Several people commented on the meme here to the effect that perhaps we’re not really intelligent.
I offer this: Humankind is plenty intelligent, but we have other characteristics that impede our capacity to use this intelligence to our benefit. Greed, selfishness, tribalism, and an indifference to the well-being of others all conspire to create a civilization that features incredible amounts of suffering today, which can only amplify over the coming years.
The United States is on an absolute frenzy to widen the wealth gap, and all the data suggests that the super-rich are being extremely successful in this endeavor. Today’s CEOs are making 287 times more than their typical worker, where in 1965, that ratio was 21:1. Almost all the new wealth that has entered the United States since the 1980s has gone to the top 1%.
As shown at left, Finland has an altogether different approach. It appears that they have somehow averted the “greed-is-our-only-priority” thing and opted for a totally different sort of society. This might not even be worth mentioning were it not for the fact that the Finnish people have wound up on top of the World Happiness Rankings for the last seven consecutive years.
Maybe being a nation led by selfish assholes is something we need to reconsider.
What philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell said here is entirely correct, but sadly, the quality of our thinking seems to have taken a turn for the worse in recent years.
What was life like here in the U.S. in 1970, the year Russell left us? Well, we had recently landed the first man on the moon. Yes, we had elected Richard Nixon president, but we didn’t know he was a criminal at the time.
In fact, Nixon announced the establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency in July of that year, demonstrating that the Republicans of the time were capable of caring for our planet and the people who lived on it.
Look at us now. Just look.
The message here, obviously, is that the blind consumption of resources leads to the death of the planet.
While this is true, we need the developing world to consume more. More food, more of the energy required for things like refrigeration and the pumping and purification of water.
The retired actress to whom I referred in my earlier post Republican Moderates Stand No Chance Against Trump said something that resonated with me, “I guess we’re all trying to convince ourselves that the next four years aren’t going to be as terrible as we fear. Maybe, somehow, we’ll get off easy.”
Exactly. If we extrapolate out over a four-year period from our news feeds that have hit us since Trump won the election in November, all we can see is a morass of presidential lawlessness, attacks on journalists, the mass-pardoning of insurrectionists and other friends of Trump, institutionalized racism, cuts to Social Security, a federal ban on abortion, people kicked off healthcare and dying of treatable diseases, tax cuts for billionaires, corporate greed making the lives of working Americans miserable, cabinet positions filled by Trump megadonors who are ridiculously unqualified for their positions, the end of our nation’s meager commitment to climate change mitigation, the demolition of our public education systems, etc.
My new acquaintance asked me, “This seems to be a dwindling spiral. How do you ‘undwindle’ it?” My response: “Great question. Wish I had even a reasonable answer.”
And yes, it’s possible that not too many of these horrors will come to pass. We can only hope.
As demonstrated at left, American politics is getting stranger by the hour.
2GreenEnergy has an X account, but it lies dormant.
We constantly hear people saying, proudly, that they’ve turned off the news, so as to preserve some level of sanity. I get that, but it’s not easy when the content is as disturbing as this.
Albert Camus lamented that the world of his time, the mid-20th Century, failed to provide “clarity and meaning.”
It’s hard to imagine what he’d make of the changes that have taken place over the last few years, in particular, the absolute authority that billionaires have over the rest of us.
Even my mom, a lifelong Republican, admires Bernie Sanders. “He’s so sincere,” she says.
He is indeed. Two more things:
• He’s on the right side of the issue here. He’s passionate about the oath he took to the U.S. Constitution, and thus his pledge to keep the United States a democracy, rather than letting it decay into an oligarchy or an authoritarian state.
• He’s not a quitter.
The cartoon here put a smile on my face, but it really could be applied to modern-day U.S. politics under Trump.
Your next stop? The Twilight Zone.
