Firstly: whatever statements I'm about to make are not facts and I acknowledge that. I believe them because that's the best interpretation that I have. I know we will have different life experiences and I hold space for diversity in opinions.
That being said, I'm frustrated by the way people I know are reacting to current world events. I see that people's pain and suffering is being misdirected. People want an enemy to blame. Watching this is very distressing for me, and I realize that people react this way in general, but I do think during times of economic stress people become more polarized. We become more prone to populism, politicians get elected based on people's emotions instead of what makes logical sense . We want an easy way out, we want to avoid pain.
What is currently happening reminds me a lot of the time period of the late medieval ages where a number of things happened back to back that created a ton of instability, death and suffering:
The bubonic plague, famine caused by a combination of climate changes and disease, these pressures resulting in changes in political and religious movements as a result.
It also reminds me a bit of the last industrial revolution and how that too was followed by the great depression and other consequences because of major societal changes.
Our society is facing fundamental changes required to sustain itself: resolve the unsustainable energy system, adapt to harsher climate conditions, absorb a major decline in population due to baby boomers dying and not being replaced adequately. Tech is a huge part of this.
I'm hearing so often talks about income inequality getting out of hand, of price gouging, the housing system being rigged, the pandemic being a global conspiracy for extermination... These all sound AWESOME because it wraps the issue up into a cohesive, ultimately corrupt situation that could be solved if only people do the right thing.
How scary would it be to instead accept that there are multiple stresses on a system that have in turn weakened it, and despite living in "modern" society, despite all of our technology, we could suffer enough natural disasters and system based issues that even when we WANT to resolve the issues, there might not be an actual plan or answer to resolve everything.
This whole "globalist" thing seems to be based on REAL events where global leaders who it is their job to manage the upper infrastructures that they operate are realizing huge issues are finally catching up and it's an urgent situation. Whether you agree with what solutions they decide on is another matter but to paint it all as an evil conspiracy to watch the world burn ... That's less scary then thinking, what if most people are actually trying to solve the problems and it is just messy and hard?
I get slack ANY TIME that I question people's strangely narrow beliefs. If I try to ask people: ok, you're in charge now, you have the power to pass whatever policies you want, what would you do and how quickly will that solve these problems? All I get is talking points and the more you question the reality of what other issues might crop up as a result of these policies and how can we solve these, what if even if you want to pass xyz policy we don't actually have enough oil we don't actually have what we need, people shut down.
I'm not trying to be a dick. I don't think I know everything. But how can everyone else be so self assured all the time? I have my theory, so does everyone else, but why would it be such an unacceptable position to take to decide there's lots of complicated issues and there's no "evil people" or "evil system" to blame?
Life is fragile and hard as fuck to maintain.
I'm genuinely curious to see how we resolve this. I acknowledge the pain and suffering. It's not fun but this type of thing happens, it's a natural ebb and flow of life, humans are not immune to disaster and tragedy. The urgency has created a lot of pressure for innovation and we are ushering in a new structure, a new way of living. Humans are resourceful, we want to survive.
Our worst enemy is our need for a simple answer and desire to blame, to want more and more, to think we are too good to suffer, that we shouldn't have to experience pain and hurt. That's life. Thank you for attending my gratuitous rant.
