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i voted yes no fuck you swords

You suck. :fu: xd

Well, a lot of democratic nations used to have empires, but they seem to have gone out of fashion now so I voted 'no'.

And vice versa, Daj.

That depends on your definition of "Democratic" to be quite truthful. Democracy is nothing more than the rule by the majority, which always turns to shit when those who hold power, most of the time economic and/or military power, figure out that they can use their influence to by votes, impose their will on others, or figure out they can vote themselves money from the treasury. I really am not fond of genuine democracy in that since, or democracy in the sense of socialism or communism. I do however believe in Republicanism.

No, I don't believe that democratic nations (in the sense they hold "free" elections of political representatives) will just turn into empires, although it is a possibility. People believe that we are living in the rise of the American Empire, when the fact of the matter is that we are currently experiencing the decline of the American Empire in that American Military and economic hegemony is collapsing. Yet, we are experiencing a shift towards totalitarianism which seems to happen in every society at one time or another. However, totalitarianism is no guarantee that there will be a rise to Empire.

However, looking at the historical record, more often than not, "democratic" societies do seem to follow a totalitarian shift which does lead to empire, take for example the Roman Republic, Prussia under Otto Von Bismark, England and France, all of which were "democratic" but none the less transformed into empire.

You raise a very good question, Swords, but I don't think the answer is so black and white, because just as there are many democratic nations with do manage to create empires, there are many more which failed, for example the African Nations after Colonialism. However, I think we should start to look into other factors, social, cultural and economic, before we can decide if it was "democracy" which lead to empire or something completely different.

Nicely said.

It's a little more difficult these days to establish an actual empire, since there are no longer entire 'uncivilized' continents and open territories for countries to claim for themselves. An invasion and attempt at an imperial state would take a lot of fucking balls, and I think that some leaders of Middle Eastern nations may have said balls.

You're all silly. My friend Karl said that highly industrialized Democratic nations (which when Karl was answering this question did not include Russia or China... or Cuba) will naturally become Communist. I believe him, you're all silly.

Heh..Perhaps, only time will tell..

what if jews are added to the equation

god help us

I kind of want to write a satirical response to that, but it will just be misconstrued and used to perpetuate a negative stereotype of me.

i was just kidding "dawg"

dont worry broheim you couldnt get any worse