June 14, 2021 by Maggie McNeill
The filibuster is a parliamentary procedure, going back at least to the Roman Senate, which allows one or a small group of politicians to obstruct some action desired by the majority in order to force a compromise or even complete abandonment of the action. As such, it tends to be popular among members of minority parties and unpopular among members of majority parties, who resent any need to consider the views of anyone not belonging to their political tribe; naturally, what this means in the US duopoly is that the poisonous hypocrites infesting one "wing" of the ruling class rightfully recognize the filibuster as a guardrail against tyranny when they're in the minority, but vocally attack it as "anti-democratic" when they're in the majority. Since the Democratic wing of the US Fascist party is now in the majority, we're once again forced to endure pompous polemics from po-faced pundits on why obstructing the freight train of government is a "threat to democracy"; the only reason we don't generally see the same when the Republican wing is in the majority is that most US journalistic outlets tend to favor Democrat-flavored authoritarianism over the GOP-flavored variety. But the sentiment is always lurking out there regardless of whether it's currently espoused by popular pseudo-intellectuals with pulpits, because banning the filbuster tends to be supported by the kind of nitwit who believes their favored party will always be in the majority and will never need to stop a drive toward some law they consider odious. And such nitwits are the backbone of both of the most popular violent authoritarian cabals in the US.
Sorry, but "democracy" isn't supposed to be a synonym for "mob rule"; any "democracy" or "republic" must recognize the inalienable rights of minority groups no matter what the majority wants or how badly it wants it, or else it's no better than any other authoritarian tyranny (and far less efficient in the bargain). When faced with a mob who wants to trample me, I don't much care whether the leader of that mob was chosen by popularity contest or drawing lots, advanced bureaucratically, inherited the position from his dad or mom, or claims to have been appointed by the gods. I don't care whether the members of that mob stomp first with their left boots or their right, or whether they employ ushers to ensure I'm trampled "equally". I don't care whether the majority of mob members are male, female, androgynous or sexless, nor do I give a damn about the relative darkness of their skins, what language they speak, or whose body parts they prefer to fondle or have jammed into their faces. Neither do I care about their supposed "reasons" for trampling me, nor whether they claim my trampling was "proper" or "fair" or "according to procedure", nor whether some person they define as being like me in some way (important to them but not to me) was part of the mob. I just want the fucking mob to leave me the fuck alone. And while the chances of anyone who cares any more about me than about any given specimen of roadkill actually standing up to filibuster against some legal abomination is so close to zero that the difference couldn't be detected with an electron microscope, any grit that is available for anyone to throw into the gears of governmental oppression is a positive good which should be expanded, not eradicated.
