(12-01-2021, 07:39 PM)Eric the Green Wrote:(10-19-2021, 12:36 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Katniss Everdeen, a hero of The Hunger Games, exemplifies someone living in a dystopian society, best described as an exaggeration of all that is wrong with a 3T carried to its logical conclusion, a grossly-inegalitarian order in which survival in a ferociously competitive world offers few rewards in return. Sports are a form of entertainment, but unlike those of recent times in which the losers are still well-paid entertainers so long as they qualify for their teams, sports become winner-take-all... and there is not much to take.
Dystopian fiction typically expresses what people most dread about their time. The Hunger Games are made for largely a Millennial audience, an audience that has the most to fear of bad trends of their time.....
So anyone the age of Justin Bieber and Harry Styles and Miley Cyrus, or older, is born into today's dystopia, and experience their world as one of dread.
Seem's plausible, although I myself feel that we have entered this dystopia, and it could drain away my boomer optimism and idealism.
The two biggest threats to the heritage of American democracy are aristocratic tendencies (government is to represent economic and bureaucratic power instead of people, which was the norm of feudal societies) and genocidal fascism. Those two threats usually link. Both are adept at creating fear of bogeys of leftist extremism even where such is rare or weak. Both ultimately serve the same class interests. Both are brutal even if the aristocrats have a veneer of civilization. The veneer of aristocratic civilization results from peons being worked to exhaustion for bare survival, which is the real nastiness of the aristocratic order toppled in the French Revolution.
Economic elites typically sacrifice the freedom of others to enhance their Power, Indulgence, and Gain (PIG is a deliberate allusion). Bureaucratic elites do not so much create wealth as they devour it in return for enforcing the rules that an aristocratic elite wants used for stifling competition and denying opportunity. There need be no native aristocracy; indeed the Soviet nomenklatura formed after the old aristocratic elite had been dispossessed, exiled, or exterminated. Commie elites started acting much like the aristocratic elites as bureaucrats set their children up to take on the 'family business' of ruling the supposedly "classless society" much like the pigs in George Orwell's Animal Farm.
Quote:Today we learn that the nuclear deal with Iran that Trump pulled out of for no reason can't just be put back the way it was. Because Iran has now developed its potential nuclear weapons to the point that it is almost able to produce a bomb. And they demand that the next president won't pull out of it, which I doubt could be arranged even if there was a Treaty ratified by the US Senate, which there won't be, and could also be revoked, especially since we might want to sanction Iran again anyway for further misbehavior. And it has to be redone anyway 4 years from now. So, where does that leave us? Can Iran's nuclear knowledge and progress be destroyed and put back as it was before Trump? Can all the sanctions Trump put on Iran be taken off? If not, do we unleash Israel to do cyber attacks or bombing? Can we bomb their nuclear program anyway? Do we keep tightening sanctions so that 4 years from now Iran will elect a moderate again? What does a world with a nuclear Iran look like? Does it attack Israel and thus start a war with the USA?
Donald Trump is a fool. He relies heavily on hunches instead of contemplation. Maybe he thought he could tear up an agreement (especially because President Obama cut the deal) and get better because, as Trump sees things, he is a great leader and Obama is singularly incompetent and disloyal.
If I were to ever get a managerial job, one of the first things I would ask is what my predecessor did right. Such is a low priority for change, as I will be looking for other things to change. I would never change anything for the sake of change. Failure, obsolescence, or turpitude will get the ax in short order. Such will need action. Fine-tuning comes later.
Quote:Meanwhile, most countries around the world have reverted to varying degrees of tyranny or authoritarian rule. Where does that leave peoples' aspirations? Do civil wars erupt? China seeks to expand its tyranny to Taiwan, and the USA and its allies are bolstering Taiwan's defenses. Possible war looms. Russia threatens to expand its tyranny to Ukraine. Possible war looms.
We will be back at war with Afghanistan soon enough.
Quote:And today we learned that the omicron variant has arrived in California. Can the guy be quarantined? Contact traced? Are there more cases here already? Meanwhile the Delta variant remains on the loose. Americans and many others still refuse to get vaccinated in numbers too high to stop the pandemic. We are unable to get the world vaccinated, and distrust of their authoritarian government cases many people in other countries to resist.
I'd love to make posters or at least write copy for them. "This needle protects you for COVID-19, and this one sedates you from a stint on a ventilator at which you might die". I could even make one for a Right-to-Life group on the ground that stillbirths as the result of COVID-19 kill a pre-born child with much the effect of an abortion. The Right-to-Life people are generally arch-conservatives, and as such they closely fit the demographics of anti-vaxxers. If such is what it takes to get one conservative constituency to get inoculated and reduce the risk for the rest of us, then so be it.
Quote:And the COP 26 conference failed, so climate change rages on. Nothing is being done. So we can expect more and more fires, more and more floods and storms, more droughts and water shortages, and higher prices for food, prices that are already now subject to major disruptions from the bouncing economy due to covid restrictions and lifted restrictions.
Global warming is the 'frog in the warm water on the stove' reality for many of us. I can easily imagine the paradise Csb climate of San Francisco becoming a BWhn climate like the Atacama should the rain patterns shift poleward. (Csb is a long-warm-summer climate with winter rains and summer drought; BWhn is a moderately-warm, foggy desert climate like that of Lima, Peru). Where I live the climate will be more like Nashville than like Detroit. That's not too bad, except that one will need an air-conditioner that only accelerates the deposition of waste heat into the atmosphere even if it be solar-powered.
Quote:While many others peoples live in abject tyranny, in the USA over 40% approve of a madman tyrant liar almost as much as they approve of an honest, hardworking president. Republicans appear ready to take back congress, ending for now all hope of a new progressive era. They are ready to purge voter rolls, impose voting restrictions, gerrymander additional seats, replace election officials with party hacks, and empower legislatures to determine who wins elections.
The dream of the Hard Right is that government represents wealth and bureaucratic power instead of the people, while staging mass rallies as the sole expression of political life. Like this:
If you cannot cheer the catastrophic decision of a bombastic, irresponsible, cruel leader then you have become a pariah. Of course great legions would march four years later through Rome in victory much like those of the Roman Empire nearly two millennia earlier. Those legions would arrive with flags bearing 48 stars and 13 stripes.
Dictatorial regimes typically impose spectacular harm upon the people.
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No-one listens to anyone on-line. You can provide as many facts and truths as you can, and people do not consider them. As far as most people are concerned these days, the only reality is what we already believe. Cognitive dissonance reigns, and can't be broken. What we've got here is, failure to communicate. And boy, are we gonna get it!
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To the contrary: liberals are far more subtle in their thoughts and expressions and have more foresight than fascists. Liberals are more likely to form a workable social order because liberalism is far more inclusive. We recognize the legitimacy of cultural differences and can ignore those when something else is more important -- like liberty and such basic decencies as fair pay under good working conditions, quality education, justice, environmental protection, and social equity. We may dislike war, but if we ever come close to victory we can do far better than genocidal tyrants at winning the peace. We are modest enough to deny infallibility or omniscience, but we usually prove less foolhardy with no loss of courage.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.