Updated

Democratic presidential hopeful Marianne Williamson said "everyone had a bad night" at Tuesday's Democratic presidential debate, and the candidates' lackluster performances in front of the American people are why she isn't dropping out of the race.

In an op-ed she wrote for The Washington Post on Wednesday, Williamson -- she failed to meet the criteria to take part in the fourth-round debate -- said the event "was a lot of things, but it was not exciting."

"If anything, it reduced some very nice people to behavior their mothers probably raised them not to engage in," Williamson wrote. "Which woman who claims feminist ideals can be the nastiest to another woman? Which young person can show the greatest arrogance toward those with decades of experience under their belts? Which intelligent person can best reduce a complicated topic to pabulum for the masses?"

She sarcastically accused the candidates of enlisting the "brilliant" strategy of engaging the public "by showing them the worst of who we are."

The wellness author and spiritual guru acknowledged that she wasn't on stage last night, and she pointed a finger at the Democratic National Committee (DNC) for narrowing the field of candidates "at the very moment when it should be opening up."

"Placing a political straitjacket on our primary system, controlling the process via money and ridiculous rules, the party is risking disaster," Williamson wrote, and that "making sure [the debate contains] only its preordained category of people, discussing its preordained category of topics, [and] is placed before the American people for consideration as contenders for the nomination to run against President Trump -- has created a false, inauthentic piece of high school theater posing as the Democratic debates."

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"This," she wrote, "would all be funny if it weren’t so dangerous."

"For reasons not easy to detect, the Democrats are held to a higher standard by the American people -- who, despite a bad rap and a few spectacular failures, are usually good at smelling a rat. Try as they might to throw people off the scent, the DNC and its media pals are creating the stench of inauthenticity at exactly the moment when some blazing truths should be shining through."

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Williamson said political insiders are parading around a "repackaged" democratic process that she called a "faux democracy."

When she asked herself a question in the third person about whether or not it's time for her to drop out, Williamson wrote: "After that debate Tuesday night, are you kidding?"

"Let me get this right. You think a sanitized wish list of Democratic proposals, focused just enough on appealing to people’s self-interest but not going anywhere near a serious discussion of what ails us, is going to defeat the Republicans? You think your 2016 redux, containing no hint of self-reflection on what created the disaster last time, is going to fight off the specter of neo-fascism? Well, I don't," she wrote.

"If our political gatekeepers keep locking the gate, then the people ourselves will unlock it."

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