Great post Dane and excellently written with a lovely sharpness to your words.

What I would add to your discussion is the following;

It's certainly true that the democratic experiment when held up to our faded/golden past isn't going to hold up. While we might be able to speak of self-determination in terms of our own value systems and participation in the democratic system, my fear at the moment that this "monster" we've created is a digital one.

The weaponisation of each respective political point of view to be slung across cyberspace for the intention to maim and wound is really what is the issue here. Our political systems since the second world war seem to underestimate the fundamental role that our evolved biological instincts play when people are organised en masse.

When a weapon is left unattended, hands inevitably seek them out. In this case our ability to craft our own echo chambers and claim offense or hurt to those who do not agree is a reflection of the incompability of real-life political discourse to fit neatly into the digital world.

Perhaps we'll need to learn the hard way - we don't fight for things until we lose them.