WEBVTT

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I'm here to talk about democracy.

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But the real one.

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The one that doesn't exist at all !

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The one that, I think, would get us out of this mess.

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I am a teacher in Marseille, and in 2005, I started to exist.

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I woke up, politically speaking, thanks to a public debate in France.

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A referendum about a so-called "constitution" (NT: a European treaty).

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While reading it, I became angry, I found it dangerous.

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I wrote a response of about ten pages, with notes.

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Then, I published it on my website.

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Sent it to my tiny contact list, as a last-ditch attempt.

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Then, something happened and changed my life.

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People grabbed onto it, it matched something they missed.

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For months, I spent my nights trying to reply to them.

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Particularly to those who didn't like me.

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Trying to prove them wrong.

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Little by little, newspapers took on the topic, then TV, radio…

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They visited me at home.

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The site's visit counter turned like a fan!

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40,000 visits per day! 12,000 emails in 2 months.

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Now I realize that it was the eyes

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of others staring at me that changed me.

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Giving me incredible strength!

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First, positive looks expecting me not to let them down.

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Then, those who didn't like me, at all !

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Suspicious. Calling me an impostor, a bum, illegitimate.

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I wanted to prove them wrong.

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All those eyes passed onto me an incredible energy.

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It still propels me today.

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I discovered that this was an old issue. Athenians called it "verecunia".

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A very interesting and essential concept.

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For the Athenians, a good citizen was someone

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sensitive to what others thought about him.

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It pushed them to virtue.

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When others were counting on them, rewarding them by their gaze,

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it gave them the will to be virtuous.

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And, when they sensed a reproving stare,

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it encouraged them to stay within the path of virtue.

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Indeed, it works!

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People who have "verecunia", are more virtuous.

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Conversely, those who don't, are very dangerous.

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To the point… At that brutal age…

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Well, no need to put them to death, but…

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we could avoid giving responsibilities to the dangerous.

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Since 2005, I have striven working hard for… For what?

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First, I've tried to understand the cause of social injustices.

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I've tried to find out the main cause.

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Then, I've discovered, with wonder, the brilliant ideas that founded the Athenian democracy.

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A real democracy.

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I've analyzed many important words and turned them right side up,

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They've been turned upside down for at least 200 years.

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Finally, I've tried to imagine this work in progress.

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I don't own the truth.

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I'm polishing, building up and strenghening an idea.

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I try to think of institutions, good ones,

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which would protect us all from abuses of power.

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I rely on good institutions to push ourselves to virtue.

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I don't count on virtuous citizens.

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We all have good and bad halves.

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But, good institutions could lead us to virtue.

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The same way they can pull us

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away from the general interest and the common good, like today.

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To do so, I use a great method, recommended by an old doctor:

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Herodotus (NT: Hippocrates, mistake).

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Who was seeking the cause of causes.

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I use this all the time.

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Why? He said:

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For a problem, an illness,

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don't fight its effects! Obviously.

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You won't fix anything.

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Neither its causes!

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Too many factors. It's not that!

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Among all causes: seek the main cause.

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At least a decisive one, one that determines the other causes.

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It's the one we need!

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The one I'm looking for.

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So.

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All my activist friends, that I've met in politics,

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with whom I've shared battles (of course), are endlessly struggling.

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I drew a tree showing the range of topics on which people resist.

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I'm surprised to see all these fighters focusing on… very important things...

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But things that are only consequences.

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I don't think anyone is trying to understand the cause of all of this!

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I think I found… I could be wrong.

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I think I found a common cause to all that impotence, and injustice

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...where social injustice starts…

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I think it's the lack of control over the political power,

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that produces the impotence in the people.

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Social injustices are there because "normal" people,

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don't have the power to resist.

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All the strikers I know, these activists,

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spend their entire lives struggling…

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They don't change a thing!

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How come?

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Because their political impotence prevents them from taking action.

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Where does this impotence come from?

