This may be true in some cases; this is why I think universal vote, without any limitations, is not a good idea. Voting is a privilege and a job of running (a small piece of) your country. Compare it to a jury duty.
This, again, may be false in some cases. Unless the voting process is framed as a sports match (like it usually sadly is), the emotions are much easier to keep in check, and reason is easier to listen to, even without an advanced university degree.
OTOH if you don't trust your countrymen, I wish you all the luck in importing infallible Martians to help you rule your country as e.g. a king. On this planet the only way used to be growing and educating some portion of your countrymen to be able to run the country (without running it into the ground). This applies to kings and dictators to a very high degree. This as well may apply to a wider mass of voters.
I suspect this is what happened to the Swiss: centuries of local self-rule and rather immediate consequences of it, combined with living in rather harsh conditions most of its history, must have educated people not to take the voting lightly. I don't see modern Swiss killing Muslims or Hispanics on sight (it's not the Reformation wars time), but I do see a ban to build minarets [1]. Apparently the fallout was pretty small, without a "culture of fear", Muslims fleeing the country or something like that. Sometimes a minority has to listen to the majority; it's best when the compromise is as small as this ban. Regular not listening to the majority and alienating them makes for what you fear: the mob running over the castle of the highly-cultured but insolent lord.
This may be true in some cases; this is why I think universal vote, without any limitations, is not a good idea. Voting is a privilege and a job of running (a small piece of) your country. Compare it to a jury duty.
This, again, may be false in some cases. Unless the voting process is framed as a sports match (like it usually sadly is), the emotions are much easier to keep in check, and reason is easier to listen to, even without an advanced university degree.
OTOH if you don't trust your countrymen, I wish you all the luck in importing infallible Martians to help you rule your country as e.g. a king. On this planet the only way used to be growing and educating some portion of your countrymen to be able to run the country (without running it into the ground). This applies to kings and dictators to a very high degree. This as well may apply to a wider mass of voters.
I suspect this is what happened to the Swiss: centuries of local self-rule and rather immediate consequences of it, combined with living in rather harsh conditions most of its history, must have educated people not to take the voting lightly. I don't see modern Swiss killing Muslims or Hispanics on sight (it's not the Reformation wars time), but I do see a ban to build minarets [1]. Apparently the fallout was pretty small, without a "culture of fear", Muslims fleeing the country or something like that. Sometimes a minority has to listen to the majority; it's best when the compromise is as small as this ban. Regular not listening to the majority and alienating them makes for what you fear: the mob running over the castle of the highly-cultured but insolent lord.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_minaret_referendum,_2009