My wife and I left the US about nine months ago to teach English in South Korea for a year. Living and working in a different country has introduced us to a host of cultural differences. Many of them were unexpected, but some of them are quite humorous. One of the differences I was not prepared for was the extent to which South Koreans use rock, paper, scissors to resolve conflict. I found in this amusing tradition a lesson for Americans, who are increasingly in danger of losing control of their government and society to those on the Left and the Right who are too impatient with democracy to accomplish their goals legitimately: rock, paper, scissors holds the key to democratic government.

People in Korea use rock, paper, scissors to decide virtually anything. I’m only half-joking when I say that I think I could convince my students to sell themselves into slavery so long as I did it using rock, paper, scissors. For example, I have a male student who’s agreed to join the cross-stitching club at school for two years, while his friend has joined the movie-watching club. It’s clear my student hates cross-stitching. When I asked him why he’ll be cross-stitching for two hours every weekend while his friend will be watching movies, he answered, “Teacher, I lost at rock, paper, scissors.” Another student I know got to shave his friend’s head because he won at rock, paper, scissors. My fellow teacher says he once saw two grown men both trying to get into the same parking space who, after briefly arguing about it, decided the issue using rock, paper, scissors. The winner got the parking space; the loser left without a word.

Rock, paper, scissors may seem like a simple or even a childish way to decide anything important, but it works in Korean society because it is legitimate: it’s a known, open, accepted method of decision-making. It’s fair. Everyone has a chance to win. Everyone agrees to abide by the results if they lose. In American society we have a similar type of method called “democracy.” It takes more time than rock, paper, scissors, but it’s similarly legitimate because it’s an open contest with known rules that is widely accepted, and which any group can conceivably win if they work hard enough.

In the past, when there have been important societal decisions for Americans to make, the people, whether individually or in groups, worked hard to convince their fellow citizens to accept their preferred position. When the time came for a decision, everyone voted for the position they thought was the best. Whichever side lost would accept the decision because, though they were unhappy with the result, they understood that they had tried their best to convince their fellow citizens and had failed. Sometimes the losers continued to pursue victory democratically until they succeeded. (Abolitionists who tried for years to end slavery, for example.) Other times they accepted defeat, or they continued to try but never succeeded. The wide acceptance of democratic decision-making made America a dynamic society, constantly changing (and often improving) itself. Where there was a flaw in the system or a perceived injustice, a remedy was available — provided that enough people could be convinced it was necessary.

Starting in the early 1960s, however, groups on both sides of the political spectrum, impatient with the slow pace of legitimate democratic change, began to take their disputes to the courts or to regulatory agencies to make the changes they wanted to see in society more quickly. Instead of going through the work of asking their fellow citizens to accept certain goals for society, or to accept certain means to accomplish certain goals, they focused instead on convincing only a handful of judges or several members of a regulatory agency (the FCC, the EPA, the FDA, etc.) to force their fellow citizens to accept their goals for society and their means of achieving them. Their victories, which were often not popular victories (in the sense of being supported by the people), siphoned away a good deal of the dynamism that allowed America to behave like a self-healing organism.

The point becomes much clearer if we look at three of these victories: the court cases Roe v. Wade and Goodrich v. Department of Public Health, and the results of the 2000 Presidential election. The changes brought about by these victories – since they were made using methods not accessible to public correction or control – have profoundly harmed America. They have made American society less responsive to popular mandates for change. And they have made American government less legitimate, more open to abuse, and less open to correction than ever before.

Roe vs. Wade

In 1973, the Supreme Court decided that the Constitution protected an unspecified right for a woman to have an abortion. In so doing, however, the Court both short-circuited debates in dozens of states concerning whether and how abortions should be available, and created a vitriolic national controversy where none existed before. Had they worked through established democratic channels, abortion advocates certainly would have had to wait longer, but they would have allowed their opponents to challenge them for public support, and (if they failed) accept that the public simply agreed with the abortion advocates’ position. (This is how abortion rights were established in the nations of Western Europe, for instance.) This they did not do. Instead, they used the courts to require states to allow abortion on demand, the most radical option on the pro-choice agenda. They gave citizens no say in the matter, trading democratic legitimacy for a quick victory. They also ensured that the only way they could be defeated was if abortion opponents convinced (or appointed) at least five Supreme Court justices. Roe (and other cases like it) effectively allowed the votes of five unelected ex-lawyers to cancel the votes of millions of citizens.

