Slow down Kemosabe. Hell in a handbasket mostly exist in the news.

[Twilight Hue]

Interesting article I came across....

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/4498298-the-worlds-descent-to-hell-in-a-handbasket-exists-mostly-on-the-news/

I find a lawn chair , a nice cold pina colada, and rolling grass hills on a sunny day to be a wonderful cure, and I feel just fine.

I invite all the others to do the same as me and Kemosabe. :O)

 

[anna.]

It takes a certain amount of privilege to float above the fray.

Such a privilege doesn't necessarily have to come from money or social class. It can simply be the happenstance privilege of living in a society where day-to-day existence isn't a near-daily encounter with death from famine, warfare, or repressive regimes. To live in a still-free country and not care how the election in your country, or anything happening in someone else's country ends up, because neither will affect the stability of one's leisure life - nothing wrong with enjoying that cocktail, but I hope the drinker understands there was always a price, just not one necessarily paid by the drinker.

 

[Twilight Hue]

It takes a certain amount of privilege to float above the fray.

Such a privilege doesn't necessarily have to come from money or social class. It can simply be the happenstance privilege of living in a society where day-to-day existence isn't a near-daily encounter with death from famine, warfare, or repressive regimes. To live in a still-free country and not care how the election in your country, or anything happening in someone else's country ends up, because neither will affect the stability of one's leisure life - nothing wrong with enjoying that cocktail, but I hope the drinker understands there was always a price, just not one necessarily paid by the drinker.

I find waiting to see if it actually happens to be the best course of action.

A lot of people end up fighting the squirming worms going around inside their minds and going crazy as a result.

 

[Soandso]

I get the point of the article. When taking a bird's eye view of where we are at in the world and we compare it to the past, we are doing a lot better now. The news focuses on negative stories because "if it bleeds it leads," and this skews our views when we allow ourselves to be manipulated by the narrative the media tries to convey to its watchers/listeners

I'd agree on a surface based level. When you dig below the surface there are sticking points that we need to deal with as a species before they do become problematic, though. It sure would suck if we were to be wiped out via a nuclear holocaust, for instance. By and large we experience less suffering and death now than any other time in history and the trend keeps improving. As mentioned above though everything we do has consequences; with fewer deaths comes increased populations and that itself brings along it's own issues as well for the future to deal with as an example

At some point the piper will need to be paid. Better to start figuring out how that's going to work now rather than just pushing these problems off onto future generations. Just because we have the luxury to be able to think about problems we may have not thought about in the past doesn't mean they aren't worthy of attention

Also it's important to keep in mind that the relative peace we experience now is unprecedented. The days we experience now are not the norm but the exception. Let's hope it continues to last. For some context of what I mean, here's what life was like in the 1920s. It only gets worse from there as you go backwards in time

 

[Stevicus]

I get the point of the article. When taking a bird's eye view of where we are at in the world and we compare it to the past, we are doing a lot better now. The news focuses on negative stories because "if it bleeds it leads," and this skews our views when we allow ourselves to be manipulated by the narrative the media tries to convey to its watchers/listeners

I'd agree on a surface based level. When you dig below the surface there are sticking points that we need to deal with as a species before they do become problematic, though. It sure would suck if we were to be wiped out via a nuclear holocaust, for instance. By and large we experience less suffering and death now than any other time in history and the trend keeps improving. As mentioned above though everything we do has consequences; with fewer deaths comes increased populations and that itself brings along it's own issues as well for the future to deal with as an example

At some point the piper will need to be paid. Better to start figuring out how that's going to work now rather than just pushing these problems off onto future generations. Just because we have the luxury to be able to think about problems we may have not thought about in the past doesn't mean they aren't worthy of attention

Also it's important to keep in mind that the relative peace we experience now is unprecedented. The days we experience now are not the norm but the exception. Let's hope it continues to last. For some context of what I mean, here's what life was like in the 1920s. It only gets worse from there as you go backwards in time

I would agree that it was much worse in previous times, although what it also means is that we have much more to lose nowadays, and the main worry is going backwards. Another thing that might cause people to worry is a certain recklessness and acceleration into uncharted territory. The world has changed more in the past 200 years than it did in the previous 2000 years. The higher one goes, the longer there is to fall. The population levels in the world, along with climate change, are unprecedented, and it's not clear what the long-term consequences might be. Will there be enough food to feed the billions of the world? Will there be enough energy resources to provide energy at the level we've come to depend upon?

Back in the 1920s, they didn't have to worry about nuclear war, and from their point of view, they had just fought the "war to end all wars." There might have been the same level of optimism back then and a feeling that "we're doing a lot better now" than in the past. While there were some harbingers that things weren't looking too good, there was still an overall sense of hope for the future. At that time, no one could have predicted the coming Second World War or the Cold War (let alone climate change or any environmental issues). So, even as people thought that things were great, they could not have anticipated the hard times in their future.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I invite all the others to do the same as me and Kemosabe.

That is absolutely the last thing I'll choose to do.

 

[icehorse]

Interesting article I came across....

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/4498298-the-worlds-descent-to-hell-in-a-handbasket-exists-mostly-on-the-news/

I find a lawn chair , a nice cold pina colada, and rolling grass hills on a sunny day to be a wonderful cure, and I feel just fine.

I invite all the others to do the same as me and Kemosabe. :O)

Ecological Overshoot is real, and it's coming to your town right quick like.

 

[Kathryn]

I recently hosted a visitor from a European country. I definitely recall his great surprise at two things: 1) that we weren't killing each other in the streets right outside my door, and 2) that we only had 13 percent African American people. He would have sworn that we all carried guns around all day every day and that we were around 50 percent African American.

 

[PureX]

Some people find it a lot easier to ignore the suffering of those around them than others. Some would even park their lawn chair on your neck and take a nap in it while you choke to death. Many of these people have become politicians because the rest of us are too stupid and indifferent to be bothered to stop them.

Indifference is a very handy respite in a world that is becoming very troubled. And sometimes we really just have to rest a while, if we can. But to use the suffering of the past as an excuse to ignore the suffering of the present is truly shameful.

 

[Soandso]

I would agree that it was much worse in previous times, although what it also means is that we have much more to lose nowadays, and the main worry is going backwards. Another thing that might cause people to worry is a certain recklessness and acceleration into uncharted territory. The world has changed more in the past 200 years than it did in the previous 2000 years. The higher one goes, the longer there is to fall. The population levels in the world, along with climate change, are unprecedented, and it's not clear what the long-term consequences might be. Will there be enough food to feed the billions of the world? Will there be enough energy resources to provide energy at the level we've come to depend upon?

Agreed. It's best to solve these things now than to suffer the consequences of inaction before it's too late. When people don't prepare when times are good then things go cockeyed when **** hits the fan

COVID's a good example of this. We knew a pandemic was going to strike as it always had every 100 years and we were overdue by a few years. We could have prepared a contingency plan

Back in the 1920s, they didn't have to worry about nuclear war, and from their point of view, they had just fought the "war to end all wars."

Ehhh... In America. Many other countries were filling the power vacuums created post WW1 and were fighting many, many wars in those days

There might have been the same level of optimism back then and a feeling that "we're doing a lot better now" than in the past. While there were some harbingers that things weren't looking too good, there was still an overall sense of hope for the future.

Again, in America (for some people). True that the world was starting to shrink post WW1 and new advancements opened people's eyes to the possibilities of the future, but for many in those days life was pretty bleak

Going back to America as an example, manifest destiny was almost complete and almost all tribes had been either relegated to reservations or exterminated altogether and the KKK and things such as the black codes and lynchings were in full swing

At that time, no one could have predicted the coming Second World War or the Cold War (let alone climate change or any environmental issues). So, even as people thought that things were great, they could not have anticipated the hard times in their future.

Some of that is true. When it comes to climate change, scientists were linking rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere to rising temperatures and proposed the greenhouse effect since the 1890s. As we've learned more year after year the evidence has only grown in that regard

As for future wars and even the nuke that's true. We don't know what geopolitical prospects will look like in the future, but the United Nations has helped a lot in preventing future wars on the same scale as WW1 and WW2. Let's hope that trend continues, but with certain politicians undermining the people's support for the United Nations that could very well change

 

[Twilight Hue]

I recently hosted a visitor from a European country. I definitely recall his great surprise at two things: 1) that we weren't killing each other in the streets right outside my door, and 2) that we only had 13 percent African American people. He would have sworn that we all carried guns around all day every day and that we were around 50 percent African American.

I had gotten similar remarks from foreigners I knew. One thought the entire state I'm in was one big gigantic city.

 

[Kathryn]

I had gotten similar remarks from foreigners I knew. One thought the entire state I'm in was one big gigantic city.

I never will forget sitting next to some European (sorry, can't recall what country she was from) on a plane and talking with her. God love her, she was so excited about picking up her rental car and traveling throughout the US. I remember she was going to be here fourteen days, and she wanted to drive from DC up to Maine, to Detroit and then down to Dallas or Austin and then over to San Francisco. She didn't like it too much when I rained a bit on her parade. Oh, she also wanted to see Nashville and Charleston or Savannah, and New Orleans. I told her to pick an east or west destination and focus on those cities and she'd still not see what all she wanted to see. She was pretty unhappy with me!

 

[beenherebeforeagain]

I never will forget sitting next to some European (sorry, can't recall what country she was from) on a plane and talking with her. God love her, she was so excited about picking up her rental car and traveling throughout the US. I remember she was going to be here fourteen days, and she wanted to drive from DC up to Maine, to Detroit and then down to Dallas or Austin and then over to San Francisco. She didn't like it too much when I rained a bit on her parade. Oh, she also wanted to see Nashville and Charleston or Savannah, and New Orleans. I told her to pick an east or west destination and focus on those cities and she'd still not see what all she wanted to see. She was pretty unhappy with me!

So, geographical ignorance is not strictly an American shortcoming, I guess?

 

[Kathryn]

So, geographical ignorance is not strictly an American shortcoming, I guess?

Apparently not.