Have you ever felt like a tiny, insignificant cog in a huge system? Have you ever felt that your voice counts for nothing? Americans don’t even need to imagine it… At least, that’s how I wanted to start—complaining again about how awful and unfair the world is. To recount how, back in 2004, Martin Gilens conducted a study with a clear, painfully unambiguous conclusion: the USA is a country where oligarchs have defeated democracy, and not the other way around. And just when I was on the edge, when it seemed no one could stop the heresy, a miracle happened—not the one I wished for, but the one I deserved. A gust of fresh democratic wind tore me out of the darkness. It swept through the room like a whirlwind and freed everything it reached. But freedom, even from oneself, never comes without consequences. When the dust settled, I saw that the wind had knocked over my monitor. It remained standing with its leg up in the air, as often happens when starry skies are crossed by stripes and Sousa begins to sound in the distance. It was no longer the monitor I once knew. Just as I was no longer the one who would doubt. It became a mirror of truth, and at last I saw the world from the right perspective.
The poor in power
The first thing I realized was that in the USA, ordinary people—the middle class and the poor—have the greatest influence on the state. At first, I thought that in his study “Inequality and Democratic Responsiveness: Who Gets What They Want from Government?”, Martin Gilens, a professor of political science at Princeton University, was criticizing the American regime, or more accurately, American democracy. Supposedly, only the opinion of the wealthiest people (those who earn more than 90% of the population) actually matters. But with the right perspective—inspired by airborne interventions—I can confidently say that he meant something entirely different. Take, for example, this graph:
I understand that such a perspective might be somewhat difficult for a reader unprepared for the truth. So let me explain what you see before you, and in the meantime you can start turning your monitors over—then the truth, like an irritated cat, will immediately leap out at you.
This table clearly shows that the views and preferences of people whose incomes surpass 90% of Americans have the least influence on the adoption of laws or policy in general. Roughly the same, though with some lag, applies to those above the 70% mark. But pay attention to the middle class and below, i.e., the 50th, 30th, and 10th percentiles. If you look at it correctly, Gilens clearly demonstrates that American democracy works exactly as it’s supposed to. You cannot think otherwise.
So I am neither exaggerating nor joking when I claim that the poor, the most ordinary people, have concentrated virtually all power in the country in their hands. I am simply stating Gilens’s conclusion from the correct point of view.
“Oligarchs” are not a problem
So much for the middle class and below. But is everything that straightforward with the rich from the 90th percentile? Can they really have such a weak influence on society as the first table suggests? It turns out they can. One might even say the opinion of the rich is simply disregarded. And really, why would it matter that much? There aren’t that many of them, whereas the “workers,” people with average and below-average incomes, are, of course, incomparably more numerous. Besides, the “oligarchs” already live well—why should they meddle in politics and try to squeeze out even more for themselves? That is better left to the poorer: those whose lives depend especially heavily on what happens in the country.
Of course, it’s hard to believe—it’s an extremely atypical phenomenon in our, to put it mildly, imperfect world. To be more convincing, you can now consult the tables in which Gilens presents statistics showing where the views and desires of the wealthiest Americans diverge from those of average and poor Americans, and what comes of it.
A heretic would say that turning the monitor over won’t help in this case. It’s still obvious that if the rich don’t want certain changes to happen, they don’t happen; if they do want them, they do happen—and the opinion of the average person doesn’t bother them. But the more astute reader has already guessed that the way of the overturned monitor is not literally about the screen’s physical position relative to the viewer or the floor. It is a philosophy, a certain approach to life—and a correct, democratic, and free one at that. Democracy itself in our world is, above all, a matter of faith, like faith in a teapot in space or in humanity. So these tables, too, should not be analyzed with the rational brain. On the contrary, the truth lies in a soul open to democracy and nowhere else.
To a person open to Democracy, it is obvious that Gilens sought to demonstrate symbolically that while the rich can very strongly want or not want something, the real middle class—and even the poor—always hold the center; they are not divided into camps by artificially created conflicts; they are united and adhere to aurea mediocritas, the golden mean, leading the state toward a bright future. And after all, who could divide them?
Thus, with the right perspective, it becomes unequivocally clear: “oligarchs” are not a problem. Only a heretic could think otherwise.
The consequences of American democracy
I would very much like to conclude that American democracy is a perfect democracy, but to be honest, I feel sorry for the oligarchs. They have such a tiny, such an insignificant influence on the state that it can be called disenfranchisement. Unfair. So I’ll take one star away from the Americans after all, giving them 9 out of 10 for democraticness.
Still, it remains one of the best examples of a democratic society we have—it’s frightening to ask for more. And since we have such a wonderful example of state-building and, as long as no evil spirit has turned my monitor back, it would be a sin not to examine the results of this approach. Spoiler: the consequences of democracy’s victory will pleasantly impress you.
Let’s start with reading books. It turns out that college graduates—the segment of the population that reads most actively—read a full 6 more books in 2021 than the average they read between 2002 and 2016. This is shown by Gallup in its study, under what is clearly an erroneous title, “Americans Reading Fewer Books Than in Past.” But even despite the erroneous title, the triumph of democracy is plainly visible; you just need to look closely.
In another Gallup study (“U.S. Depression Rates Reach New Highs”), they say that from 2017 to 2023, the rate of depression among youth fell by 12%. It turns out that faith in a bright future is growing and growing—logically, noting what’s been happening in the world in recent years.
The statistics from the National Literacy Institute (Literacy Statistics 2022–2023) also cannot lie. Between 2022 and 2023, 130 million Americans learned to read bedtime stories to their children. Twenty-one percent of adults in America suddenly got rid of their literacy problems. I presume that democracy affects people on a genetic level. So that every American can learn the Second Amendment and memorize the anthem, it rewrites human DNA so that the brain automatically learns to read these holy words (children’s fairy tales turn out to be a pleasant bonus).
That is, American democracy stimulates people to read more books, cures depression, and successfully combats illiteracy. Perhaps we are lucky to be living in the time of a true utopia’s formation, paradise on earth.
But such an overwhelmingly positive vision of American democracy gives rise to certain collisions. For example, Schrödinger, one of the creators of quantum mechanics, in his book Nature and the Greeks, lamented that it is almost impossible to advance further, to develop, without knowledge of history and at least the basics of philosophy. He believed that first we must sort through the mistakes and achievements of past ages, starting with Ancient Greece, and only after that can we emerge from the crises in science and scientific progress (and, I would add, from spiritual crises as well). In his version, then, every day we either move away from the ideal or at least do not get closer to it. Plato, by the way, would also not have believed in the possibility of such a utopia. In his dialogues, he criticizes ordinary people for their incompetence in governing the state, as though they cannot know how to make political decisions if they haven’t studied the matter. And he even wants to put some philosopher at the head. Very undemocratic, in my—today correct—view.
But again, numbers don’t lie. Thanks to the modern studies I analyzed above, it becomes clear that both Schrödinger and Plato were simply mistaken. Nothing good came of their opposition to democracy. After all, America still stands, and them? It is obvious that the American Übermensch does not need this tedious digging into the history of human thought in order to build a better world.
In the end, in our strange times, the only non-strange solution is to turn over your monitor and look at the world with faith in your heart, seeing it as it is (or at least as it ought to be). By the way, do you think democracy has triumphed like this only in America?
