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Originally Posted by someone123
I agree. There are different ways to think about that situation though:
1) Maybe the cause is not a good one if people aren't taking it up. Maybe they disagree, maybe they don't care. Therefore it does not make sense as a democratic goal. Democracy involves compromise; sometimes you don't get your way.
2) Maybe the cause is good and people could get onboard but activists have not done enough work trying to convince voters and politicians.
3) Maybe the whole system is rotten and unresponsive. The cause is good but the only way to accomplish it is to go outside the system.
Municipal politics in Halifax are probably some of the most democratic and responsive around. It takes comparatively few votes to determine whether or not a councillor gets elected, they talk to their constituents, it's easy to vote or run, and there is tons of public consultation during the course of municipal decision making.
(3) and the "break a few eggs" mindset meanwhile was probably the biggest cause of human suffering in the 20th century. Not saying that the Cornwallis vandalism rises to that level but there's a long track record of people using the idea that they are fighting for good as justification for doing destructive things. And unfortunately it can be very hard for people to accept (1) or (2) when they are committed to a goal, so (3) can seem like an attractive path.
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I think that when it comes to certain issues such as the fight for respect / rights / dignity / recognition etc. for minorities, people don't necessarily trust standard "democratic" processes which basically requires the mainstream public to care about something that comes across as being solely in someone else's interest. The idea is that democracy breaks down in such cases because democracy is basically tyranny of the majority to rule over the will of the minority which is a sort of necessary evil when the populace is basically a single united group that just happens to have different preferences or opinions, but unworkable when it comes to fundamentally separate identities. In those cases many people feel that it's necessary to force/demand the desired change because otherwise it will never happen or take an unreasonably long time. In other words, with option 3, there are certain scenarios in which civil disobedience and activism is a necessary part of change
within any system including democracies.
While I accept that this idea is true in many cases, I agree that it's questionable whether or not the issue of such monuments is actually a fundamental issue of minority respect / rights / dignity / recognition. In this case I'm skeptical.