251–260 of 937 posts
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The newspaper at least... stops once you've read it -- so that's what an hour (or whatever) gone of your day. That's a major difference, at least.
And you didn't carry it with you everywhere. It blows my mind that my kids will never know what it's like to wait for a bus with nothing else to do.
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Even without raised expectations, people have got to be disappointed that they can't get the same things as the previous generation. Hell they can't even get basic things at a reasonable price. I'm out of touch with the reality of teenagers, but it feels like they're expected to fight harder and harder for less and less. Someone else also talked about how everything became dominated by metrics and competition. It has…
"but it feels like they're expected to fight harder and harder for less and less." And they also should feel ashamed for what they get and consume, as it has a CO2 impact and their future is doomed if they use too much. But in my experience, climate change is a minor factor, compared to the always comparing yourself not to your local group anymore, but the whole world.
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The price of housing is outrageous and it's worldwide, somehow. The knock-on effects are huge and I think this is one of them. Or maybe governments just can't last as long as they have and they steal all progress eventually. (WW2 reset most, but not the US, would help explain why it's worse here?) Or maybe it really is monkey-brain things and normies shouldn't be on the Internet.
This one is puzzling because "shelter" (right to adequate housing) is directly a human right we once agreed upon. But when we view this as a commodity and allow housing to be an investment vehicle it really displays the lack of empathy and care for the humans around us we have.
In France my kids walked to school by themselves at age 7, including taking a bus and the metro, and coming back at night in the winter.
I'm currently in Morocco and here one sees scores of very young children running around everywhere, with no adult supervision whatsoever, at all hours. That's how it should be, IMHO.
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All this talk about “community” - what “community”? It simply doesn’t exist anymore even if you wanted it - short of arranging to stay near your extended family and in laws, what else is there in the modern western world? Churches, I guess is the only other true community left…
What is "the modern western world"? The Finns, Italians, and Californians by and large have a very different idea of "community".
The increase in depression numbers might be a rational reaction to the current environment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Never_to_Have_Been
Depression is not a rational response though, is it? It's an irrational response that persists even when there is no reason to be unhappy. That's why I give little credence to ideas like those in your link. I don't consider the worldview of depressed people to be valuable to my own life experience.
What if there is?
Generally, we are not very good at judging what makes us happy. Happiness research points to things that many of us are indeed missing in life: physical activity, social connectedness, interacting with nature.
The reason for unhappiness might also be internal; bad diet, lack of exercise, etc. throws your body's hormones off-balance, making you feel like crap and causing, quite predictably, unhappiness.
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In the past we could stay online for long hours doing some few activities (chatting, playing games, browsing few sites). These days we can barely survive without a mobile phone always on, permeating every little interaction we have with the world. It’s quite a difference.
Before cell phones there were beepers. and people could always reach you on a landline. or leave a message on the machine. payphones. people weren’t really that much farther than they are now, it just required a little more coordination. and cell phones have been around a lot longer than 10 years when this really picked up steam. even if you filter this statement to exclude everything but smart phones - smart, intern…
A beeper isn’t even in the same league and it’s really not a point here.
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I deny a drinking age is necessary. From what it sounds like, the kids should be out there drinking more!
Alcohol is a depressant. It won't impove anybody's mental health.
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The price of housing is outrageous and it's worldwide, somehow. The knock-on effects are huge and I think this is one of them. Or maybe governments just can't last as long as they have and they steal all progress eventually. (WW2 reset most, but not the US, would help explain why it's worse here?) Or maybe it really is monkey-brain things and normies shouldn't be on the Internet.
This one is puzzling because "shelter" (right to adequate housing) is directly a human right we once agreed upon. But when we view this as a commodity and allow housing to be an investment vehicle it really displays the lack of empathy and care for the humans around us we have.
That's the issue. All the basic human rights have been rolled back especially in the anglosphere. Housing, public health services, employment (proper jobs, non gigs)
I think all the social media stuff is missing the mark. It's 100% bad but it's just trash filling the hole society is making. Looking top down at the problem, humans need self actualization or propose to be happy. Originally we evolved to live in medium sized social groups that worked together to ensure their survival, we took care of each other and that was what drove our purpose, or rather why that need evolved, it…
Competition and stack ranking are nothing new, Imperial China was doing it in the 6th century with civil service exams. You might as well say humanity is the cause.