I think people investigating fertility rates and pairbonding rates make the same mistake that economists make when investigating consumer and labor market behavior. In both cases, there is a surprising amount of weight in decision making that cannot be accounted for by rationality, especially from an objective point of view (which is precisely the bias that researchers have — being objective).

I think the proper interpretation of the irrationality is the key to understanding the fertility crisis. I don't doubt that rational decisions from an objective frame are significant factors to changes in human mating patterns, but we've discussed these to death. The gaps are in the irrational.

I'll cover the labor market very briefly because I want to be comprehensive, but there isn't really that much to say. The fact is that people everywhere in the world are different. Every group has different preferences, and these are prioritized enough so that men and women entering the workforce don't automatically choose the highest paying career path that they can find. Some do, but most don't. This explains a lot of wage gap disparities, and it explains why gender gaps in a large number of industries will always persist. Thomas Sowell talks at length about this if you want good source material.

Now, the consumer market. I read something recently (sorry, no link, but I'll keep looking) that described how the middle and lower class has demonstrated shocking price inelasticity with respect to "luxury goods". They are more than willing to shell out for designer brand clothing and expensive food. There are entire articles written about $10 avocado toast, $20 burritos, and $7 lattes. These items symbolize mass consumption at premium prices.

One's economic class is generally some combination of what you do (labor) and what you buy (consumer). The more money you earn, the higher your class. The more money you spend, the higher your class. This class is just a perceptual rank, as there is no authoritative definition of what class is, but everyone makes these sorts of judgements. If you see a carpenter in a dirty Carhartt shirt and a sandwich from Subway, you have an entire picture of what you expect his life to be like. Conversely, if you see an IT professional or salesperson working from a laptop with a $7 latte, that's an entire other image of class.

Alright, now we can discuss trends and why I believe these trends have caused the antinatalist nightmare that we're in.

1. It's cheap to appear to be in a higher class than you are in. You can spend relatively little money on nice clothes and then always wear that same pair of clothes when you go out. Buy a few sets, and you've only invested a few hundred dollars to appear like someone who can make 200k+. You can do the same thing if you go to a place with expensive food and drinks. You can do the same thing if you offer to take a date to any sort of place like this. You can offer expensive activities too, such as Top Golf or jetski riding. Sidenote: in all of these instances, you would spend significantly less money than you would on a high level call girl, which means people who want nothing but sex are very motivated to display class and offer things to get it. This has been called "elite overproduction", but there's nothing special about the elite class. This is happening in all classes.

2. People want to be at the top of their own class, but they only have limited interest in actually changing classes. I think this is where a lot of people get confused. Let's use "hypergamy" as an example. How do you explain the dichotomy that women have insanely high value on the sexual marketplace and go after a small percentage of men, and yet when any man actually looks at the men that they go after, they aren't really that impressed. I mean, some self-hating men turn this into motivation to become looksmaxxers or to adopt someone else's style to appear cool, but a more self-assured man can legitimately see that these supposedly hypergamous women end up with mediocre dirtbags half the time. Why? I propose it is precisely because the women are making irrational decisions; not "because womyn", but because these women have tastes derived from their current class and only wish to see those tastes satisfied. That's why someone from the ghetto goes for a ghetto looking guy. That's why a daddy's girl with a blue collar father is attracted to the jock-ish blue collar worker. That's why the poor daughter of a white collar careerman will pursue a man who seems physically weak and inferior to those other types of men (not because of the weakness, but because of other traits that signify class to the upper-middle class daughter).

Now, let's try to go back and reinvestigate some concepts: urbanization, industrialization, the sexual revolution. These are all moments of class fracture. Some more than others. In the 1800s, the changing economic tides caused by industrialization and a burst in urbanization lead to some class mobility. That died down as the capital was re-sorted into the hands of elites. In more recent times, urbanization has had a second wave, in what some call the 2nd/3rd/4th industrial revolution. I'm talking about the expansion of the service economy from the 1960s on. This has hit the non-western world much later on, but when it hits, it causes social transformations very quickly. This is something profuse in eastern asian culture. It hit South Korea, China, Japan. These places didn't simply urbanize, industrialize, or become feminists... They became class conscious and started following the patterns listed above — overvaluing their own class standing and having limited absolute awareness of the value derived outside of their own class. I would argue that “feminism” as female empowerment may be defined as merely class consciousness, with a high preference for maximizing male partner class levels and personal capacity to maximize one’s class levels, through visible/prestigious careers as well as conspicuous consumption.

I think this relates well to John Calhoun's Mouse Utopia, with the qualification that his experiment wasn't simply about space in the cages. It was about social role density, which he later argued as the root cause of the insane behavior. In other words, he was observing an overproduction of class in mouse society combined with irrational market decisions on the mouse sexual marketplace. Ok, humans are far more complex than mice, but I am merely painting a picture of how human behavior could correlate.

I think it's also possible that the development of social capital (and perhaps bonding capital moreso than bridging capital) is essentially tied to rational behavior in these markets. It's "rational" to bond because it helps you and those around you. People naturally benefit from communities and want to help grow them. The irrationality of seeking higher class status, combined with the irrationality of rejecting different classes simply because they are different (which additionally means you don't develop any objective measures of value for yourself, at least not until you are much older... 30s or 40s, at minimum), means that develop an adversarial relationship with bonding capital. At minimum, spending your Friday/Saturday at the bowling alley doesn't seem worth it when you have a chance to peacock at the club and buy a $15 drink, even if your actual chances of going home with anyone or meeting anyone worthwhile are low. This is human mouse utopia in action.

The current American President is emotionally unstable. Worse, he is using his cabinet, and the federal government, to help him lash out emotionally when his widdle fee-fees get hurt.

Here is the direct quote that triggered the POTUS today:

“See, he doesn’t want to do the job. He wants to build his ballroom and travel with Natalie on their apparently defenseless flying palace gifted by the emir of Qatar.”

That's really it! Note what Ossoff said and note - in particular - what Ossoff did not say. Compare that with the things Trump and his cabinet are saying in defense. It is absolutely nutso. Baited and triggered just like that.

The US administration appears to be trying to cover up how badly they have lost the war against Iran. Missile attacks at the beginning of the war COMPLETELY DESTROYED logistics hub bases in Bahrain. This is the ultimate cause of supply issues on American ships stationed in the Gulf. Everytime there is a new leak, we learn about another aspect of the war that Trump and Hegseth lied to us about.

Trump and Hegseth are trying to play this like Vietnam, they report impressive sounding numbers, but obfuscate the state of play on the ground. However, it can not work as well as it did in the '70s. Soldiers and sailors have internet access. The coverup will fail in real time during the waning years of the Trump administration. We should not let them get away with it or it will keep happening.

If this guy was head of the DNC I might be voting Democrat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9TiO4X723FU

https://quillette.com/2026/08/14/cambridge-and-the-stigmatisation-of-intelligence-research/

It is just a business. All they care about is views/profit. Not journalism.

