Yes, the Culture novels have an extremely biased POV by design, comparable to an alien's only knowledge of human society being CIA mission reports.
> The Culture is explicitly a direct democracy
It's not, and what you've quoted at length only reinforces my point.
Sure, humans get a vote in the design of their habitats, and even input on where the ship might fly.
But that's like saying that a modern nuclear power is a democracy because people get to vote on where their local park benches are located.
I'm saying that humans have no say on anything of consequence in the Culture. Anything that matters is decided upon by sentient hyperintelligent machines.
> The Culture is explicitly a direct democracy
It's not, and what you've quoted at length only reinforces my point.
Sure, humans get a vote in the design of their habitats, and even input on where the ship might fly.
But that's like saying that a modern nuclear power is a democracy because people get to vote on where their local park benches are located.
I'm saying that humans have no say on anything of consequence in the Culture. Anything that matters is decided upon by sentient hyperintelligent machines.