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Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

1843magazine.com

481–490 of 535 posts

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#481

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I keep hearing that term lately...but nobody can explain to me how post scarcity is even possible

Like JoeAltmaier said, I was referring to just basic needs being met (eg. shelter, food, internet connection). Obviously we'll never reach a point where everyone can have whatever they want. If there's a better term than "post-scarcity", would love to hear it.

"Basic needs" is a concept with expands with prosperity.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#482

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some gaming communities are hostile to noobs. Some are hostile to women. Some are both. I'm surprised anyone is willing to make the claim that there is no hostility towards women in videogame communities!

It doesn't seem like he's implying it's not hostile to women. Rather, it's hostile in general. Which is bad, but not merely because you're women. Though that happens as well in some community.

He is arguing that it [hostility to women for being women] does not happen in any gaming communities, which is wrong.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#483
post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It should be respected and fought for. " Sorry, 100 million dead bodies is more than enough to convince me that Marxism doesn't work.

>Sorry, 100 million dead bodies is more than enough to convince me that Marxism doesn't work. Where did Marx and Engels write about 100M dead bodies?

Where did the people who invented thalidomide write about deformed babies?

Sorry, not seeing your point here.

If Very Bad Things happen every time a particular idea is put into practice, it's a bad idea, regardless of whether the Very Bad Things were explicitly mentioned when the idea was put forth.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#484
post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, yes. "No true Scotsman". Nope, not going to play that. Edit: At this stage, enough so-called "Marxist" governments have descended into slavery, starvation, and mass murder that the burden of proof should lie on those who advocate such governments, and that burden should be heavy indeed. But nope, it's always "but that wasn't REAL Marxism". After a century of trying, with dozens of attempts, it is quite clear that…

> Ah, yes. "No true Scotsman". Refusing to back up certain or all interpretations of an idea by no means amounts to NTS. You're making a fallacy by saying that these problems you mention are core to Marxist thought. Modern Marxist philosophers are almost dedicated to finding flaws in 20th century Marxist implementations, and doing research on other models such as anarchism, post-left anarchism and technocracy. Dismis…

"You're making a fallacy by saying that these problems you mention are core to Marxist thought."

Nope. I recognize that "Marxist thought" doesn't specifically advocate such things.

Nonetheless, those things always happen.

So far the scorecard is about Murderous Hellhole: 100, Utopia:0.

Usually one only needs to be burned once or twice before deciding that touching a hot stove is a bad idea, even if that glowing burner does look really pretty.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#485
post #400

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It should be respected and fought for. " Sorry, 100 million dead bodies is more than enough to convince me that Marxism doesn't work.

>Sorry, 100 million dead bodies is more than enough to convince me that Marxism doesn't work. Where did Marx and Engels write about 100M dead bodies?

> Where did Marx and Engels write about 100M dead bodies?

More to the point, where did Marx and Engels write about narrow vanguardism instead of broad class consciousness, bypassing capitalism rather than moving forward from it, or any of the other central points of Leninism, which (and not Marxism) is the common ideology shared by the people responsible for those 100 million dead bodies?

The only people trying to put Marxism, rather than Leninism, into effect have been in developed capitalist (and now, in part due to their efforts, post-capitalist mixed) economies.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#486

It's not just video games either. Add Netflix and social media, and soon, VR, to the equation, and it's pretty clear that the game of life offers insufficient rewards relative to one's efforts. I don't believe we ended up here due to some grand conspiracy, but I do think that the top 1% have gotten so skilled at trapping wealth and therefore opportunity that it's really screwing over everyone else. Even as a relative…

One thing that's great about gaming as an addiction: it's very inexpensive. This has been changing for the worse with all the pay to win stuff, but there's still a fair amount of cheap gaming out there. With a gaming addiction, never leaving the house and a minimal food budget I wonder how much the average gamer subsists on each month. I had a friend whose brother would go to work and come home and play video games e…

It can actually be extremely expensive if you are addicted to free to play games. There is literally no upper limit on how much you can spend in those games.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#487
post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ah, yes. "No true Scotsman". Refusing to back up certain or all interpretations of an idea by no means amounts to NTS. You're making a fallacy by saying that these problems you mention are core to Marxist thought. Modern Marxist philosophers are almost dedicated to finding flaws in 20th century Marxist implementations, and doing research on other models such as anarchism, post-left anarchism and technocracy. Dismis…

