Would an Athenian agree or disagree with modern day democracy?

I think that an Athenian would agree with the principles, that everyone gets a vote, but not with many of the other details. For instance, i don't think they would like how we give one person so much power, and let him hold that job for 4 years. There is the possibility of that person being impeached, but that very rarely happens. On the Athenian side, they have many people in power, but each one holds that position for a very short time. They would also not like how, even though everyone gets a vote, not everyone's vote counts the same; the president has much more authority than the Average Joe. Also, things like the electoral college really stints how much power the voter actually has. While our democracy is much like that of Athens, it is also very different, and in ways i don't think an Athenian would like.

5. Then to Now

From afar, our civilization and the Mayan civilization way back when seem like too blatantly diametric societies. But from a closer look, you can see that they arent all that different. We share a lot of things with the Mayans (although they were not necessarily directly derived from there). For instance, their religion had a difinite leader, called the Hlach Unic, who ruled over that religion. This is just like the Pope to the Christian religion. They also believed in many Gods, as do many of the Eastern religions, such as Hinduism and Shinto. There religion and their government were not seperate, instead they were the same thing, their religion was their government. This is not exactly the same today, but it is still true that religiong greatly influences government. For example, one of the big issues today is wether or not gay marriage should be legal. One could argue that this it is not currently legal heavily due to religious conflict. The similarities don't only lie with religion. In certain areas, you can definitley see the architecture influenced by that of the Mayans. One such place, as pointed out by one of the groups, is Alta Plaza Park. For instance, the large staircase, is very reminiscent of the staricase on the Mayan temple. I could sit here for hours and tell you about all the similarities between these two seemingly different societies; there are just that many!