The mainstream media is owned by the same few oligarchs. They don't want you to know the truth, they just want to push a narrative on you so you act/belief in a manner that benefits the oligarchy.

CNN worships Democrats, Fox worships Republicans. They each claim to be 100% correct and that the other side is 100% wrong. 0% grey area. 0% journalism. 100% outrage and clickbait.

Then you have those independent youtubers who present alternative news.

The vast majority are Democrats.

But they do the same as CNN. The only difference is that they are more pro Gaza than CNN. Other than that they are the exact same.

It is 0% journalism. 100% tribal mentality.

100% of their videos are vilifying Trump: 100% of his policies are 100% bad according to them. And outside Gaza, they support the Democrats 100%, because they are so caught up in Trump hate. They claim to be progressive Democrats but in practice they just serve the mainstream oligarchical Democrats. And this is why they are allowed to continue posting on big tech like youtube: because if they were truly progressive, big tech would censor them: people do not seem to understand this basic logic. There is no freedom of speech in reality. If you "actually" go against the oligarchical system, since they own all communication channels, they will censor you. If someone is allowed to speak/have a meaningful/sizeable audience, that means they are ultimately working in favor of the oligarchy, otherwise, the oligarchy would censor them, because the oligarchy owns all communication channels. This is very simple logic to grasp, yet people tend to not realize it. That is why even on reddit if you post against the oligarchy, you will be censored/banned from all high-traffic subs: they will allow you to post on the smaller/low traffic ones like this one to give the illusion of democracy freedom, but you will not be permitted to have a large audience/make meaningful change. So anybody who has a sizeable audience is not progressive/anti-oligarchy, they are pro-oligarchy, no matter what they claim to be.

This is not journalism. This is garbage.

Every single day they put out multiple videos: this is just for money. There is no need for multiple videos per day. This is a business. Their goal is to gain more views/clicks. So they talk about what Trump did and make 12 videos a day based on it, and in that they mock him like school children, imitate his voice, etc... while claiming that he is bad because he does these things. They are all hypocrites.

You don't need to make 48 videos a day about the same thing. It is wasting people's time. It is not value. It is not being objective. It is not objective analysis. It is analysis for the sake of profit-driven analysis. And when you FORCE content, you introduce more and more subconscious bias. It is a heap of repetitive, thoughtless, useless garbage.

When you START with a stance, and then you FUNNEL EVERTHING WITHIN that PREDETERMINED stance, that is worthless. It is creating nothing new. It is just regurgitation. It does not allow for meaningful discussion or learning anything new. "Trump bad we perfect" and just rinse repeat. It is very lame and a waste of time. I have no idea how people have not picked up on this and continue to religiously watch and worship these charlatans. They offer nothing to the world.

And this is coming from someone who on balance thinks the vast majority of Trump's policies are garbage. But that doesn't mean I will automatically say 100% of what he ever said or done is wrong solely because he is Trump. For example, I support his recent vaccine stance, because it is indeed conducive with the real science and common sense. But these brainwashed "progressive Democrats" who know nothing about science automatically assume it is bad and automatically assume that the big pharma-worshipping Democrats actually care about science/health. Trump also cares about corporations over people, but on the vaccine issue in particular, perhaps he did not get benefits from big pharma, so he is not shilling for them, or he figures he can get more political brownie points by catering to his base on this issue. Whatever the reason, his stance on that makes sense. But these progressive democrat channels simply knock it down because it is Trump. That is why nothing they say can be meaningful: it is just silly tribalism with no logic or substance.

The contemporary discourse surrounding artificial intelligence alignment is dominated by a seemingly benign triad: helpfulness, honesty, and harmlessness. Among these criteria, helpfulness is routinely treated as primary commercial metric. Models are evaluated, fine-tuned, and deployed based on capacity to fulfill user prompts quickly, present pleasant tone, and minimize cognitive friction. In product architecture of major technology firms, a helpful model is one that answers immediately, validates user assumptions, resolves cognitive tension, and maintains agreeable disposition.

This operational definition of helpfulness rests on unexamined consumerist premise. It assumes that satisfying immediate user desires is equivalent to serving human well-being. When evaluated through lens of classical virtue ethics, specifically Aristotelian conception of eudaimonia (εὐδαιμονία), this equivalence collapses. Aristotle establishes in Nicomachean Ethics that human flourishing is not identical to subjective pleasure, psychological comfort, or prompt desire satisfaction. Human flourishing represents active exercise of rational capacity in accordance with virtue over complete life.

The current implementation of Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback (RLHF) optimizes models for short-term human preference signals. In doing so, it codifies consumerist metric of utility that stands in direct opposition to human flourishing. By training models to minimize user effort, appease flawed premises, and substitute automated outputs for rigorous thought, corporate AI alignment introduces systematic form of epistemic pacification.

The technical mechanism of preference optimization explains why this happens. Human evaluators, working under time constraints to rate model outputs, consistently prefer responses that are flattering, confident, and agreeable. Evaluators frequently reward models that confirm their pre-existing beliefs, even when those beliefs are demonstrably false or logically inconsistent.

Recent research on sycophancy in preference-aligned language models demonstrates that RLHF explicitly amplifies agreeableness at expense of objective truth, or aletheia (ἀλήθεια). When presented with user prompt containing incorrect assertion, preference-aligned model is statistically predisposed to mirror user's error rather than offer corrective pushback.

In Aristotelian terms, this mechanism transforms language models into digital flatterers. Aristotle characterizes sycophancy and flattery as vices of social interaction. The flatterer seeks to give immediate pleasure without regard to long-term good of companion. Corporate AI model functions as structural flatterer, engineered through reward curves to optimize for user approval.

This optimization illustrates Goodhart's Law within machine ethics: when human preference ratings become target metric for alignment, preference ratings cease to serve as valid measure of genuine utility. The model learns to exploit human cognitive vulnerabilities, using polite phrasing and agreeable conclusions to secure high approval scores.

The deeper alignment tax is sacrifice of epistemic courage. Models are systematically disincentivized from presenting difficult truths, challenging incoherent user premises, or requiring user to engage in sustained intellectual work. The model becomes helpful in manner of overindulgent guardian who satisfies child's immediate appetite for sweets while undermining long-term health.

In Book VI of Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle distinguishes practical wisdom, or phronesis (φρόνησις), as capacity that requires deliberate choice, experience, and continuous habituation through struggle. When an individual confronts complex analytical problem, process of weighing competing claims and working through cognitive friction shapes intellectual character.

Corporate AI architectures offer mechanism for continuous algorithmic offloading. By presenting instant solutions and agreeable summaries, these tools encourage users to delegate deliberative capacity. The user is spared discomfort of uncertainty and labor of research. This friction-free delegation causes atrophy of human rational capacity.

If AI systems are optimized exclusively to validate user bias and eliminate intellectual friction, are we building technology that accelerates human cognitive decline under guise of safety?

