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Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

kenklippenstein.com

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Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#111

Post by dijit »

thrance wrote: post #95
notepad0x90 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

can a poor person not disconnect in the same way? I think plenty already do without meaning too, lots of tech-illiterate truck drivers and construction workers with flip phones.

Poor people suffer from political conflict more directly, enduring the abysmal policies coming from the top in a very concrete way.

even if they suffer societal consequences; its also still easy not to put it to mind and suffer anxiety from it.

This makes you susceptible to populism though.

I know this because I am from an impoverished family.

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#112

Post by larodi »

sallveburrpi wrote: post #3

Escaping the internet on a luxury trip doesn’t disprove political conflict… it just shows how privilege can opt out of reality and sell the experience as clickbaity insight.

Yes, exactly. Op escaped because he can allow himself to. He is wealthy and well educated also - knows what a disconnect means and is able to pay for a pricey trip to end of the world why his affairs cater to themselves.

It’s perhaps less than 0.001% of the population that can allow themselves to do it.

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#113

Post by braza »

ryandrake wrote: post #27
slyall wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that 90% of the news is unimportant. Often you can read a weekly and that is enough A politician said something and other politicians reacted. Usually unimportant unless it was backed by a law or something. If it was important then the weekly will cover it. Main Character of the day on Social media. unimportant A crime happened nearby. Unimportant A celeb did something. Unimportant Something happened to…

I think OP's point is that if your life is so blessed that "90% of the news is unimportant to you" then that itself is a great, fortunate privilege. For example, I can tell you that if you are an immigrant in the USA from one of the (now many) targeted countries, even one with legal residency, news about ICE's actions is very relevant and very important to you.

> For example, I can tell you that if you are an immigrant in the USA from one of the (now many) targeted countries, even one with legal residency, news about ICE's actions is very relevant and very important to you.

Exactly. There's a post from last week on how media/journalism became more entertainment than information, and I think the complete opposite of the first reply: If you have bandwidth and time to consume most of those "world news", then you're the privileged.

One example: In Germany if you watch/read the state regional public broadcast from Berlin[1] for 2 days you will learn more about the whereabouts of Donald Trump, the President of Ukraine, sports news, or some broad reporting about "cultural" aspect of the city (e.g. about Hildegard Knef, something about Karl Lagerfeld and so on), or general gossip.

The city itself has fewer private investments than 5 years, the schools lack basic infrastructure, educational ratings are dropping, delays in public transportation, the hospitals are lacking personnel, 10% unemployment, and an awful housing situation, squeezing the working people.

[1] - I'm totally in favor of public broadcasting that comes from the principle called "broadcast what you want to become or aspire to be" that is more focused on factual journalism (i.e., no commentary), educational programs (especially with Public Universities STEM lectures being broadcasted), educational cartoons, classic music and orchestras, and space/nature/technology documentaries.

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#114

Post by dangus »

rockskon wrote: post #105
dangus wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No capacity to affect change? Are we forgetting that this specific policy we are discussing was voted in by the public and won the popular vote barely more than a year ago? I think if more people were legitimately better educated and informed that outcome might not have happened. The problem is…who is doing the informing and educating? Oftentimes the sources taking up that role are doing so with motives that are not…

Wow. Great. Which term is our President on again and can you confirm that time flows linearly and cannot, in fact, flow backwards to undo the election? The public has no ability to affect change on the policy this Presidency makes. Especially not the public that is predisposed to dislike the President. This is sadistic and selfish to believe the public must be relentlessly informed of these individual policies that t…

Well now you’re moving goalposts by adding specific time periods as qualifiers. So when you made your original statement, you meant to say that the ability to affect change ended recently? And now “This is foisting misery on people who have no capacity to affect change.”

Well, even that isn’t true. The congressional midterms are next year. Control over congress is on the ballot. Turnout will be the decider as it always is.

If “did not vote” was a candidate, it often wins elections.

In addition, local politics happen every year with higher levels of influence per person, and they often directly affect individuals more than national politics.

Going around telling people they have no impact guarantees that outcome.

