I heard the creepiest definition for oligarchy.

[Baitball Blogger]

It's a small group of people who come together in order to get things done, in a way that cannot be successfully accomplished in a democracy.

[CanonRay]

1. The "get things done"?

There's only one thing....get richer.

[Baitball Blogger]

2. I know, right?

The fact that someone tried to come up with a positive slant is remarkable.

[haele]

3. I always defined an Oligarchy as a Mafia.

Where a small group of people get together to force everyone that lives within their sphere of influence to act the way they want them and the greater economy for the benefit and perpetual power of that small group of people.

Haele

[magicarpet]

13. Oligarchs - Fascist Henchmen, Fascist Goons, a Fascist Syndicate out for profit, plunder, and ...

... self enrichment where murder is not considered an obstacle.

[Anon-C]

4. K&R! Please where did you here it put that way!

The National Prayer Breakfast?

[Baitball Blogger]

6. It was an innocuous conversation.

Someone I know who is right-leaning who understands our political fractions. He is usually very careful, but some things slip. We were talking about things to say at a wedding and he said that a marriage is not a democracy, it is an oligarchy. I asked him to define oligarchy, and there you are.

It felt like a throwback to the time I heard the priest who married his children say at the altar, that it's okay to hate people. Like he prayed that Barbara Walters would slip on a banana peel.

[maxsolomon]

8. That doesn't even make sense.

a 2-person Oligarchy? or 1 person is the Oligarch?

[Baitball Blogger]

9. I brought that up. Seems pretty obvious to me what he meant.

Some mens have to do what needs to be done -even in their marriages.

[lpbk2713]

5. Circumventing the will of the people.

Or, "let the other 96% be damned" .

[dalton99a]

7. The French had a rather elegant mechanical solution for that

[Recursion]

10. That's pretty much Aristotle's argument for oligarchy

It's ugly but it's been a common idea for thousands of years.

[Baitball Blogger]

11. Did he just assume that there would be benevolent people in that group?

[Recursion]

14. No, but he saw firsthand that Democracy need not be benevolent either

Remember he had to sneak out of Athens at night to avoid getting his own dose of hemlock.

[ProudLib72]

12. "Mob" large group of people who come together to get things done

in a way that cannot be successfully accomplished in a corrupted democracy.

Point being, there are more of us than them. They'd do well to remember that.