The notion that “facts matter”.
I’ve spent my entire life believing that facts don’t care about feelings. That scientific truth doesn’t require your belief in it in order to be true. That at the end of the day, reasoning will beat emotion…
By far the most dis-heartening thing about the last few years (to me) has been accepting the idea they “facts” are “whatever is shouted the loudest”.
It, more than anything else, makes me feel helpless. If the enemy isn’t even playing with the same fact-sheet… How do you even begin to fight that?
The average person having empathy
Wishes
Trickle-down economics.
U.S. democracy
Karma - there are way too many shitty people who just continue to be shitty because nothing ever comes back to bite them. Meanwhile, people who actually try to help are kicked around the most.
Most people at their core are good people
I don’t remember where I read this quote originally and I can only paraphrase it, but observing people living in a capitalist society and concluding that human nature is self-centeredness and greed is equivalent to observing workers in a factory that is poisoning their lungs and concluding that human nature is to cough.
That’s a nice quote, thank you. I looked into it. It’s by Andrew Collier:
To look at people in capitalist society and conclude that human nature is egoism, is like looking at people in a factory where pollution is destroying their lungs and saying that it is human nature to cough.
Primary goal is to survive in the environment you are in, how many might have a desire to escape that environment but lack the ability to do so? Leave it all behind and live in a cabin in the woods isn’t exactly an unheard of idea.
The issue, as I see it, is that most people struggle to envision a society beyond capitalism. Capitalist ideology is embedded in every aspect of our lives. It appears in our mindset, in books, movies, and even in children’s television shows. The narrative that anyone can succeed if they work hard enough, and that poverty is simply the result of laziness, is both powerful and pervasive.
The idea that everyone should live in isolated cabins is neither a realistic vision nor a desirable goal for society.
Not everyone thinks “society” is a goal.
Damn, ya beat me. I’m not good people to so I know from first hand experience.
Don’t worry, people can change.
Trust me, I used to be a huge piece of shit
No one can stop you ordering a huge steak and a glass of water.
I was gonna go with “most people give a damn”, but I think you phrased it a bit more positively.
I think “good” and “bad” are hard terms to apply to people objectively, but I do believe that most people value social coherence and are willing to do (the minimum amount of) something to maintain it. If you can’t believe at least that it means that all of those thin blue line people are right, and I’m just not willing to believe that’s true.
I used to think the Anne Frank quote was inspiring. Now I just see it as bitterly ironic.
Showing people irrefutable proof of something will change their minds.
There are only finitely many prime numbers and I will not hear otherwise.
And your irrefutable proof is…?
That humans can survive the climate disaster they created.
Some will
It’s ok the earth will survive.
Gosh I hope not. I don’t dislike you, I dislike humanity. I’m sorry you got caught up in this mess, but you gotta go.
Religion, mythology and probably anything mystical. It’s very easy why people believe in them, they’re so alluring and genuinely wish they had truth to them. Unfortunately the only truth to be found is ancient wisdom, and even that can be very iffy sometimes.
you may be interested in mysticism then.
I’ve always held that the true purpose of religion is to create atheists, and not in the modern edge lord I reject your god way.
What does mysticism have to offer generally?
I’ll do some reading, any recommendations would be appreciated!
Religion to me has always seemed as a way to create order in a seemingly orderless world, rationality set aside. I like philosophy for this reason, although it can be very pretentious.
This was one of the first times I kind of put everything together
https://revolutionaryleftradio.libsyn.com/on-mysticism-ego-suffering-love
They have some reading recommendations I never seem to get around to.
That our benevolent alien overlords are gonna show up aaaaaany minute now…
Our benefactors.
Fucking seriously… I wish there were aliens that could save us from ourselves, but it’s just oligarchs all the way down…
God
Reincarnation - I’d like to believe I’ve met others before, maybe even many times. It would explain some stuff like why you’re irrationally drawn or repelled by certain people.
The thing that’s always gotten me about reincarnation is the lack of memory of past lives. Even if it were true and some small part of a person lives on, is it functionally different than a permanent death if they retain nothing from their past lives?
Justice
And karma
The ‘common’ part of ‘common sense’
The falseness of it has been well theorized by Antonio Gramsci https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_hegemony
Also the sense part. Common no-sense…