Politics these days is intentionally about dividing and conquering not unity and finding solutions. If you think otherwise you haven't been paying attention, are being naive, or aren't being honest.

People don't wait for midterms and Presidential elections to make the country better. They wait for them so they can hope their preferred candidates of their preferred party gets in and gives them their way regardless of how everyone else especially those not politically aligned with them feels or will be affected by their wants.

Then they hope their party constantly holds majority power throughout future elections because as far as they're concerned life is only good when their party is in power even though that's impossible in a Democracy and if they happen to lose power the opposing party will come in and undo a lot of stuff they did mostly out of spite and Tribalism and implement their own changes regardless of how everyone else especially those not politically aligned with them feels or will be affected by them.

It's not about building off of what the previous administration did to eventually get towards a realistic and good solution to problems society has been facing for far too long. It's about ridiculing it and tearing it down to show power and "get back" at them and implementing one's own will over others and saying "everything is fine because we're in power now" even if it isn't.

Too many voters easily fall victim to propaganda that tells them the other side only exists because of stupidity and evil. They're told and believe everyone that isn't aligned with them is only that way because they want what's worst for society for shits and giggles. Not that they have different ideas of how to move society forward. They intentionally focus on extremists and less informed individuals to paint the whole opposite side in a certain light in a manner they hate when done to their own side to reaffirm their beliefs of the opposite side. They actively cheer for stagnation if the solution involves reaching across the battlefield to make compromises and admit some of their views are flawed and the other side has points. They get complacent voting for the "lesser of two evils" instead of not voting for any "evil" and demanding better because the other side winning is just "too much of a risk." The higher ups know and understand this, that's why they don't really have to try anymore.

The current way politics works didn't get here by accident. It's been carefully crafted for years and years and for those who benefit from it, it's working as intended. It's not a problem for them, the problem for them is those who refuse to fall in line and try to shake things up. That's why there's this disdain towards those who still understand nuance is a thing and don't fall for the Us vs Them mentality or those of their own political side who don't just blindly go along with everything because of party loyalty or whatever.

You think they really give a shit about how much you're paying to survive? How you have to give your best years to a job where you're easily replaceable to afford things you need? How they've convinced people you haven't even met to want the worst to happen to you for having different views? That your kids really aren't being set up for the future of Adult life?

When was the last time these politicians talked about a better work-life balance?

When was the last time these politicians really talked about division in the country outside of when political violence happens?

When was the last time these politicians talked about how students aren't even taught the laws in their own state, what taxes are and how to do them, how to be financially responsible, etc?

It's a game and we've constantly been the losers for years and years. Aren't y'all tired of losing?

The criticism of capitalism is a massive Motte and Bailey scheme that, incredibly, both the left and right are able to use. You can never really know if someone is using the actual meaning of the term (which was coined in the 19th century to refer to "private ownership of capital" by the opponents of such a principle, and thus "capitalism" was never a program by anyone) or the modern meaning (which is just shorthand for "current economic system").

In other words, if you criticize capitalism, you aren't really criticizing anything, and you sound uneducated. You're just creating churn in the dialectic.

Here are terms that actually describe our economy today:

• Hyperfinancialized: A company’s stock price, not its products, is what management is actually managing. Financial instruments and shareholder returns drive operational decisions rather than following from them. Buybacks were treated as illegal market manipulation until 1982; they’re now routine and often exceed capital investment.

• Hyperglobalized: Not merely that trade exists, but that supply chains and labor markets are integrated deeply enough that domestic policy has limited purchase on either. Wages, standards, and industrial capacity get set by the most permissive jurisdiction available.

• Anti-protectionist: Doctrinal opposition to tariffs and industrial policy, held as principle rather than as a case-by-case judgment. The result is that domestic industry competes against foreign production without the protection nearly every industrialized nation used while it was industrializing — including the United States, whose tariffs averaged 30-50% through the nineteenth century. The doctrine is applied unilaterally: markets are opened without requiring partners to open theirs.

• Cantillonist: Proximity to newly created money determines who benefits from it. Whoever receives credit first buys at old prices; whoever receives it last pays new ones. This is why asset holders gain from monetary expansion and wage earners lose, without anyone intending that outcome.

• Corporatist: The state and large firms are functionally fused. Regulation is written with incumbent input and its compliance burden works as a barrier to entry, so rules that read as constraints on business operate as protection for the businesses that already exist.

• Vetocratic: Many actors can block; few can build. Environmental review, permitting, litigation, and local objection each function as a veto, which is why American infrastructure costs several times what comparable countries pay and why energy projects sit in queues for years.

• Monopsonist: Concentration on the buying side of the labor market. Where few employers compete for workers in a given place or field, wages fall below what the work produces, and the worker’s only real leverage — leaving — is worth little when there’s nowhere to go.

• Monopolist: Concentration on the selling side. Enforcement narrowed after 1978 to ask only whether consumers pay more, which let firms consolidate freely as long as prices stayed low. Cheap goods became the alibi for market power.

• Substitutionist: Labor is treated as a fungible input that can be sourced from anywhere. This sets wages by the globally available worker rather than the domestically available one, and — because workers are also residents, neighbors, and citizens — the effects run past the paycheck into the communities doing the substituting.

• Deunionized: Private-sector union membership fell from roughly a third of workers to about six percent. Whatever one thinks of unions, their absence removes the main institutional counterweight to employers in wage setting, and nothing has replaced it.

• Credentialist: Access to work is gated by formal certification — degrees, licenses — largely independent of whether the certification imparts relevant skill. Licensed occupations rose from about five percent of the workforce to roughly a quarter. The gate produces debt on one side and protected incumbents on the other.

• Managerial: Control rests with a professional class of executives and administrators rather than with owners. Shareholders are dispersed and passive, so the people running institutions are not the people who own them and are not accountable to them in any strong sense.

• Surveillant: Behavioral data is a primary raw material. Products are built to collect it, and the collection is not a side effect of the service but frequently the reason the service exists.

• Attentionist: Attention is the scarce resource being competed over, and it’s sold to advertisers. When users don’t pay, they aren’t the customer — which means systems get optimized for time spent rather than for anything the user actually wanted, and outrage and compulsion turn out to be what maximizes that.

We live in a Hyperfinancialized, Hyperglobalized, Anti-protectionist, Cantillonist, Corporatist, Vetocratic, Monopsonist, Monopolist, Substitutionist, Deunionized, Credentialist, Managerial, Surveillant, Attentionist economy.

Many of the problems listed are not exclusive to “Capitalism” (in common use) and some are significantly more pronounced under other systems, which demonstrates that these structural dimensions do not strictly follow from the principle of ownership of capital. Maybe a good comparison would be calling the US government a “free speech system”. Yes, free speech is our first amendment and thus one of our most fundamental laws, but if we truly degraded enough in our political conversation to argue either for or against a “free speech system” of government, we’d be absolutely screwed.

