My perspective is always Eurocentric. And throughout the history of Western Europe for as long as we have known, it was never a lawless tyranny, and the natural rights of people were more or less respected, and that become more the case after the spread of Christianity. Not to say there weren’t abuses, but they were isolated incidents back in the day.

And when it was tyrannical during those couple of times, there was a rule and a system to that tyranny. Not to undermine the tyrannical aspect of these examples, but these tyrannies were natural, in the sense that they arose spontaneously to satisfy the appetite of the masses. As bad as it was, there was not a a big divide between the rulers and the ruled. Not as much as today.

Today, there’s almost a complete disconnect between the ruling class and the rest. It baffles me how they’re still in power. I know this sounds naive, but consider that back in the day, kings lost their heads for much less than the excesses of today’s rulers

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Everyone's heads were worth less, back then. People didn't live as long and their lives were generally more violent.

Also, you couldn't vote out a king. You _had_ to chop his head off, to change the government.

The way I see it, you _got_ to chop off the king’s head and things would change. Radical, tragic, but sometimes necessary or inevitable.

Now, even voting someone in or out of power doesn’t change anything that counts.

Ironically, I’m attending right now a history conference about the French Revolution given by Emmanuel de Waresquiel. I would love to recommend his work, but sadly it’s not translated to English.

Also right now, the responsibility is spread across many heads many of which we don’t even know about.

Yeah, we're ruled by a bureaucracy. Can't vote them out.

A bureaucracy and a technocracy that treats everyone outside their club with contempt.

Ursula von der Leyen is only the tip of the iceberg.

Because the person at the top doesn't actually run things.