UK Referism

I don't have much time for Pat Condell. He strikes me as the classic "man-in-pub", reinforcing prejudices which make him almost a parody of himself. This clip is typical of the genre, even if the underlying theme is sound. We do need a revolution – more a counter-revolution, as the "colleagues" got there first to steal our rights.

But Condell, like so many, confuses elections with democracy. We need to understand here that electing officials does not a democracy make, and nor is the election of our officials a necessary condition for democracy - as Klein Verzet also notes. Until it was so perverted, there was more democracy in the unelected House of Lords than there was in the Commons.

Democracy, therefore, is not about choosing officials, but of controlling them once they are in office. With election comes the threat that, should they not behave, we will remove them ... but since those officials all work to the same agenda now, that threat has lost its force.

Nor can we really talk about restoring democracy. In this country, we have never really had it, except around the margins. The history of the British people has been the journey towards a destination, at which we have never arrived. We need, actually, to create a democracy, to which effect we need to give the means some considerable thought.

For the moment, though, Condell will have to suffice, with his call for a revolution – not an uprising. His is not a call to violence, and neither will you get one here. But to fight the current order and to seek its overthrow by peaceful means are legitimate aspirations of the British people.

And, as I keep saying, there are more of us than there are of them. We just need to realise our own power.

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