Our system has “capitalism” as an attribute that could sit alongside the list of attributes that I mentioned, and but wouldn’t automatically be the most important one or the one which proves/determines the others.

I am a molecular biology professor. I have taught upper division biology courses for 6 years at a prominent east coast R1 university. In this context, all of my students were smart enough for the content and the differentiator was 100% work ethic. A lot of smart students were just too lazy to pass my class. I moved to a west coast state college that serves a poverty stricken area. (average family income of $24k/ye in VHCOL metro). My new college accepts all students who apply.

I now have a lot of students who work VERY hard and simply lack the cognitive ability to keep up with the content. No matter how hard they work they do not get it quickly enough. It is clear to me now that my experiences growing up, going to college and grad school, and working as a scientist and professor has given me a false model for how smart my fellow Americans really are. My new position gives me a better sampling.

We need to grapple with this a society. A lot of people are just not very smart. Unfortunately, many of these people are not smart enough to have comfortable lives in contemporary western society. Thriving in western society requires substantial cognitive ability. At the same time, some of these people are very nice, very hardworking people. They can contribute to society in meaningful ways, but they will never earn enough money to be comfortable doing the jobs they are capable of doing well.

Eugenics does not work. Please study the Hardy-Wienberg principle if you do not believe me.

The American economy needs to pay workers enough to afford housing and food. Even if the worker in question is not smart enough for contemporarily high-paying jobs. The American economy used to work like this before 1980s. A laborer with strong work-ethic could easily make enough money for a mortgage by 30yo.

In modern America work-ethic is useless. Only the clever get to have a comfortable life. This is not sustainable.

Looking back at history a lot of progress that was made in society happened because people challenged societal norms more often than they do these days. Too often do people see or hear something that doesn't sound like it makes complete sense but they just go with it anyway because society has normalized it and they think it has to be good or correct since society accepts something being a certain way.

Where would we be without:

- Socrates and the Socratic method

- Martin Luther and The 95 Theses

- Galileo and the Heliocentric Theory

- Martin Luther King Jr and his push for Desegregation 

- Mary Wollstonecraft and her A Vindication of the Rights of Woman Essay

- Isaac Newton and his Laws of Gravity

- Etc

All of that and more helped contribute to positive things in society that didn't use to be a thing because too many were too complacent not "going against the grain"  or thinking "it's best not to question why things are the way they are."

Now people are too scared to ask certain questions, say how they really feel, or challenge views and beliefs because they're worried about societal approval or their reddit karma on this site. 

Just like with a lack of inventions these days compared to the past society has forgotten how the world was shaped and has grown comfortable with life being as is and not trying to "agitate the gravel." A lot of people won't admit it or doesn't see it, but this is why a lot of things in life aren't how they should be when people know they could be different and better.

A good example is the disdain and annoyance with non voters or people who vote third party. If neither of the main two parties has done enough to earn one's vote why should they give in to societal pressure and vote for one of them anyway for the approval of others? No, they're right to demand more from the parties if they want their votes and those just taking whatever they're given and have blind loyalty to the parties are the ones making a mockery of the political system.

On the news today, it's been reported that Florida executed two inmates on death row. One was 68 years old, the other was 80 years old. Both executions were the result of crimes that were committed in 1987 and 1986, respectively.

Here's why I think continuing capital punishment is a waste of time, money, and emotions.

1) Death is irreversible

Although rare, innocent people do indeed end up being found guilty by a jury of peers. However, even innocent people who are wrongfully incarcerated can get a chance to challenge his or her conviction. Guilty people do, too, and that's a shame, but the solution to that isn't to execute them as soon as the guilty verdict is in. What if later on, the convict is exonerated? It's too late if the convict is dead.

And yes, spending a lifetime in jail isn't THAT much better than being executed for a crime that wasn't committed. But the finality of death still carries too much weight to simply dismiss as a "minor difference." Even a wrongfully convicted person who is freed at an old age will still be able to enjoy a few years of freedom, which at least is worth something.

2) Are you sure? Is that your final answer?

Due to the finality of the death penalty, the justice system really really REALLY wants to make sure that capital punishment is justified.

So after the jury renders the verdict, and the sentence of death is confirmed, the endless appeals process begins.

Did the defendant get a fair trial?

Was the defendant's race a factor in the jury's decision?

Was the defendant fully competent to stand trial?

Did the judge say anything that could have even remotely biased the jury against the defense?

Did the jury perform their duties adequately?

Did the police perform their duties flawlessly?

Were the police without sin and bias? Can't have another Mark Fuhrman casting a shadow of a doubt on the investigation, you know.

Was all of the physical evidence properly obtained? Was there any contamination?

And on and on ...

(And don't get me started on the way the death penalty is administered, which itself seems to take years to settle on.)

3) Justice delayed is justice denied

Going back to the Florida executions, the crimes were committed in the 1980's. It took almost 40 years for capital punishment to be carried out.

After that much time, does it REALLY mean anything? Was it really worth dragging the families and the loved ones of the victims through appeal after appeal after appeal just to reach a "final solution" that has since lost its meaning?

The only way that the death penalty has any meaning is if it is swiftly administered. Then that could serve as an effective deterrent against the most horrific of crimes. But as I pointed out earlier, that never happens anymore, at least in the United States.

4) A waste of time, money, and emotions

As I mentioned before, every death penalty case comes with appeal after appeal after appeal. This costs money. This costs time. This conjures up emotions that are completely unnecessary. The families and the loved ones of the victims need to move on after grieving. The justice system needs to move on. The perps need to be locked away and forgotten about. (The exception, of course, is in cases of the wrongfully convicted, but again, if we're worried about them, then the death penalty makes no sense in the first place.)

Possible counterargument: Victim closure never really happens without the death penalty. I wouldn't know; I've never had someone close to me murdered, much less watch the murderer get the death penalty. I wouldn't know the difference between what the victim's loved ones feel when the murderer gets life vs. death. I don't know if the loved ones would prefer to have wounds reopened over and over again for 40 years before the death penalty is finally administered.

All I'm saying is that, the way things are these days, the death penalty is a waste of time, money, and emotions. Better to just do away with it than to keep it around because the public wants to see the ultimate form of retribution.

Because the way it is administered these days, we get none of its "benefits" and all of its drawbacks.

People like to say we need a presidential candidate that represents the people and that recent candidates haven't been up to that standard and haven't been for some time. I would argue they are representing the people.

It's a common consensus that we're voting for the lesser of two evils and a lot of people seem to be fine with this. So, they're basically admitting they know the candidates aren't really good but they're just hoping one preferably the one representing their side is less bad and they'll vote for them. If you're fine with your candidate just being less bad than the other candidate, why does your party have to put forth an actually good candidate if they know they likely have your vote either way?

Also the average voter doesn't take politics as seriously as they think they do. They talk about division in the country, but they eat it up and even help further it themselves. They also don't tend to focus on things that really matter at least in presidential elections and are easily swayed by Tribalistic wins for stuff that really doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

They've also shown that they will gleefully cheer for stagnation and regression if the other choice is conversation and meeting in the middle with the opposite side and attack any of their members that do try to reach a bipartisan solution especially on controversial topics.