Goodrich v. Department of Public Health

In early 2004, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) ruled that refusing full marriage rights to homosexual couples violated the state constitution’s equal protection provisions. After the decision, gay marriage opponents in Massachusetts tried to put a constitutional amendment affirming a traditional concept of marriage (which appeared to have significant popular support) on the ballot, but were prevented from doing so by the state legislature. In response to the Massachusetts SJC’s decision, citizens in several states did what the people in Massachusetts were not allowed to do: they amended their constitutions to affirm the traditional concept of marriage.

The traditional concept of marriage (that marriage is between one man and one woman) has been central to Western Civilization for well over 1,500 years – or about as long as Western Civilization as we know it has existed. Any attempt to officially change that concept on a societal level – to return to a pre-Christian polygamist definition of marriage, for instance, or to move forward to a post-Christian unisex definition – is precisely the type of major change which the people in general should discuss and vote on in order to come to a decision which everyone in a state or the nation can accept (if not agree with). Instead, such a debate has been bypassed in favor of one side’s use of the courts to impose its values on its opponents without their consent. Such a development lacks legitimacy, promotes division, and also exhibits a startling contempt for the opinion of the people, who were neither consulted nor given any legitimate means to alter the decision if they disagreed with it. Perhaps not coincidentally, Massachusetts is currently the only state where gay marriage is legal.

The 2000 Presidential Election

In 2000, one of the closest Presidential elections ever hinged on less than six hundred votes from three counties in Florida. Ballots were counted and recounted amid reports of Election Day irregularities in the hours and locations of polling places, as well as allegations of voter fraud committed by the Florida GOP. What enraged people most about the election, however, were not the recounts, the alleged irregularities, or the voter fraud allegations per se. What enraged them most was that George W. Bush was abruptly declared the winner before the recounts were finished or the alleged irregularities or voter fraud allegations were seriously investigated. First the Florida Secretary of State, Katherine Harris (who was also Bush’s campaign manager), ended the recounts. Bush’s opponent, Al Gore, appealed Harris’s decision all the way to the Supreme Court, where five justices (who were all appointed either by Bush’s father or by his ideological predecessor, Ronald Reagan) confirmed her decision and essentially declared George W. Bush the forty-third President. The protests against the Bush presidency started before he was even sworn in, as millions of people claimed that their votes were effectively canceled by the votes of five unelected ex-lawyers. Perhaps not coincidentally, George W. Bush’s presidency has been one of the most divisive in a generation.

In contrast to the examples above, let’s consider just one major change in society that followed what might be called the Rock, Paper, Scissors Approach to Fundamental Social Change: the nineteenth amendment, which allowed women to vote in federal elections. Under the original Constitution, only men with property could vote. In the 1830s the vote was extended to all white men (the so-called “universal” male suffrage), but women were still excluded. While proponents of women’s suffrage today might simply encourage federal judges to interpret the Constitution to include a woman’s right to vote, in the 1870s they understood that the Constitution included no such provision, and encouraged their fellow citizens to amend it so that it did. In 1920, they finally succeeded. Their efforts took a very long time – almost fifty years – but in the end women’s suffrage quickly became a part of the national fabric precisely because it was legitimate. Opponents were allowed their say, their chance to stop this change from ever happening. They failed. But they accepted their failure, not because their opponents’ values were imposed on them against their will (as is so often the case today) but because it was decided on by the vast majority of their fellow citizens in a process in which they themselves took part.

The lesson for us today is simple: democracy requires citizens to be patient, disciplined, and willing to accept majority decisions with which they disagree if it is to be effective. Forcing one’s agenda on others through the courts or through regulation, though certainly more effective than democratic change, does infinitely more harm than good. America is a more divided country today because of Roe. Massachusetts is a more divided state today because of Goodrich. George W. Bush’s presidency — and, by extension, America — are worse off today because of his disputed election. In a democracy, we must play by the rules we’ve established — however long it takes — and abide by the results — whatever they may be. Otherwise, the consequences will be disastrous. My students could tell us that.