Why are the masses so easily duped by political shysters and crooks?

 

“Nothing is more disgusting than the majority: because it consists of a few powerful predecessors, of rogues who adapt themselves, of weak who assimilate themselves, and the masses who imitate without knowing at all what they want.”

 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The vast majority of people are susceptible to group think and that includes the educated. They're like 'Panurge's sheep'. That's why they follow political shysters and demagogues like Hitler, Mussolini, Trump and Farage. Many are also easily led and often act in a way that may be contrary to their own interest.

Do people ever stop and think that what we call a Liberal representative democracy, is just a delusion and a snare. Aren't general elections, just about rotating and switching political elites. Does anything really change? The Rumanians have a saying that "Only fools exult, when governments change."

The Fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini, believed that the multitudes, were there to be violated, just like a woman. but Il Duce, was still very popular with many Italians. Many Italians followed him with a slavish devotion.

We can see this herd instinct ingrained in the English way of thinking and their sayings. The English will say "sing along with Joe"; "swim with the tide." "Don't stick your head above the parapet." It's an attitude that's guaranteed to lead to us all into having a jackboot stomped in our faces.

Many English people revere Winston Churchill, but he didn't seem to have had a very high opinion of the intelligence of many English people. He famously said that the best argument against democracy was a five-minute conversation with the average voter. Some ancient Greeks in Athens, thought much the same way. They thought democracy was the rule by the uneducated and the mob.

The Fabian, Beatrice Webb, thought that democracy was just the multiplication of ignorant opinions. Like Voltaire, she seemed to be in favour of an enlightened despotism or rule by technocrats and bureaucrats. She was totally enthralled by Joseph Stalin and his fraudulent Soviet regime. The writer, Louis-Ferdinand Celine, said that Stalin took a turd and dressed it up as a Carmel. He built a society on a mountain of Russian corpses.

The German people democratically elected a man into power who abolished democracy altogether, trade unions, political parties, and the free press, and installed a Nazi dictatorship.

The 'elitist' went as far as to suggest that people should be subjected to an intelligence test before they are given the vote or to stand for Parliament. What do you think?