[Paybeskf]

Before there was mass-media, the average people were informed by the church or by labor unions, or simply by a literate family member. Which wasn't any better! Also, after recently having read newspaper articles from 1905, I concluded that lust of sensation, gossip, misinformation and propaganda has never been better than today either (actually quite the contrary!).

In today's world it has become some sort of irreversible 'force majeure' that people will become automatically uncooperative or even violent if they don't feel represented in politics. So there is nothing much to do against it! But I have to note also that IMO there is nothing much to complain about for the people in most Western democracies. Most of them have either proportional voting systems with a variety of parties which have to find coalitions, or they have 'first-past-the-post' elections with two major 'catch-all' parties.
On the other hand, I know a lot of East Germans who mourn about the loss of the benevolent single party of unity, under which everything was easier, better, safer, warmer, less complicated, and people felt to be cared for...