Political Memes

there's also the matter that most of the time, you didn't have to deal with noble strangers with horses expecting your loyalty (often, not the same nobles and horses as the last ones to come around). There may be the local lord but he had good cause to keep things consistent and open up the grain reserves whenever the winter was bad and crops failed.

But the keen thing that changed in the 20th century is we went from a desperate labor shortage to a labor surplus. There was just tons to do and no giant machines with which to do them. Death was right around the corner: A boar attack here, a bad influenza there, any kind of infection (no antibiotics), so people were dropping dead often enough that every last idiot, hunchback and bastard daughter were celebrated as a strong back that could churn butter or assemble barrels or pitch hay.

In fact, society was so fraught that clergy who knew the deal would look the other way when peasants were rutting like bunnies out of wedlock in springtime. (Stories are told and songs are sung of parish priests who were a bit strict on the sins, and how they had a tendency toward morbid mishap.)

We have crusades and territorial disbutes to thank for higher ranks getting into common business. The Third Crusade (King Richard v. Salah ad-Din) squeezed the peasants hard in England. Then Richard went cooky, disguised himself as a merchant, and was seized for ransom, and a king's ransom was a lot. So the peasants were squeezed so hard it hurt the earls, and John of England (last of his name to this very day) was already a Trumpian / Neroesque asshole, and the economy was already tanked when Richard died in 1199, and at that point enough people were pissed off at unilateral monarchy they made John sign the Magna Carta at swordpoint. Several times.

And that was the beginning of the end of monarchy.

I was thinking something similar in regards to the amount of time it takes. If dystopia and dictatorship is coming to the "free world" the dictators have learned to land that plane gently. It's nuts that things haven't properly broken completely. We just keep putting up with small adjustments. I don't think the serfs would have gone from, say, 2008 to 2025 without some sort of uproar or downright rebellion. Then again. Not my area of expertise.

SO much learned helplessness in the "geeks" around me. They've given up on privacy, ownership, seemingly democracy, certainly peace for Palestine. Never been to a protest, or even considered boycotting. I'm surprised they even bother voting (centrist ofc).

...and instead of joining the boycott, proceeds to do nothing.

To me, it's only because they use their services and the concept of inconveniencing themselves is absurd. "It didn't happen in MY province, and Prime delivery is next day! I'm sure they'll all find better jobs."

They work a job and are probably underpaid, so instead of thinking about someone else, especially when that other person makes more than they do, they view it as the other person just isn't "surviving" as hard as they are... maybe? There's tons of possibilities, but that's my anecdotal take on it.

The average American reads at an 8th grade level, with slightly more than half reading at a 6th grade level.

We have been cognitively neutered, by design.

Didn’t that actually happen (not the Blackrock part)? I thought it came out in a Congressional hearing that there was oil which motivated the whole thing. The U.S. went in to find WMDs but after many years could not find evidence of any.

over here hoping we destroy ourselves for the benefit of the universe

... and Trump took that literally.

don't say things such as this, not even as a joke :)

pre 9/11 sweet spot

There's a line in Fight Club about how Jack's generation has no great war, out no way to prove themselves. It really is a great example of how things felt pre-9/11.

I am Jack's overwhelming sense of buyer's remorse.

Its cyclical, there is no end or beginning just a chain of actions. Might not be the fun part od the circle but it goes around again, we will see better days.

The eternal pendulum of nihilism and existentialism.

Nihilism, there is no meaning. Existential, there is no meaning, so find meaning.

If you can, find a reason. Find that meaning. And, if nothing else, live and love out of spite. One day, you'll wake up to the obituaries (naturally caused; no martyrs here please) of the awful people. And you'll never have to think on them again, ideally.