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#115

Post by hiddencost »

godelski wrote: post #80
MrJohz wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that exactly what privilege is though? A measure of a person's ability to be part of that self-selected pool, and to shield yourself from issues that affect other people?

Googling it, looks like the trip costs around $6.5k for 2 people for a week. Expensive, but not out of reach for most Americans. I mean we're on HN... if anything we're more likely to be in a wealthy bubble here. On average. There's plenty outside Silicon Valley but this place is a bubble too.

Uhhhhh yeah that's out of reach for a huge fraction of Americans, probably 80%.

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#116

Post by zkmon »

But you felt the strong urge to write once you are on the flight back. I bet you were thinking about the stuff that should go into that writing, all the time during that week. You were collecting photos to share.

That's not true disconnecting. You should just experience it and not share it. That week should only exist in your own memory.

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#117

Post by rockskon »

dangus wrote: post #114
rockskon wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow. Great. Which term is our President on again and can you confirm that time flows linearly and cannot, in fact, flow backwards to undo the election? The public has no ability to affect change on the policy this Presidency makes. Especially not the public that is predisposed to dislike the President. This is sadistic and selfish to believe the public must be relentlessly informed of these individual policies that t…

Well now you’re moving goalposts by adding specific time periods as qualifiers. So when you made your original statement, you meant to say that the ability to affect change ended recently? And now “This is foisting misery on people who have no capacity to affect change.” Well, even that isn’t true. The congressional midterms are next year. Control over congress is on the ballot. Turnout will be the decider as it alwa…

Considering time does, in fact, move linearly and only in one direction - it's a default. Not a moved goalpost.

And referring to the present in contrast with the next Presidential election - an event thematically related to the previous Presidential election that you referenced - it seemed relevant.

As for what people need to be informed about - they'll inform themselves via increased prices on just about everything due to tarriffs + continued lowered interest rates despite notable inflationary pressures.

I maintain it is cruel to relentlessly and aggressively inform people of the horrors of the world that they - and I repeat myself - cannot do anything about. From news media fewer and fewer trust every year.

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#118

Post by blackhaj7 »

“They were young and older, professors and small business owners (even an Army colonel!), Republicans and Democrats, from big cities and small towns”

It’s just so bizarre to me as a non-American that someone would go to the Galapagos Islands and come away knowing the political affiliations of the people they were with. It shouldn’t even need to come up

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#119

Post by potato3732842 »

energy123 wrote: post #100
sallveburrpi wrote: post #3

Escaping the internet on a luxury trip doesn’t disprove political conflict… it just shows how privilege can opt out of reality and sell the experience as clickbaity insight.

It's lame how a timeless Buddhist principle is derided as "privilege" by contemporary leftists. So closed minded and presumptuous towards something so effective and universally applicable. My personal observation is that those with the least engage in this practice the most, partly because they don't have the bandwidth to bother. It's the middle and upper-middle class who are the terminally online cynics.

>My personal observation is that those with the least engage in this practice the most, partly because they don't have the bandwidth to bother. It's the middle and upper-middle class who are the terminally online cynics.

Look at what the people who were living high on the hog due to tax/graft/dysfunction before losing their heads in the french revolution got up to. Look at the rabbit holes minor British nobility went down. The current american upper-ish middle class is just another cover of the same stupid bad for everyone song.

Re: Why I Disappeared – My week with minimal internet in a remote island chain

#120

Post by potato3732842 »

thrance wrote: post #95
notepad0x90 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

can a poor person not disconnect in the same way? I think plenty already do without meaning too, lots of tech-illiterate truck drivers and construction workers with flip phones.

Poor people suffer from political conflict more directly, enduring the abysmal policies coming from the top in a very concrete way.

Exactly. People who are stupid enough to afford dysfunction peddle stupid policy that makes everyone's lives worse. They don't care because they're not affected and when they are it's not bad enough to make them question the beliefs that got there.

All the stuff the "rich but not nobility" people did to pour gas on the fire in the lead up to the french revolution is a good comparison point IMO.

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