The word idiots was originally used in Greece to mean 'private person' or 'unskilled person' as opposed to 'citizens' who took part in politics and public life and were the ones who ran the country and did all the democracy.
ἰδιώτης were the poorer people who were not considered informed or educated enough to take part in any of the decision making. The citizens though of the idiots as concerned only with their own day-to day-life and what was good for them, rather than the greater good.
Athenian democracy wasn't perfect. Only a very small proportion of the population got to vote and make decisions. You didn't get one if you were female, a slave or an idiot.
Idiots, the every day labourers and soldiers, were considered selfish and self-involved.
In Roman democracy more people got to vote - still not universal suffrage - but the equivalent of the Greek 'idiot' class could have a say.
They were still widely scorned by the political class though. Bread and circuses (panem et circenses) were used to appease the populace.
Free grain and lots of spectacle and policies designed to please the idiots.
Things like Jubilee processions, Olympic Games, Football, royal babies, celebrity pages in The Daily Mail.
Only the idiots want Brexit and circuses.
