Is Modern Democracy a Religion?

Watching the highlights of Obama’s state of the union address reminded me of something I have been thinking about recently – Is modern democracy a religion?

We spend so much of our time believing in the idea of democracy and promoting democracy and fighting wars for democracy that we fail forget to actually be democratic. Religious people spend so much of there time believing in the idea of religion, promoting religion and fighting wars for religion that they fail to actually be religious. Being religious is about being truthful to oneself, all of God’s other people and God himself; being good to oneself, all of God’s other people and God himself. Do we as a democracy not do the same thing, a true democracy is about the decisions coming from the people. How many democratic countries can truthfully say that that is the case. In the UK the only decision that comes directly from the people is that on election day we vote for a representative to speak and vote on our behalf in Parliament. Can we truthfully say that we, the people, get any say in the decisions of our country. We often vote for a representative who then goes and votes for policies against those he pledged before the election – how is this democratic?

Perhaps we should see democracy for what it actually is, like religions, it is a belief system that believes in an idea which would perhaps be nice if it existed but there is really little evidence that it does.