Propaganda/tyranny of the majority

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About

Although it refers to a legitimate concern, the phrase "tyranny of the majority" is often used as an implicit argument that the majority should not impose their will on the minority because this is essentially a form of tyranny.

Examples

  • Admiral Taptap says "The collective free will of the vast majority of the US citizenry CHOOSES the taxation system established in the Constitution." Anthony Loera responds "what you describe is called the Tyranny of the majority".[1]

Reality

This can be used to make arguments supporting the following positions:

Caveat

As US founder James Madison observed in Federalist #10, we must be careful not to let a cohesive majority abuse a minority – but this is why the US government was designed with various checks and balances to prevent such abuse. However poorly these checks may work in some cases, Madison was never arguing that people shouldn't have to follow rules they don't like.

Links

Footnotes

  1. 2015-07-21 comments on Google+ discussion