"You're making a fallacy by saying that these problems you mention are core to Marxist thought." Nope. I recognize that "Marxist thought" doesn't specifically advocate such things. Nonetheless, those things always happen. So far the scorecard is about Murderous Hellhole: 100, Utopia:0. Usually one only needs to be burned once or twice before deciding that touching a hot stove is a bad idea, even if that glowing burne…

I don't think they must necessarily "always happen"; capitalism is much more developed now, much more advanced, and the conditions for revolution are more pertinent. I think you should move out of thinking of the way hitherto "Communist" states have been thought of. If you think that the kind of society Communism wants to acheive is desirable, I would also suggest that you help research and develop ideas for how to reach it.

You may be interested in anarchist writers, or Murray Bookchin.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#488
post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very true. I have seen this in Australian academia: Boomer academics who were permitted to publish a paper every 2-3 years during the first 10+ years of their academic life, and/or defer getting a PhD to ludicrously late in their careers, are now elevated to senior positions supervising students and junior faculty who will not have reasonable careers unless they publish a paper every 2-3 months or better.

Well, the world just got a lot more competitive and there are a lot more people trying to get a PhD.

I'm not salty about that. More just salty at the experience of dealing with people who were teleported to the top of a hierarchy, throwing their weight around as if they'd climbed it.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#489

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no room to grow. In the modern world, for most people, there's nothing productive to do and no fame to get from it. In the USA, all the highways are already built (and even when they're failing, their fixing will be postponed). High speed rail lines weren't, and they're not going to be. Not on any human time frame. So most people are engaged with running pre-built technosphere that is slowly falling apart, wi…

"There's no room to grow." "Productivity, respect and growth are. Are we having any all across post-development countries?" Have any of you ever taken a basic Econ course? 'No room for growth'? THE ECONOMY HAS BEEN GROWING EVERY YEAR. Do you realize that 'feature phones' to 'cell phones' is economic growth? Do you realize that '2G to 4G' is economic growth? Do you realize that more people going to college than ever b…

> THE ECONOMY HAS BEEN GROWING

If the college provides same service while extorting twice as much money, this means that economy grows, but people become poorer, more indebted and strained. The economy might be growing; but WE don't.

> Do you realize that more people going to college than ever before is good?

But when they graduate they have worse employment prospects than High School graduates 40 years ago.

> Do you realize that '2G to 4G' is economic growth?

But how many participate in it as makers and not just as consumers?

When Interstates happened, a lot of people made them with their hands. But now, very few people are directly involved in the 2G to 4G transition and are proud for it. The others just feel like a passengers in a fast moving bus without any control of the route, or, for that reason, trip safety.

> Jesus H Christ you can now chose the gender and eye colour of your offspring

But can you afford it today as a middle-income person? If you can't, it's not there yet. What's the engagement numbers?

> You do realize that the iPhone/Android/Facebook are only 10 years old?

...but I liked more what was before them. I would have preferred N900 and LiveJournal, too bad I don't have this choice realistically. Talk about bus passengers.

> Do you realize that the amount of air travel in the world has doubled in the last little while?

How many people are making it happen? And not on the crappy jobs such as flight attendants? Wait - now even the pilots have their jobs unsatisfactory thanks to long hours and bad pay.

> When you hit your 30's

I'm 32.

Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality

#490
post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your assumptions rest on some very big claims, such as being able to work part time as a low end labour worker. I can't imagine how that would come about in a natural market unless cost of goods dropped even further, and that's not possible through automation alone. Food for example, still needs huge resources and even if it's 100% automated you can't avoid the use of the finite resources required for it. I do apprec…

I see this part-time work happening via things like the informal economy and the sharing economy. We're certainly a long ways off from this dynamic playing out across the entire economy, but it seems to me to be the general direction we're headed.

So the majority of the population will make their income from gray market work? I can see this being feasible only if we have fusion power, some kind of benevolent dictator and a fully developed social safety net. I do _not_ see this as an inevitable equilibrium state extrapolated from the current economy and political thinking, so if it does happen it will have to be the result of decades of hard dedicated work, much like our 40 hour work week.
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