When Emperor Constantine faced religious heresy in Rome's North African provinces, he first attempted to persecute the heretics out of existence. They soon became martyrs, so he tried a different strategy. Rather than oppose the heretics, he ignored them and lavished attention on North Africa's orthodox believers. The heretic movement fizzeled out from a simple lack of p.r.
I was surprised to open Democracy in America and be reminded of Constantine's politics. Tocqueville's comments about the tyranny of the American majority make it clear that it acts as a sort of Constantine, crushing his opponents by making them voiceless shades amongst the living.
"[The master] does say: ' You are free not to think as I do... but from this day you are a stranger among us.... When you approach your fellows, they will shun you as an impure being...Go in peace. I have given you your life, but it is a life worse than death'" (Tocqueville 255-6).
If the majority actually was consistently right, such a system would work wonderfully. Unfortunately, when I think of major social movements --particularly women's rights -- I remember that they were only able to finally prevail by using modern media to force the public's attention. How saddening it is to think of the generations of young women before me who might have been able to fully enjoy the fruits of citizenship, had they not been condemned to silence by a majority whose claim to enlightenment rested solely on its numbers.
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