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My analysis is that it comes from the constitution.

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The text that makes elected officials

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not liable to annulment nor accountable.

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We can't choose our candidates.

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There are no referendum based on popular initiative.

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We can't decide anything through personal initiative.

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We let money become privatized because the constitution

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doesn't require it to be public.

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Etc... No time for a detailed list.

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But, in the constitution, all our impotences are planned out.

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It didn't happen by magic ! It's written.

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Keep considering the root…

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Why do all constitutions anticipate people's impotence? Worldwide.

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It isn't a conspiracy, it can't be,

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not every time, in every country, it's not that!

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A universal process must have a universal cause.

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It seems to me that what makes bad constitutions,

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since they plan our powerlessness, instead of our power.

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Since they do not protect us against abuse of power, it prophesizes our impotence.

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I think it's because those who write the constitutions,

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the authors,

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they have a self-interest in not coming up with a good constitution.

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Not mentioning the people's power.

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They are judge and defendant, they are professional politicians.

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This gets closer to the cause of causes.

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It's not their fault, they aren't crooked.

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It's us who let them write it !

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To measure the importance of this mistake,

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let's remember what a constitution stands for.

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People, us, for about 2500 years,

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have needed to put representatives above us.

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In order to produce and enforce the law,

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that protects us from the arbitrary rule of the powerful.

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So, these people are very useful, of course !

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They establish the laws that bring peace to society.

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But, they are also very dangerous !

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If they start to abuse their power, serving the interests of a selected few,

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instead of the common interest…

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If they abuse power by going mad,

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power drives them mad, systematically.

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Uh, yes, we have known that for 2500 years ! Power drives people mad.

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All powers tend towards abuse.

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Always ! (said Montesquieu).

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Like laws of physics, implacable.

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And, there is a brilliant idea to protect us from it:

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the constitution.

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So, what is it ? It's a text, standing above powers.

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Not to organize powers, no need for that, at all !

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Any citizen should know that its purpose is to weaken the powers.

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To worry the powers.

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In order to protect us ! Against abuse of power.

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Wait…

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If representatives must fear the constitution…

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They mustn't write it themselves !

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If they do, they will establish their power and our powerlessness.

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A child understands that.

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The main and essential idea is:

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men of power mustn't write the rules of power.

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Don't wait for them to renounce their power, they won't, never.

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The solution won't come from them, but from us.

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We must forbid them to write it.

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I think this is the essential idea that we lack.

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So, in the scuffle between normal people and

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those who wield power at the moment. There are…

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Oh, there is a timer there, good !

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There are… words turned upside down.

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First, I'm not a citizen.

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A citizen is autonomous, voting his own laws.

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I am just a voter, I'm heteronomous.

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I'm under laws written by someone else.

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"Citizens": it's taking us in with fine words.

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We brag about it but we are nothing !

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What do we have in this so-called "democracy" ?

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What rights ?

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Take your pick of political masters who decide everything for us.

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Selected from people we didn't even choose, the richest choose them.

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And, when they eventually betray us to the marrow,

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there is no way to resist !

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Well, we have freedom of speech, right.

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But absolutely no power of constraint.

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We can jabber, if it has no effect, it's allowed.

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If it changes anything, it's a massacre.

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We call this democracy !? It's our fault !

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We should boycott these trojan words,

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refuse to call democracy what is in fact its strict opposite.

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We feed our political impotence by allowing ourselves to call

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democracy something that is the very negation of our rights.

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When we call it democracy, we can't even express the solution.

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We need democracy, but we can't express it.

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Since the word is taken hostage by its opposite.

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Reversing the words is genius ! Big Brother, absolutely !

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It didn't happen by accident.

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It was not good, at first, in 1789.

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And didn't deteriorate later. Not at all!

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Sieyès, a great thinker of the French Revolution,

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a top dog, not a minion (NT: similar to Madison in USA), in 1789:

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"Citizens who choose to have representatives

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[...]

