Consent of the Governed: A View on American Life in the 21st Century

According to the New Jersey Center for Civic Education, “consent of the governed” means: “the idea that a government’s legitimacy and moral right to use state power is justified and lawful only when consented, or agreed to, by the people over which that political power is exercised.” The term was famously coined by enlightenment philosopher John Locke, who you may recognize from the nature rights of “Life, Liberty, and Property” which were reworked by Jefferson to form “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

While the nation may have once been formed by Enlightenment ideals and a promise of freedom, the current state does not reflect these goals. Despite constant, state-supported, media showing Americans the ‘might’ and ‘power’ of their nation, we truly are at the weakest point of American Democracy since the Civil War. This is the breaking point; either the founder’s ideals hold true; or the experiment ends. 

During this ever most precarious time in the nation’s journey, you would assume the American public is stricken with anxiety and fear, but you would be mistaken. The public holds tight to the ever-so American ideals of distraction and consumerism. We stay glued to our social media sites, not for coverage, but rather for nonsense and funny videos. The great distraction of Americans from New York to LA has led to the rise of both social media-spawned, destructive echo chambers, and a higher awareness of these groups. While having these hateful groups in the public consciousness is generally positive, it also increases the likelihood of someone who agrees with their stance to find and join them. 

The algorithms designed to keep your attention and feed you media that you agree with provide a great space for vulnerable individuals to be radicalized without even hearing a disagreeing point-of-view. The owners of these media companies make up some of the richest people in the US, and use their platforms to stop any resistance that may come from the late-stage, capitalistic machine they’ve assembled. By selectively displaying one-sided media to certain individuals, these individuals may be led to believe “everyone” agrees with them, and those that disagree are a small, wicked sect of people. 

Through these factors, ill intentioned politicians have divided the country, leaving in its most polarized form. Individuals in the Republican Party have displayed a willingness, and most of all: acceptance, towards using these groups to attempt to keep control over the population. A clear, obvious example is January 6, 2021, where members of several far-right groups stormed the US Capitol, in an effort to stop the certification of the 2020 US Presidential Election. While these acts blatantly go against the design of the, admittedly flawed, US government set up by the Constitution, these groups claimed it was the will of the people (presumably not the 81,282,916 Americans who, according to Cook Political, voted for Joe Biden in 2020). As President Joe Biden said, in his 2024 State of the Union, “You can’t love your country only when you win.”

As much as the 2020 election made it easy to see Biden as a hero who overcame strife to keep the Democracy continuing, but his in-office action is not as Democratic as he’d like you to believe. As easy as it is to place blame for the current day issues on Republican politicians hanging onto ideals of old, the Democratic Party refuses to truly embody a “Left Wing” party. They claim to support union workers, impoverished people, unhoused people, and the overall disadvantaged, yet make compromises and deal with the very opposition they claim to disdain and work against. 

“Leftist” politics and Leftist’s true views differ widely, especially relating to the work, health, and tax systems. While current Democratic politicians claim to  represent the “average American,” they hold well paying, benefit-including, government jobs with no term limits. They gain nothing but power, money, and the stench of new-money egotism. 

“But what do we do?” you may find yourself asking, and there is no easy answer. We could do what the American Public is best at: cognitive dissonance and complacency. Put simply, do nothing; just accept things how they are. However, this isn’t truly a solution to any of these problems we collectively face. The power hungry will never satiate their hunger. They will continue to remove rights we once thought untouchable, they will continue to oppress the oppressed, and worst of all: they will oppress the un-oppressed. They will not stop at the man next to you, they will not stop for you, they will not stop after you. 

So then, what do we really do? The first step towards a solution is unity. The polarization and separation of the American public has done exactly what it was designed to do. We fight amongst ourselves, meanwhile our rights are taken from right under our nose. We must stop the infighting to make a future we truly want to pass on to future generations. We must see each other not as enemies on a battlefield, but rather two sides to the same coin. We have to put our disagreements aside, or we will be crushed; Democrat or Republican; Liberal or Conservative; Man or Woman: Straight or Gay; Christian or Muslim; Religious or Agnostic. The heel of a boot feels the same from every side of the aisle. 

The second step we must take is to identify the individuals and systems which have kept us suppressed. We must not violently retaliate, but rather create new, or change old, systems that do what the previous could not. While many government offices do not perform their job as intended, or well, they have a job that was needed when it was created. If we, as a collective people, find that their intended job was not in our best interests, then we must remove them. We must weed out the rampant corruption within our congress, and stop the lobbying market. Must it be said the corporations are not people. They must serve the people, and our interests as a whole, rather than a specific problem without further thought. As the governed, we must revoke our consent. 

The final step is to move into a new era; an era of rebuilding and restructuring. We must stop the ways of old, we as a society are much too old and wise to continue this centuries-long cycle. It is the 21st century, and this will no longer stand. We must find new visionaries, and teams of people who can work towards a significant change in our future’s outlook. Disjointed, we are nothing; Together, we are everything.