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By Elaine Balbuena
“All these politicians do is take the money of the people and get away with it!”
Most people believe that politicians are personalities—the messiah, the savior, the herald of change—because they are repeatedly presented with unsatisfying "choices." They will choose the least of two evils. They will believe that there is a choice. The risk of selecting the lesser of two evils is that it leads to a return to the status quo, which is comfortable and convenient but remains disconnected from the misery of the people.
The lesser evil can take various forms, including the radical punisher, the "poor" technocrat, the motherly, the experienced, the economist, or the heir to the straight path—all of which are accompanied by a lengthy list of "buts" that will only add to the irritation and uncertainty. They will always be bound by the interests of their class, no matter how progressive they are. It boils down to changing kings and queens but never eliminating the monarchy.
The electoral system is seen as a solution by default; yet, it may foster an unhealthy connection with the people. People return to the cycle of poverty and landscape of social injustice that the candidate they chose promised to eliminate after the election. In the electoral system, the structures that allow the elite, political dynasties, and patronage politics to thrive are still in existence. After the dust has cleared, the elite web of allies that pushed the politicians to power still exists.
"We have our own opinions. If you don’t like my candidate, then respect my choice,"
a cognitive dissonance has produced a dark hole of fear and deception in the era of the internet. “It's just my opinion," makes little difference if the candidate is crooked, inept, repressive, or without vision.
Supporters who are adamant about their candidates know not to expect anything more from them. The power of choice has transferred from the people's hands to the hands of the flightless superheroes.
This isn't the type of democracy we were hoping for. This isn't the democracy for which we've battled twice in our history.
Because the true winner is still the same oppressive system that has enslaved the people for so long after the votes have been cast and the numbers have been calculated. If the people's power ends where the chosen leaders' authority begins, elections will inevitably become a non-solution.
Elected officials are not akin to messiahs. We must learn from our failures in the past and stop assuming that voting would fix all of our issues. It is necessary to expand the strong electoral force that we already have from the voting box to groups that will transform the desire for change into a coordinated counter-force. After all, liberation is a communal act.
Rather than allowing our emotions to die a natural death in present institutions of power, other processes of change will arise as a counterpower.
True empowerment in a democratic democracy does not lie in the people's ability to surrender their fate to the lesser evil because they require a leviathan to rescue them from society's ills. It is in their power to control their own destiny, to fight for their rights, and to refuse to be subjugated by lesser evils.
Elections will serve as a wake-up call rather than a dagger that will leave us all impoverished. We will be compelled to make a decision, not just for one day, but for the rest of our lives, regardless of who wins.
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