I say entertainment rules, not democracy.
As flimsy, whimsical and tacky as it may sound, there is reason to believe this. I have the evidence to back this up, and that too from the world’s oldest democracy as well as from the world’s largest democracy.
Let us start with the world’s oldest democracy – The United States of America.
In the 1960’s, the lover boy of American silver screens, the charming Ronald Reagan got his first moment of fame in Hollywood’s ‘B-Film Unit’. After a successful career in films, he changed track and took up politics. His early critics were apprehensive of whether an actor could take the highest office. Reagan won the presidential elections to become the 40th President of the USA. A few decades later, Arnold Schwarzenegger, the muscular Austrian-American, also made the move from acting to politics. The ‘Terminator’ was governor of California for a full two terms.
Together, these actors entertained the masses with their charm, muscles and everything else.
Cut to 2016, the world’s oldest democracy shocked the world by voting Donald Trump, of WWE and ‘The Apprentice’ fame, to the White House. A sort of entertainment industry side kick, a reality TV star and businessman, has become the President of the United States.