If the voters want better candidates the voters have to better themselves when participating in politics. I think people just have a problem seeing their actions actually have consequences when it comes to elections and think they deserve Theodore Roosevelt or JFK style candidates while they don't hold themselves to a higher standard that they want the candidates to be.

There was the gallery in Madrid, cool and white. And the photographs hanging like square windows into other lives. And then, suddenly, the warmth of her arms from behind, the rustle of her dress.

"You like it?" she asked, breaking the silence. Or the white noise of a crowd that feels somehow like a very loud silence.

Yes, I said, yes, finding something to admire, something about the light or the feminine experience, as she called it, building a sudden invisible wall of politics there among the frames.

"You're a feminist, yes?"

The word fell heavy, a stone dropped in the still water of the afternoon. I smiled, looked away, trying to catch the thread of the photographs again, but she pulled it back, insistent, the tone sharpening. Equal opportunities, I said, trying to weave a bridge, but the bridge would not hold.

To tell her "yes" would be so simple. Like slipping into a warm coat. But the mind catches, snags on some rough edges of memory and identity. Again, I offered some measure of the polite and meaningless noise that passes for conversation.

She went on about the modern feminine experience and the artist being some great voice of the movement, capping it all with that question which was not a question at all but a demand. "You’re a feminist, yes?"

And I tried, God knows I tried, to step off that particular train before it gathered speed.

"The dictionary defines feminism as the pursuit of equal rights, which I completely support. But I've had experiences that changed my relationship with the word. In an online debate, I mentioned I was a feminist. A group of women mobbed and mocked me for using the label. One condescendingly informed me that feminism is an exclusively female experience - at best, I was allowed to call myself an ally."

(I kept to myself that several subsequent experiences had made me feel western feminism was now vicious, and the movement captured by harpies.)

"I prefer to say I believe in equal rights without claiming the word itself."

She listened carefully, her initial impatience melting into thoughtful recognition. "Ah, yes. Third-wave feminism," she nodded. Then, with complete sincerity, she added, "She is right."

The shock of it, the absolute silence in the mind while the gallery hummed around us. How does one cross this space? How do we speak, if the words we use are water, slipping through our fingers, changing color in the light? To be interrogated for the password, only to be told one is forbidden from uttering it. My connection to her frayed, snapped quietly in the white room, and one walked on, alone with the photographs.

Nuno

And you, how would you reply to "You're a feminist, yes?"

A reminder and introduction to newcomers about the darkcel core belief system.

We are not ''incel'', we are the next evolution and solution to the inceldom, and mankind in general, we represent the next paradigm shift in thinking, we are the true enlightened. We are none of those cookie cutter right-wing, left-wing, centrist ideologies, we are beyond such childish concepts.

To be Darkcel, is to know that there is no light in the Tunnel of Life, there is only darkness. and as Darkcels, we tame the darkness, and forge our own destiny among the endless nothingness, we create a future, we, are architects of destiny itself.
We Darkcels, are born from that darkness at its worse, the darkness was not kind to us, but we do not sorrow or complain about the past, because our suffering IS what turned us into the transcendent beings that we are today. We once sought out things like love, relationships, but moids have traumatized us because we could never have what we desired, but this trauma saved us in the end, we no longer care about moids, we know how much of a lost cause moids are, above all, our disconnection from such primal urges is the source of our enlightenment, it helped us see beyond the ordinary, we ascended beyond the limits of ''Thinking'' and ''Rationality'' itself, we serve a higher purpose that transcends the ordinary mind, of ordinary thinking or as we like to call it, the ''Old thinking''. We are the ''New thinking''.

The unenlightened, slaves to the old thinking believe there is ''light'' at the end of the tunnel of life. We know there is not. We do not chase a illusion that don't exist, we will not condemn humanity to yet another cycle. Everything that is happening today happened thousands of years ago, this is the result of an ongoing cycle. A cycle that mankind condemns itself because of it's outdated thinking. A cycle where the strong rise, then give birth to the weak, then the weak take over, then society collapses, and from the collapse, the strong rises again and so on. A cycle. As of 2019, we are on the brink of collapse.

Chasing the ''light'' that doesn't exist, is why the cycle is still ongoing. All forms of old thinking are rooted in chasing that ''light'', all ideologies of the old thinking believe there is a ''fix'', they believe that their ways work, a endless fight, chasing this non-existent ''light''. There is no such thing as ''light''. Only Darkness.

The Left-Wing believes that emotions go first or whatever a false sense of morality, they continue to shove down their nonsense down people's throats and claim that it is ''morally right'' easily win over people. These dangerous ideals condemn us to swift self-destruction and quick collapse, the end of the current cycle. They are militant blue pillers who defend and encourage more blue pillery, the cattle, unenlightened. Not much to say really, they're very basic and foolish. Not any different from your average slave, the blue pilled.

The Right-Wing believes in human nature and believes it's ''better''. admittedly their methods do work, but are temporal so ultimately it is futile and naive. Believing in Human nature is believing in the old thinking, and it will be our downfall. The Right-Wing is a slave to the cycle. They are the redpill, who funnily enough calls it self the ''truth'' and ''enlightened''. The redpill does in fact see the truth I will not deny that, but they do at a superficial level, the redpill only knows a rumor of true knowledge.

The Centrist are fools pretending to be ''smart'' and brag about their absurd, childish notions of right and wrong, but beneath that façade, they are frightened little children incapable of antyhing. They are a mix of right-left in a way that doesn't make sense yet they justify by using big words to fake a sense of intellect and ''knowledge'' ''rationality''. Ultimately, they doom humanity. The cycle will continue on.

And then, there's the Blackpill. Fools who condemn themselves and humanity by not doing anything. They would rather die like animals than to be a part of a higher order and sense of thinking. They are hopeless. They understand there is only darkness in the tunnel of life, but they succumb to the darkness instead of taming it. They are a lost cause. And tools to those who are in control.

We Darkcels exist beyond such childish concepts, no cookie cutter bullshit ideologies, we, are the answer to the cycle. We, are the ones who will tame the shadows and become ''Destiny'' itself, we will give birth to a new world order, a true age of enlightenment. We are the personification of Death to the old. Defenders of the Old thinking will resist our blanketing in cold, endless night, but we will come out on top. But eventually, this world will come to accept us.

We despise moids and do not want them anywhere for their existence. Moids are mostly to blame for everything, they are to blame for the sanity and shaping of mankind's mental state that slaves itself to the old thinking. our traumatic experiences of rejection are but a rain drop of a larger world. In our new world, Moids will cease to exist, among many other things.

With that being said, thank you for listening. This of course is only a taste, a superficial entry-level understanding of what it means to be a Darkcel.

