Protecting democracy
Dear Editor:
Last week’s Advertiser cartoon depicting Trump smashing democracy should make us think about our own role in protecting it.
The destruction of democracy by one man is not the story. If I were drawing the cartoon, I would show citizens surrounding democracy’s pillars, each chipping away with a mallet.
We chip away at democracy when intolerance replaces listening, tribalism replaces questioning, and winning becomes more important than democratic principles.
Once those pillars are weakened, all an aspiring autocrat needs is a cult surrounding their personality willing to push the pillars over.
Democracy isn’t destroyed by one person alone. It is weakened when we stop defending the principles that sustain it.
John Scott,
Elora