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must give up making the law themselves.

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They don't have any particular desire to impose.

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If they were dictating wills,

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France wouldn't be this representative state, it would be democratic.

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The people, I repeat (Sieyès speaking),

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in a non-democratic country (and France cannot be), cannot speak,

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can only act through their representatives".

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He wasn't a democrat !

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He knew very well what a democracy was. I'll show you.

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Everyone knew, before 1789, Montesquieu, Aristote,

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that the election is aristocratic, thus, oligarchic.

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Aristotle said it explicitly, I'll skip the quote.

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Montesquieu as well, I'll skip it too.

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Look up online, I must save time.

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Let me stress out the two most important things:

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for 200 years of random appointment* in Athens…

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*(NT: citizens drawn from the society for responsibility)

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During which there were rich and poor.

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OK, I know they set aside slaves and women.

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That's not my point.

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I'm talking about the citizens ! The citizens of that time.

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For 200 years of random appointment, the poor governed, always.

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Always !

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Then, another historical example, no opinions, facts !

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200 years of random appointment: the poor governed.

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There were rich people. But they didn't govern.

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And in a "supposedly representative government" regime,

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not a democracy, for 200 years, it's always the rich who have governed.

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Always !

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Since random appointment gives power to the poor, to the 99%.

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Since the election empowers the 1%, the ultra rich,

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how long will the poor, the 99%, defend the election!?

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As if it were a sacred cow !

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It's untenable, the poor defending the election process,

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while random appointment would give them power back…

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Why do we value so much the election ?

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It's not due to reason,

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the facts show that it's not in our interest.

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But, we have myths.

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The "Republican" school has taugt us, since we are toddlers:

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elections = democracy = election, etc...

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Since the outset we have all believed it.

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We need to rehab from the lies of these robbers of power.

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Turn words the right side up.

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We are not in a democracy,

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we need a random drawing system

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To change things, we can't rely on those who are now in power.

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To change things, we can't rely on those who have the power right now.

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The solution won't come from them.

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It will come from normal people, simple people.

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People who don't want power.

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You must know this thought of Alain.

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A great thinker, I recommend him, who said:

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"The most visible sign of the righteous man,

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is that he doesn't want to govern others, at all.

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He seeks to govern only himself.

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This seals everything. In other words, the worst will govern."

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If righteous people don't want to govern,

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and if we give power, as in representative government,

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to those who want it, the worst will govern.

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This despairing representative trap - Alain is right -

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might also makes us overlook righteous men.

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We won't have them.

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But, we can escape from this trap, these pincers, I think.

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With a real democracy!

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By vesting power to anyone, the best of us are among "anyone",

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those who don't want power.

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Democracy we need !

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But we must want it.

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Don't wait for our elected officials to want it.

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They will never want it !

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True democracy would make them redondant.

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Random selection in Athens meant giving away a little bit of power,

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but not for long, and never twice in a row.

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With many controls, but no time to explain.

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Athenians were giving up a little bit of power,

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to keep the power to themselves !

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Randomly selected people weren't voting on the bills.

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They were police, justice, and enforced the law.

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They prepared the bills, because the Athenians,

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couldn't prepare them in the assembly.

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Representatives were weakened by random selection…

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Weakened !

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Thus, citizens were guaranteed to remain sovereign.

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Don't fear random selection, we would,

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all of us, be greatly empowered through random selection.

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Random selection implies that our representatives remain our servants,

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and can't become our masters.

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One last word…

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One word…

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Visit le-message.org, which was created by one of you.

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I think we should… Like viruses, as a grassroots movement…

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- don't expect anything from the media or the powerful -

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Let's spread the word among one another, on this principle:

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"don't elect the constituent assembly, select it randomly".

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Everything will follow from this.

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I think this idea is valid for the entire world.

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Thank you for listening.

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Translation: Camille Harang & Tomasz Bethell & Kévin Marceau