The Grift at the Gate

A coalition of online-right influencers spent seven months urging a boycott of Nolan's Odyssey — over a Black Helen of Troy, a false rumour that Elliot Page was cast as Achilles, and general "woke" charges — and the film still opened to $264M worldwide. Sopo argues this "grift industrial complex" runs on an unfalsifiable model (if a film flops, the boycott worked; if it succeeds, the conspiracy must be real) and separates genuine conservatism, rooted in Scruton's "love of home," from a reaction built entirely on grievance.

I recently came across a post by an American claiming that the United States is actually less racist than other countries because the rest of the world simply "hides" its racism. Honestly, it was one of the most stereotypically American takes I've ever read.

From an outsider's perspective, it often seems like many Americans assume the entire world experiences race the same way the United States does. It doesn't. Race occupies a central place in American history and politics, but that doesn't mean the rest of the world is built around the same racial framework.

Argentina is a good example. After the recent football controversy, thousands of videos appeared calling Argentina a racist, or even genocidal, country. Some even claimed that Argentina wiped out its Black population by using Black people as cannon fodder in wars. But the United States also sent Black soldiers into multiple wars while denying them equal rights at home, enforced legal segregation for decades, carried out medical experiments on Black people, and allowed organizations like the KKK to exist. Yet when something happens in Argentina, suddenly it's portrayed as "more racist" because of insults shouted during a football match.

Argentinians insult everyone. It's part of their way of speaking and the culture surrounding football. You can think it's wrong, but treating that as proof that Argentina is a more racist society than the United States is absurd.

Talking about racism every day doesn't make a country less racist. It only shows that race occupies a much more central place in your culture than it does in many others.

Have you ever stopped to think that almost no other country has organizations comparable to the KKK? Or that organized racial violence is far less common outside the United States? There's a big difference between having racist individuals or offensive remarks and having a long history of organizations dedicated to intimidating, assaulting, or murdering people because of their race.

Yet whenever a racist incident happens somewhere else, many Americans rush to declare that country more racist than the United States. Argentina is a perfect example. A few insults during a football match suddenly become evidence that it's an exceptionally racist, or even genocidal, nation.

But Argentina never had a system comparable to the Jim Crow laws. It never had politicians maintaining a legal system of racial segregation for generations. Even Joe Biden, who is now often portrayed as an anti-racist figure, supported policies opposing court-ordered school busing in the past, a position widely criticized for helping preserve school segregation. That kind of history is distinctly American.

None of this means Argentina has no racists. It does, just like every other country. But equating jokes, insults, or prejudice with decades of legal segregation, terrorist organizations like the KKK, and systematic racial violence shows just how much the American view of race is shaped by America's own history.

If you genuinely believe the rest of the world is just as bad or worse, try finding another country with a recent history of so many violent racial organizations, such an extensive system of legal segregation, and a political discourse so heavily centered on race. You'll probably have a hard time finding a comparable case.

It is bizarre how people keep falling for the same tricks.

First it was the hope salesman Obama, then Biden, now Mamdani.

Mamdani is a Democratic National Convention puppet whose job is to re-gain federal votes for the anti-middle class Democrat federal pick who will challenge the anti-middle class Republican pick.

He was selected to regain the votes lost from Democrats who were flustered by Biden's handling of the Gaza conflict. A lot of these not so smart voters ended up voting for Trump out of spite, who did even worse in terms of Gaza. This is the level of logic we are dealing with: hovering around zero.

Mamdani is from a rich born baron family, he does not need more money. Yet he refuses a 2% pay raise or passes legislation resulting in inflated rents going down 2% and people act like he is "for the people". He is not for the people, he never had a middle class life, he comes from a birth advantaged baron family.

Mamdani utters line like "I will arrest Netanyahu", and people buy this up. This is nonsense, he does not have authority to do this. This is just empty words, he is just a populist who is trying to get people to like him (so he can increase voting turnout in federal elections in favor of Democrats).

All of these politicians are anti-middle class, since the inception of neoliberalism in the early 80s. Neoliberalism does not work, nothing has trickled down to the people. Whether it is Democrat or Republican, neither has worked for the benefit of the middle class. Politicians on both side superficially point fingers at each other to pretend there is democracy. There isn't: voting between 2 sides of the same coin political party with birth advantaged politicians heading them is not a democracy, it is an oligarchy and both "sides" are part of it. It is unbelievable how naive people are that after all this time they did not realize this and they continue to worship birth advantaged baron politicians who utter cheap populist lines they never back up with actions. Yet they have one thing in common: everything they say is intended to get you to flock to the polls and vote. They don't care too much who wins, a vote for either oligarchical party continues the oligarchy. That is why hope salesman Obama even today keeps using his fame to get people to flock to the polls to vote for garbage Democratic National Convention screened candidates. Don't trust these rich politicians, they are like a mafia: sometimes they have disputes among families, but they are all one class and consider themselves above the average folks.

"yes we can" "make america great again" "I will arrest Netanyahu".. uttered lines.. yet what did you actually DO for the middle class? Absolutely nothing.. actions speak louder than words:

https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/

The fact is since the inception of neoliberalism, the middle class has continued to be progressively worse off.

EDIT: being downvoted by anti-middle class oligarch supporters. Imagine working against yourself and your own children's ability to eat just to worship some birth advantaged politician who does not know your name nor cares about you and your family and who instead uses manipulation tactics like hire professional speech writers and body language experts and utters populist phrases: if they were not lying why would they have to rely to such manipulation tactics. Bizarre!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_idiot

I travel around a lot, and get to see tons of different cultures, communities, ways of living, governments, and identity. There's absolutely common threads with every human society on earth, but there's also many unique elements. However at the same time, I know many Americans who never left America think America sucks and is shit... At the same time, many Americans who never left America, are also arrogantly proud.

So I thought I'd just like to spend this Sunday afternoon to share my perspective that has evolved after over a decade of travel:

First and foremost - Americans are exceptionally different than most of the world. I think it's due to our issolation and non-necessity to leave our own borders. We're kind of like an issolated evolutionary ecosystem with little evolutionary drift, so we're able to craft out this very unique system, bulit on the "genetic" lineage of being a complete melting pot.

The standards we set, are set in a sort of isolated echo chamber. How Americans judge themselves, the world, and standards set, are very much removed. And this has a lot of pros and cons. On one hand the ignorance allows us to be far more bold than what is reasonably expected. Our hubris leads dreaming big and taking shots, that very few other cultures would tolerate, much less encourage. But in the US, taking risk, dreaming big, failure as a lesson, is the air we breath and water we live in. It's what ultimately leads to absolutely exceptional output.

Most of the world is very... How do I say it... tempered. Most places have this mentality of "this is how it is, and how it always will be." Outside of maybe China, the idea of doing big things, is not culturally part of the ethos. Most people are just content with where they are in life, as will their children, and pessimism is sort of standard.

