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Is everything falling apart?

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Re: Is everything falling apart?

#161

Post by giantg2 »

mbg721 wrote: post #124

It's easy to lament polarization, but the reason it's not going away is that there are important differences in how people view the world, and calls for unity are really closer to "It would be so peaceful if we could eliminate the opposing viewpoint once and for all".

I agree. It seems "compromise" is increasingly used as "What I'm proposing should be considered the compromise and you should listen to me". There's no real debate. Nobody tries to address the other side's concerns. And then we do have, as you say, some fundamental differences in world views and experiences that sometimes form an impasse.

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#162

Post by jaqalopes »

tamaharbor wrote: post #17
jaqalopes wrote: post #7

I think some things are falling apart but not everything. If you had the foresight/luck/guidance to get into a stable white collar career, find a partner, and buy a house before 2022 I think you're on "the train". This train is currently pulling away from a burning station containing everyone else who hasn't done those things yet. It's still possible to escape the station by running down the tracks but at this point…

Or you can just wait for the next stop and get on there.

I appreciate extending the analogy but I don't understand what this actually looks like in real life. You only go to college one, have your first job out of college once, etc. If you don't maximize ROI on those (not just financially but socially) you're playing catchup forever. Success is absolutely still possible but it will take hard work and luck compared to if I had just followed the prescribed path like so many people I know.

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#163

Post by BlargMcLarg »

david927 wrote: post #139

I think there are two intersecting issues. The first is the dwindling of easy resources. The second half of the 20th century was so easy it was wasteful, and we don't want to give that up -- that abundance of resources, readily available and on the cheap. But the bigger issue right now is the end of the US/NATO empire. It matches with the end of other empires like Rome: the spending, the inflation, the corruption and…

>if only they would agree with our side, we'd be fine again

I'd argue a lot of problems today would be solved if people stopped buying into the massive intra-class war propaganda pushed onto the working class and had a little more empathy for one another.

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#164

Post by pelasaco »

"The story of Babel,” Haidt writes, “is the best metaphor I have found for what happened to America in the 2010s, and for the fractured country we now inhabit. Something went terribly wrong, very suddenly. We are disoriented, unable to speak the same language or recognize the same truth. We are cut off from one another and from the past.".. it could be Germany from 2015 and beyond..

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#165

Post by thriftwy »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #53
zozbot234 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an endless cycle. As the saying goes... Hard times make strong men Strong men make good times Good times make weak men And weak men make hard times.

"Strong men" make fascism, not good times. It's pretty much the definition of fascism - a delusional paternalistic idiot infecting everyone around him with his own neuroses and narcissism, in the name of "patriotism" and "respect."

I hope you realize that strong men (of old times) have nothing in common with delusional paternalistic idiots?

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#166

Post by krapp »

SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #104
krapp wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I’m skeptical that he can fundamentally change the incentives that make social media amplify extremist views over moderate views. I'm skeptical that someone who unironically uses the phrase "woke mindvirus" has any such intent. There's a reason right-wing accounts are flooding the platform now and everyone else is running for the hills, and it isn't because Elon makes both sides equally welcome or unwelcome. He's cl…

I'd really encourage you to take a step back and think about how deeply the attitude of extreme-vs-extreme conflict pervades this comment. You say "everyone else is running for the hills", but I don't think you'd claim that 100% or even 25% of left-wing Twitter users have left the platform today. Is it true that the "wokeness" debate is such a big issue you can't use a social media platform run by someone who doesn't…

>You say "everyone else is running for the hills", but I don't think you'd claim that 100% or even 25% of left-wing Twitter users have left the platform today.

Sorry, I forgot where I was posting for a second. It was an idiom, not an attempt at a mathematical proof.

The point is that only one side suddenly feels unwelcome and the other suddenly feels very welcome.

>Is it true that the "wokeness" debate is such a big issue you can't use a social media platform run by someone who doesn't agree with your stance,

No. I just don't look forward to the flood of edgelord Nazi shitposters, bots and harassment I predict Elon (and, Trump's probable reinstatement) will draw to the platform, nor do I particularly want to use a platform whose owner considers my views to be akin to a plague. I will, as long as it remains feasible to block accounts I have no interest in.

>or have the incentives of social media tricked you into seeing it as a totalizing conflict where nobody can agree to disagree?

I didn't take over Twitter because I felt it needed to be liberated from the "woke mindvirus." Elon is bringing the totalizing conflict, I just want to read my feed in peace.

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#167

Post by paulpauper »

ravenstine wrote: post #111

Everything is not falling apart, though certain institutions may be falling apart. In America, there's definitely been a breakdown of belief in its own institutions. Far more people are skeptical of things like journalism and Silicon Valley; it really wasn't that long ago that the former was constantly salivating over the latter, but now it's more of an openly vulture-carrion relationship because that caters to publi…

Old institutions cannot compete with Elon Musk, YouTube, podcasts such as Rogan, and the dopamine of social media. The CDC changing minds on masks hurt confidence, for example. Someone like Musk is viewed as decisive .

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#168

Post by JumpCrisscross »

jl6 wrote: post #129
leereeves wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Certainly there have been some parts of the world that didn’t have that peace or that prosperity, but it was widespread. Former colonies threw off their colonial yokes. Most of the "developing world" developed. Marginalized groups gained new civil rights. China and India rose to become great powers even as their former colonial masters, though declining, still enjoyed peace and prosperity. Recognizing that there is s…

> Certainly there have been some parts of the world that didn’t have that peace or that prosperity, but it was widespread. > Former colonies threw off their colonial yokes. While I don’t disagree that decolonization was progress, it ironically came at the cost of the peace that had been imposed on the colonies by their former colonial masters. Many of the world’s most conflict-stricken areas today are ex-colonies sti…

> dirty secret of peace is that it is often imposed by a dominant power. Pax Romana, Pax Britannica, Pax Americana.

If it’s literally in the name it’s not a secret. Competition for monopolies on violence are bloody. When we can sidestep that contest, we get a lasting peace.

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#169

Post by andrewclunn »

NationalPark wrote: post #140
ravenstine wrote: post #111

Everything is not falling apart, though certain institutions may be falling apart. In America, there's definitely been a breakdown of belief in its own institutions. Far more people are skeptical of things like journalism and Silicon Valley; it really wasn't that long ago that the former was constantly salivating over the latter, but now it's more of an openly vulture-carrion relationship because that caters to publi…

We have some relatively recent public polling data on this phenomenon: https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/08/20/republicans... For what it's worth, the decline of trust in institutions is primarily among "Republican/lean Republican" respondents, who are a minority of American voters and likely a minority of American non-voters as well.

Are they still a minority?

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/joe-bidens-approval-...

Yes, there is a clear political tribal alignment between the current "out-group" and skepticism of institutions, but the rise of that iconoclasm on the right seems to be correlating with its growth as a whole.

Re: Is everything falling apart?

#170

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

photochemsyn wrote: post #100

The printing press story always seems to focus on the Protestant-vs-Catholic conflict, but let's also recall it fostered an explosion of scientific and mathematical knowledge across the continent. For example, the print runs of Isaac Newton's Principia : https://www.livescience.com/200-more-copies-newton-principia... I'm not sure if social media has contributed in any similar way to the spread of useful scientific an…

I think in this analogy, the Internet is the printing press.

Social media is maybe the gutter press. But note that the gutter press is only possible where enough people are literate, which is definitely a good thing.

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