“Our democracy” is in peril, we are told, endlessly, by pundits and politicians. A Supreme Court justice, talking heads, politicians, and academics have come out as worriers about the state of democratic politics. Even a former pope did so. In the United States, histrionics about “our democracy” have reached a pitch not seen since, well, five minutes ago, when “our democracy” was last threatened by whoever or whatever was the clear and present fascist in our midst. “Our democracy” is under attack. “Our democracy” may not survive another minute. “Our democracy” is dying, and, once it’s gone, there will be no way to get it back.

What do people mean by “our democracy,” though? For one thing, the Constitution establishes a republic, not a democracy. There is all the difference in the world for those paying attention. So, do the criers-in-the-streets lamenting the downfall of democracy fear republican form of government, or do they just not know what they’re talking about? I suspect it’s the latter, but it’s hard to know for sure because such people have a habit of preferring violence to reasoned argument. Do they mean Rousseau, Locke, Rosa Luxemburg? None of these, I think. The “our democracy” crowd seems to mean Molotov, Louisville Slugger, and Smith & Wesson. Yes, that’s the “democracy” that democracy advocates most likely have in mind.

This is a crucial point. “Our democracy” does not connote what most of us learned in civics class that “democracy” means. Or, to put it another way, “our democracy” means precisely what democracy has always meant, but what our civics teachers never taught us it means.

Here’s the textbook version of democracy. One of the fundamental prerogatives of the modern state is a monopoly on violence. Divested of the ability to settle disputes by dueling, or jousting, or feuding, or raising small armies and launching dawn raids, “citizens” in a democracy are to hash things out by debating in the public square, with periodic elections to determine which positions become policy and which ones get relegated to the minority. The voters vote, the losing side accepts defeat, and all is peaceful among the reasonable “citizenry.”

Here’s how democracy works in practice. One group of people hijacks the state and its institutions. They redefine the moral contours of society. They say that two men can marry. Two women. Maybe three people can marry. Maybe four. They say that “married” men can rent uteruses and buy the babies that come out of them, raising those trafficked children as their own. They say that men can become women, and women men. They say that children in the womb are expendable — probably better off dead anyway. They say that Foreign Countries A, B, and C must be invaded and occupied until they, too, learn how to “democracy.” They say that if anyone disputes any of this, then he or she is a neo-Nazi, “literally Hitler.” A substantial fraction of “the citizenry,” having been primed for “democratic direct action” in the democratic public schools, takes this kind of talk dead seriously, and acts accordingly. Bullets fly. Blood spills. “Our democracy” is defended by killing those who disagree with the immoral majority. One side treats the slain as martyrs. The other side treats the assassins as heroes. The work of “democracy” is done, until, that is, another threat to “our democracy” emerges and is dealt with accordingly. The state, having the monopoly on violence (in theory, at least), rushes in to keep order. Armed agents patrol the streets, keeping the democratic peace with nightsticks and long guns. “Elections” do nothing except drive the warring factions farther and farther apart. The above process repeats.

Given the above reality, perhaps you’ve noticed something about the phrase “our democracy”: the possessive pronoun doesn’t stick to the object (see here). Democracy is not something that the majority and the minority can hold in common. The majority does not treat the minority with magnanimity, but with contempt. The proscription against violence is a convenient hypocrisy. This past week proves the point most poignantly. Big swaths of the liberals who hold virtually all the positions of power in American society, those who dominate the media, the academy, the institutions and bureaucracies that rule over us, gloated when “our democracy” claimed another victim. A man was murdered in cold blood for saying the words “Jesus” and “pro-life” in public. This is not an aberration of democracy. This is democracy, the very thing, in all its splendor.

Step back from the horror of the moment and the wider meaning becomes clear. There is no “our democracy.” There is only the devil’s own Enlightenment, sanctioning political murder in the absence of the Social Kingship of Christ.