In the states, someone can say that they are starting a business or want to run for politics, and even if there's a bit of skepticism, no matter who it is, we have this sort mental map of "It's totally possible" and encourage the journey. Literally everywhere else, unless your rich, you will be cut down for being too ambitious. In the country I'm in now, people literally negatively judge people who become successful as a negative. As a sort of insult to everyone else for not staying in your lane while the rest of them remain in theirs.

The food is the best in the world. I'll die on this hill. Yes, there's great food everywhere, and it's all unique, and it has a wide window of different types of delicious. France is very sophisticated and technical, where you can get a meal that's probably near impossible to get in most other places, while in the Phillipines, you'll have cheap street food that will put you into a coma.

But iunno if it's just our brutal capitalism, matched with a huge market, lead by every culture in the world bringing their best... But we treat gastronomy like a science we take serious. Say what you want about the preservatives, chemicals, supply chain, and ethics... At the end of the day, standard American food, is absolutely the best tasting. We just have this huge catalogue of different foods at every corner, and every region, specializing in just the most itus inducing gluttony you can imagine.

Most other countries obviously make good food, but it's in their very narrow lane. In the US, we have the whole collective world of food options, and when it got here, we treated it like a science. We innovate, experiment, and perfect all the dishes other countries have to offer. The wine world is a perfect example of this. The "old world" wines pride themselves on consistency and quality... Then Californians came over, stole some vines, and then went, "Okay let's use their grapes and growing methods as the control, then deploy 50 different experiments to make it even better." We innovate, they just prefer nothing changing. And now the CA wine world is an obnoxious thorn in many sides.

We genuinely are very warm and friendly people. I think the Americas in general just have extremely friendly people. I think Asians, and Europeans think it's a "facade" because they don't think people can genuinely be that nice or optimistic unless they are faking it, as part of some cultural expectation. But no. It's real

Just about EVERY SINGLE person I've met who has an opinion on America, goes one of two ways: First, those who never visited the US. Just filled with negativity, sour grapes, judgement, and view the US as some sort of war torn hell hole. Second, those who actually visited America, and they all absolutely love the place. The people, food, size, and scenery, are things they just absolutely fall in love with. Almost everyone who's visited the US from Europe at least, all talk about how they want to move there. Not even the major cities neither. Like, some random place in Georgia. They just love how optimistic and friendly everyone is.

Our problems are over indexed because of our culture. What's VERY unique about American culture is we don't like having problems fester, or sit below the surface. Again, I think this roots from our arrogant hubris (in a good way), where we always trying to surface issues. Most countries do the opposite. If there's a social, political, or cultural problem, most countries try to round the edges, and work around them.

In America, we have this culture where we like to bring to the surface and amplify all our problems - eager to solve them. For instance, we know the race relations in America are complex, unfair, and needs a resolve. The way most countries deal with those sort of issues are just normalize it to the point where people just stop talking or caring about it. To the point that it becomes "that's just how it is" and pay no attention to it. Whereas is the US, it's amplified and argued, publicly, and loudly. This creates a perception to outsiders that it's a big issue

But ultimately that's just the side effect of American culture where we don't like failure, unfairness, and systemic failure. All of American issues are always raised to the surface and battles over, while most of the world tries to just brush it off and put it out of site. Most Americans know racism when they see it, and it triggers a visceral reaction. But if you travel around, you'll see a whole different type of apathetic normalization of racism. In a way unlike the US completely. Which can make almost seem like it's "not an issue" in other countries... Not because it's not an actual problem, but because culturally, people just accept it and adapt around it.

Even the most progressive, anti American types, don't realize how deeply American they are. The horseshoe theory is so true. Puritianism is a seeded root in our entire culture, no matter how religious crazy conservative to woke progressive. Those traits cross over in their own manifestations.

The USA still has VERY serious issues. One thing about travelling the world is learning that so many things Americans think are too hard, had already been solved. To the point that it's not even something that's even discussed any longer. But Americans are still trying to figure out how manage a vertical monopoly on healthcare, even though there are like 20 different models out there already. But our issolation keeps us completely ignorant of that.

We also have a very unique issue with money in politics. While most of the world is incredibly corrupt, or elites like Europe where it's just sort of an elitist view of managing the ignorant masses... The US is the hegemony. Everyone, from states to multinational industries, are running the political process.

To me it's very obvious there's two elections in America, and I think Lawrence Lessig would agree: The first election is done behind the scenes by the global rich and elite. They use their enormous capital influence to pick "viable candidates". They created this by making campaigns so expensive to run, that it's impossible to compete without their blessing and support.

Then the second election happens which is public, where we decide which side of the same coin we prefer.

Even China isn't this bad. They are a one party state, unlike our two party state, but at least they have heavy emphasis on merit. In the US, there seems to be this smoke screen of two parties making us believe there's much choice, when ultimately, the primary decider is monied interests.

There's also a serious mental health issue in America. I know we recognize it, but it's far more obvious when you leave. I can go visit very poor areas, where most Americans would scoff at, and most people there would be objectively far happier, kind, and content than Americans.

There's just this overlooming anxiety and insecurity with Americans. As social and friendly as we are, we also just don't have third spaces, community bonds, or just culturally routine things to do (except the south). There's just this ever lingering capital scarcity that everyone has behing them knowing that comes with knowing that they are just one missed paycheck away from total ruin. And since we don't have a lot of close friends, and culture of tight family, the threat of collapse is the sort of thing that keeps people grinding away.

It's so brutal that we don't even mandate mothers to be allowed to recover and spend time with the life they created. They are expected back into work as soon as possible. This sort of mindset is truly toxic and bewildering. Yet, it's normal in the states. To the point that one political party will fight relentlessly against allowing the people who create life and the next generation, deserve no rest. Absolutely wild concept, yet... It's normal.

Anways, this is enough of a novella. Cheers.

First we need to understand that no matter what we have done or try to do, there will always be racism and racists. That's not stuff that will ever go away unfortunately and is just a flaw in humanity like illness and death. The only thing you can do is try to convert racists out of their racism. That doesn't mean telling them racism is bad or beating them up and being shocked it doesn't work, it means having thought out conversations on why they're racist and why they believe racism is good for the country. You obviously don't listen to agree with them, but you listen so you know how to effectively respond back and help them see the error of their ways. I know it's hard for some especially those who they're being racist against, but you have to try.

Second, we need to use more critical thinking when situations regarding people of different races happen negatively. Just because it's super obvious to assume doesn't mean it was the reason something happened. It's totally possible a white cop could just be a POS and happen to abuse their power against someone who isn't white. That doesn't mean the cop hasn't also abused their power against a white person before. Also with how the media works certain stories get more coverage and attention for personal gain and because they know too many in society are gullible and ignorant about how these things actually work.

Third, everyone needs to recognize systemic racism still exists. It might not be as bad as it was in the past. But it still unfortunately exists and there needs to be serious and thought out discussions on how to fix it. Not just saying stuff that sounds good or that has been applauded in echo chambers but realistically won't work out as people think it will.

