The author notes that the Christian emphasis on truth makes Christianity intolerant and therefore illegitimate by the new definition of tolerance. He therefore ends the book with a discussion of how Christians (and indeed perhaps other religious believers as well) should proceed today. At the intellectual level, he says, they should stand for civility and the principle of the supremacy of truth.
This book is primarily aimed at the Theological Seminary crowd, and various literate christians who want to take us back to a catholic-centered society prior to the Reformation.
If rational discussion is impossible democracy becomes unworkable, and power inevitably flows upward to manipulative and irresponsible elites.
The problems of democracy being antithetical to rational discussion, are the problems inherent in mass hysteria and the whipped-up emotional frenzies of mobs. Democracy is all about vote-counting. And vote-counting means I simply must accumulate enough idiots on my side so that the size of my Idiot Mob is larger than the size of your Idiot Mob.
Rational discussion does not go hand-in-hand with democracy. Democracy is antithetical to all discussion. Taking a vote and then tallying the votes, is adherence to a principle of mob mentality. In democracy, the mob has spoken, and do not disagree with the mob's conclusions. But more to the point here regarding the above quote -- The mob is under no obligation to explain itself or its reasons for voting such a way, which is the very reason why it is antithetical to RATIONAL DISCUSSION.
There many many examples which corroborate what I'm saying here. But for brevity, let me pluck a few at random. One being the criminalization of marijuana and the other the illegality of prostitution in the United States. Marijuana was criminalized essentially by a single man, named Harry Anslinger in the 1930s, when he was assigned as commander of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics. His reasons for making marijuana criminal were both racist and twinged with superstition.
There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos and entertainers… Their satanic music, jazz, and swing result from marijuana use. This marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others
That is, marijuana was made illegal because it was quote-un-quote, "satanic" and made white women have sex with black men.
During recent years regarding the DE-criminalization of marijuana -- In this case, legislatures demand 6 to 10 double-blind scientific studies of the effects of marijuana and its possible harmful effects, from 6 to 10 major universities.
So lets review. When it comes to throwing people in prison for possession of a substance, all that is needed is the that the mob vote it illegal. The reasons for doing so are never pronounced, never written down, never scrutinized and never put under the RATIONAL DISCUSSION that James Kalb would demand of us. In a democracy under the democratic process of blindly counting votes, the mob decides when a person is thrown in prison for possession of a substance. The mob need not explain or rationally discuss this decision at all. For all we know, the mob's reasoning could be as crazy and ridiculous as the substance being satanic and making white women sleep with negroes!
(We may never know. Rational discussion was never done. Just let the mob vote and go with the largest number. Period. End-of-story. The mob has spoken).
Ironically, when it comes to the decision to
STOP throwing people in prison and branding them felons -- well well slown down my dear debator -- that will require six to 10 double-blind scientific studies from six to 10 major universities, won't it? Suddenly, as if by magic, the decision to stop inflicting mob justice unto the individual requires not only rational discussion, but corroborated scientific studies spread among many universities to carefully remove all bias!!
So consider this question. Wouldn't it be nice, if the decision to throw a person in a prison cell and brand them a felon .. wouldn't it be nice if a decision to do that transcended the mere up-and-down votes of a mob? Wouldn't it be nice if that was subject to, at the very least, rational discussion? (at the very best, a cluster of scientific studies?)
{transitional pause}
Exactly the same observation regarding marijuana crimes and be re-told in an identical story by replacing marijuana with prostitution.
The problems of democracy being antithetical to rational discussion, are the problems inherent in mass hysteria and the whipped-up emotional frenzies of mobs. Democracy is all about vote-counting. And vote-counting means I simply must accumulate enough idiots on my side so that the size of my Idiot Mob is larger than the size of your Idiot Mob. The job is to merely accumulate enough emotional, self-righteous fools by swaying them with fear and charismatic presentation. It is only a matter of making them really afraid, and then springboarding on those fears by arming them with emotions of self-righteousness to feed that fear in a feedback loop.
The feedback loop proceeds
fear <---- * -----> Self righteousness
These emotions feed on one another, and this mental process is known by cable television executives. This method was also used as a science by NAZI propagandists. It is the reason millions of people tune in to Oprah Winfrey, Montel Williams, The View, and the other cluster of popular talkshows.
If you think this social phenomena is not real, see this article and its underlying references section:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult