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I think if the Liberals win the White House the entire country will implode. Massive, uncontrolled illegal immigration, never ending laws to control our lives, massive economic depression.
I'm sure lots of people think I'm speaking like an alarmist but I can't stop thinking about this. As far as I'm concerned, it's likely that society is entering a new Dark Ages because of a combination of a culture that tries to brainwash people and the progress of technology. What is a way we prove this wrong?
Entertainment and pop culture hitting a dead-end
Media is concentrated by only 5 large companies and blinding people away from the truth
Advanced technology allowing spying and invading privacy, and potentially threatening mass job losses
Men are no longer men and women are no longer women
Nuclear war (or even more deadly advanced weapons) is potentially a looming threat again
Living is harder because everything is way more expensive and income hasn't quite caught up
Admittedly it is little Western-centric, but I don't doubt it can apply to the non-West. The West is just what I happen to be more familiar with.
Please read Steven Pinker Enlightenment. We are passing through the most prosperous peaceful era in world history. You are a victim of TOO MUCH news.
This is meaningless. Your subjective dislike of modern culture has nothing whatsoever to do with a 'dark age'.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ghostee
Media is concentrated by only 5 large companies and blinding people away from the truth
As opposed to the good old days of yellow journalism? Or most of history in most places, where the concept of free speech didn't even exist as an ideal?
And people were wringing their hands over the ABC/Paramount merger in ... 1953. Before that, William Randolph Hearst - surely that name must ring a bell?
Quote:
Originally Posted by ghostee
Advanced technology allowing spying and invading privacy, and potentially threatening mass job losses
In the late 19th century, more than a 3rd of the workforce was in agriculture. Now it's less than 2% - and we produce far more agricultural products then we did then. Yet 1/3rd of the population is not now wandering around unemployed because they can't get jobs planting or plowing. Seriously, people have been confused about how markets work since the Luddites were smashing textile machinery.
Every age has seen technological advancements in surveillance capabilities (and every generation is full of people who insist 'yeah, but this time it's totally different ... because!')
Quote:
Originally Posted by ghostee
Men are no longer men and women are no longer women.
The fact that people have the social and actual liberty to decline to adhere to the rigid gender roles you prefer speaks to nothing but your own unhappiness with the fact that they exercise that liberty.
Notice how your list of complaints comprise both a fear of a loss of liberty as well as a dislike of other liberty? That shows that your list is nothing more than a compilation of your own preferences.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ghostee
Nuclear war (or even more deadly advanced weapons) is potentially a looming threat again.
More deadly than hydrogen bombs? Huh?
In reality, nuclear yields have gone down as targeting technology has improved, because the large yields of the early Cold War were a result of the fact that if an ICBM missed its target by 10 miles, the boom had to be big enough to still take out the target. That's no longer an issue; hence, the yield reductions.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ghostee
Living is harder because everything is way more expensive and income hasn't quite caught up.
Things are only 'more expensive' on a superficial level. Take your car. Does it cost more dollars? Sure does. It also requires a lot more maintenance. It lasts a lot longer (yes, it does - don't give me isolated anecdotes; the average car goes many tens of thousands of miles further today than the average car did decades ago). It is much safer. It is much more comfortable. It is much more convenient. It's an entirely different, better product you're getting. Same with televisions. Same with computers. Same with clothing. Same with virtually everything.
I'm sure lots of people think I'm speaking like an alarmist but I can't stop thinking about this. As far as I'm concerned, it's likely that society is entering a new Dark Ages because of a combination of a culture that tries to brainwash people and the progress of technology. What is a way we prove this wrong?
Entertainment and pop culture hitting a dead-end
Media is concentrated by only 5 large companies and blinding people away from the truth
Advanced technology allowing spying and invading privacy, and potentially threatening mass job losses
Men are no longer men and women are no longer women
Nuclear war (or even more deadly advanced weapons) is potentially a looming threat again
Living is harder because everything is way more expensive and income hasn't quite caught up
Admittedly it is little Western-centric, but I don't doubt it can apply to the non-West. The West is just what I happen to be more familiar with.
A new dark ages?
Highly unlikely.
Idiocracy?
We're living it, in a sense.
Large scale rejection of science.
Conspiracy theories taking precedence over reality among a considerable portion of the public.
Widespread contempt for education, particularly higher ed.
Hopefully, 2020 will be the year that America regains its vision.
Given that we're now living a world economy with a global communication network, a dark ages seems less likely unless there's some major physical calamity like a nuclear war. It may be possible that a series of challenges could accumulate to create a regional collapse scenario, but the survivors can then potentially move in and rebuild.
I think OP's issues have been debunked sufficiently. The future might not be to everyone's liking but, barring a catastrophe, I'd not consider it a global Dark Age. Pop culture is what it is. Men and women will continue being men and women.
Media consolidation and information management is a symptom of a broader and troubling issue: the loss of critical thinking skills and the willingness to be led coupled with the increased sway of unscrupulous leaders. There is a dangerous and real anti-education, anti-intellectual, anti-science thread that runs through society that needs to be eradicated.
I think we are so dependant on technology, a double edged sword, that we have largely forgotten how to function without it. We fight distant wars and kill enemies anonymously with drones and a joystick. If the internet would suddenly disappear there would be a global panic because few people know how to manage without it. Few people carry enough cash. Commerce and business would come to a screeching halt. Failure of the global satellite system would be a disaster for communication and transport. But, at the same time, a growing number of people are alive and functioning in society because of bio-medical technology.
Sixty years ago, the epidemiological evidence actually suggested that smoking did not cause lung cancer.
Yes. More recently there were myths published as science about eating a low fat diet. Which has now been proven wrong as more of us than ever are insanely obese. People can manipulate "science" anyway they want to. I feel like scientists have gotten really good at it... making science almost useless. No matter what you want to set out to prove.. you will be able to prove it, even if it isn't factually true.
I am not quite so pessimistic. I feel like when you look at history you see that it seems like a series of -- pinwheels? That is what I like to call it. Humans push forward so far sometimes they didn't mean to, only to track back. Either on purpose or not. But once the "future" is glimpsed by humanity they always seem to rise to meet it eventually. Now true, it might take a few generations to get back there... but I think that is the natural ebb and flow of history. I feel like the 40s to the 60s were a time of unparalleled pinwheeling forward. Likely that generation was pushed forward by what they experienced with the great depression and then, the generation that came after was awed and scared by what the prior one had done and was doing.
There will be another generation that comes up with a great passion for life and right thinking and they will be another giant leap forward. But they won't exist without the corruption, graft and stupidity of today to make them horrified.
But I think you can call from the 70s to now and perhaps a few more years, a dark ages of a type.
I think if the Liberals win the White House the entire country will implode. Massive, uncontrolled illegal immigration, never ending laws to control our lives, massive economic depression.
But I think you can call from the 70s to now and perhaps a few more years, a dark ages of a type.
To some degree, but the seeds were planted with JFK, RFK, MLK and other killings...showing all of us that if anyone tried to change the system, they would be silenced one way or another. Then Nixon....J. Edgar Hoover and Reagan who followed in those "wars on our own people" type of things.
A brief interlude with the beginnings of the Internet.....and then a complete fall from grace with the SCOTUS appointing a POTUS in 2000 (look at the wars and recession as being formulate since).....
That's my quick take..and I was there for all of it.
Last edited by craigiri; 01-22-2020 at 11:44 AM..
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Are we just entering a new Dark Ages?
