolation in knowing that attachment to created goods, even created spiritual goods, is in the long run an impediment to full union with God.