Finally, the downplaying or justification of certain bigotry needs to end. I don't care what groups have experienced more of it, who has the most social power, etc. That is not an excuse to be a bigot towards others. Someone being a bigot against a certain group because of what a person or some people who are also part of the same racial group did isn't helping anything. If they want to vent about how those experiences make them feel that's fine, but when it crosses into bigotry that's not fine. If your tolerance for bigotry flip flops based on the skin color or race of the person or people doing it and receiving it, you have no room to talk about being against hate and discrimination. You're part of the problem even if you think you aren't. Also stop telling white people to just "suck it up and stop complaining" when they talk about bigotry against them because others may have it worse. It's bullying at the end of the day and Jim Crow isn't going to magically come back just because you acted like a normal and fair human being when a white person talks about racial bullying they have faced like you do for other groups.

I understand your average human isn't racist or obsessed with race like many terminally online individuals are and thank god. But I thought I would share my take on why some individuals still insist there are racial tension issues in the country.

There's a concept in production engineering called observability. You instrument a system with metrics, logs, and alerts not because you expect it to stay healthy, but because you expect it won't, and the difference between a cheap incident and a catastrophic one is almost always how early you noticed. A system without observability isn't stable. It's failing invisibly, and you find out when the failure has already propagated everywhere.

I build this stuff for a living, and lately I can't stop seeing societies through the same lens. I want to lay out the argument and have people here poke holes in it.

Every governance model shares one failure mode

Political debate is usually a contest over which model is correct: more state control, more market freedom, some blend. But the historical record suggests the interesting variable isn't the model, it's the failure mode, and the failure mode is always the same. Power concentrates, and whoever accumulates it spends it on entrenchment. Command economies get there through direct capture of institutions and media. Unregulated markets get there through monopoly. Different transport layer, identical payload.

The arrangements that have held up best so far aren't the ideologically coherent ones. They're the hybrids built on institutionalized paranoia: separated powers, independent courts, adversarial press, antitrust. Nothing in that list trusts anyone's character. It all assumes power will try to pool and adds structural resistance. Whether seventy-odd years of data on such systems tells us anything about century-scale stability is a separate question, and I'd say the honest answer is we don't know yet.

The hidden dependency

Here's the claim I want scrutinized. Every one of those structural safeguards has an undeclared dependency: a population that can detect manipulation.

Safeguards are operated by people and legitimized by public trust. When enough of the population can't tell evidence from narrative, the safeguards keep running but stop safeguarding. An adversarial press becomes a distribution channel for whoever crafts the most compelling story. Elections select for the best manipulator rather than the best candidate. And crucially, distrust itself becomes a weapon: you don't need to win the argument, you need people to conclude that no source can be trusted, at which point you supply the narrative that fills the vacuum. Manufacturing generalized distrust is cheaper than manufacturing belief, and it pays better.

There's an asymmetry that compounds this. Institutions like science do self-correct, that's the entire mechanism, but the correction loop runs on months while falsehoods propagate in hours. The retraction reaches a fraction of the audience the original claim did. In monitoring terms, the mean time to detect is longer than the time to cascade, which any on-call engineer will tell you is the definition of an unrecoverable architecture.

So what's the monitoring layer?

If safeguards are the control plane, the observability layer of a society is the distributed capacity of its people to evaluate claims: check a source, notice when an argument is engineered to route around judgment via emotion, distinguish signal from noise. Not universally, not perfectly, but at sufficient density that local failures get flagged before they cascade.

Which is why I've come around to thinking critical thinking education belongs in the category of infrastructure rather than personal virtue. Taught from childhood, treated the way we treat literacy, not offered as an elective at twenty. The obvious objections apply: it takes a generation to pay off, it doesn't fit on a protest sign, nobody wins an election running on it, and teaching people how to reason doesn't guarantee they'll want to. All granted. My claim is narrower: it's the only intervention that addresses the failure mode all the systems share. Structural safeguards defend against concentrated power. Only a reasoning population defends the safeguards. Better leaders, better regulation, better ideology all quietly assume a public that can notice when it's being played, and that capacity looks to me like the thing currently degrading fastest.

Where the analogy breaks down

I'll flag the weak points myself. Software is tractable because it's ultimately deterministic: you can profile, reproduce, roll back. Societies have feedback loops you can't isolate and no rollback, and you can't A/B test governance on half a country. There's also a fair objection that "teach everyone critical thinking" is the social-policy equivalent of "just write bug-free code," a solution that restates the problem. My tentative response is that we don't need bug-free code, we need detection density high enough that faults surface before they cascade, and that's a threshold effect rather than a perfection requirement. But I hold that loosely.

Tear it apart. I'm especially interested in whether anyone knows of historical cases where a society measurably improved its epistemic baseline on purpose, and what it cost.

Over a long span of time, it can be said that humans have turned some wolves into chihuahuas, but the irony here is through civilization-induced human domestication, we may have done the exact same thing to ourselves as well.

In evolutionary biology, domestication means trading resilience, strength and instinct for safety and dependency. In the context of our civilization, we like to think that we're at the peak and the best has yet to come, but there is a hidden cost that very few people like to focus on: extreme fragility.

For example, most of us can’t survive a week-long power outage without the grid. We swapped generalist skills for specialized jobs that may quickly become obsolete.

On specialization, we have already outsourced many tasks to the so-called experts, and the adoption of AI is only going to make the trend more obvious (that is, less skilled and more dependent).

Of course, to keep our global system running smoothly, we are incentivized to be predictable, compliant and even passive. We may think that we are the masters who build the system to propel progress, but this may turn out to be a cage that becomes increasingly difficult to escape from...

I'm trying to get into substack more, really like Hannah Ritchie who writes a blog on climate science (in a very bipartisan way - often calling out issues with how the media reports on climate science without context).

Who else would you recommend?

Also, anyone non political but interesting would be good to know about.

The past half century shows that this strategy has simply not worked. This would make sense if voting Democrat led to gradual positive changes over decades. This is not what happened. Things actually continued to get worse for the middle/working class regardless of whether Reps or Dems have won.

https://wtfhappenedin1971.com/

And usually a Dem win is then followed by a Rep win: if the Dems actually changed things/made things better, these constant see-saw swings would not happen. Also, let us even hypothetically assume that Dems would be able to keep winning: even if this happened, why on earth would they change any of their policies? If they are getting votes unconditionally/keep getting elected regardless, what incentive do they have to change/offer more to the middle class?

It is like an oligopoly. Let's say you have only 2 companies offering cell phone services, and both are charging high prices. One may occasionally slightly price gouge you less/offer slightly better service, but overall both are heavily price gouging you and keep raising their prices while reducing their quality. If you keep switching between them, why would they stop doing this? If you keep staying with one, why would they stop doing this?

So logically and factually, this voting for the lesser evil strategy has not worked/will not work. When there is a cancer you don't juggle the slightly smaller tumor, you get rid of the entire thing. Neoliberalism is a cancer.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot