When The Minority Is You

What do you do

When democracy’s all through

What do you do

When minority means you?

‘What Do You Do‘ by The Proclaimers (from  ‘Sunshine on Leith‘ -1988)

I was listening to this song the other day. I don’t usually pay much attention to the lyrics, but something about the line ‘What do you do when minority means you?’ caused me to stop and think (yes, it happens from time to time!).

Minority of One

I am a minority of one.

No other human being has the same view of the world, interests or responsibility for my life as I do. Even if I found someone who was similar enough I doubt I would fully trust them to govern any major aspect of my life. That’s my responsibility and I don’t want to put aside some things that are important to me – such as my continued education, my health, the well-being of my family etc..

We are all minorities.

As being a minority can be a lonely experience, we tend to group together in many different ways. We’re each part of communities based around families, schools, churches, interests, work or where we live. Each of those communities is a minority as well.

The only point at which we stop being part of a minority, I suspect, is when the community is so large it encompasses each and every one of us – the community of all the human beings sharing this planet.

Majority Rule

I get the impression at the level of society that the mainstream has settled for our (principally US and European variants) vision of how to organise at society level. Of course it’s a hugely complex thing and living in Europe I’m much more familiar with Western forms of government that are often conveniently lumped together and called ‘Democracy‘.

One of the principles I’ve taken for granted through my whole life is that of ‘majority rule‘ – one of the seemingly unchallenged foundations of democracy. Whenever a group of people has to make a collective decision, in my experience it ends with someone saying ‘Let’s vote.’ Of course, the unspoken assumption is that the majority will get their way and the minority will immediately give up their disagreement and follow the decision.

I’ve been wondering if maybe the root of many conflicts and violence in the world are a direct result of this assumption. After all, whenever a majority forms, there is, by definition, a minority. Aren’t many of the wars in the world a direct result of separation into majority and minority? Minorities fighting to get heard? Majorities resorting to force to get submission of the minority?

Is ‘majority rule’ really the best way we can imagine of making collective decisions?

Learning and Growing

As an individual I’m changing and developing throughout my whole life.

Physically I may start to decline at some point, but how I see the world and operate in it gets better and better as I learn. When things don’t work I make adjustments and when they do, I capture what works and repeat it. Sometimes I go down a path that isn’t serving me and then I might make radical change, but usually the growth is more gradual.

I’ve found that this is not just an unconscious experience but one where I bring things to the surface, explore my experiences to learn from them, to consciously grow and seek improvements.

While the process and the journey are different for all of us, I believe we’re fundamentally built the same way – as learning machines.

I do this as an individual, but …

… Are We Learning As Communities?

Probably, but there are not many signs of it. Reading the media and watching the foreign policies of the powerful nations I would have to conclude that ‘democracy’ and ‘majority rule’ are perceived as the ultimate form of governance. So much so that there’s a desire to export them all over the world.

I don’t have any answers at the level of society – but I’m concerned by the lack of conscious questionning of our ’systems’ by those who hold power.

There are form of governance that don’t alientate minorities – for example ‘sociocracy‘. But there seems little appetite to introduce these kinds of government that include minorities rather than exclude them.

And it scares me.

After all – we are all minorities.

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