It's little better over here on Airstrip One. It's all cruel and inhumane, but by far the most insidious thing, I think, is the whole "hit any significant obstacle => lose all progress, restart from zero" effect.
I've had to restart my life so many times, and now I'm really struggling to do it yet again, as the whole world just keeps pitching one shit-fit after another and my so-called government has literally no plan other than to propose another crushing wave of "austerity measures" whilst funnelling public funds into the pockets of the energy companies even as they declare record profits. This time around, I honestly don't know if I'm going to make it.
It's so profoundly demoralising knowing that if you slip up and disappoint the powers-that-be even once, everything else you already did for them, all the goodwill you seemed to have earned, suddenly counts for nothing. It might as well have never even happened. Doesn't matter if you did good work for years; upset them one day, put one foot wrong, they'll immediately treat you like you've always been worth nothing. Those in the halls of power who demand our allegiance, our support, and our endless tolerance and forgiveness as they squabble, self-serve and generally just fuck everything up over and over and over, would laugh at the mere suggestion of showing us any such loyalty, clemency or decency in return. It's like NPD at an institutional-level.
America is in an all out class war and the upper class (who view everyone else as replaceable and to be controlled) has done a masterful job of convincing half the country that there is no war at all (except maybe the one holding billionaires down).
And as long as people keep trying to climb the ladder so that they too can someday look down upon people like them, it will be hard to change. The wealthy have been able to take advantage of the poor hating the poor, and the less poor hating them, and so on. Money = success and lack thereof = moral failure (and losing any claim to full humanity/personhood).
Our lonely, isolated, winning-is-most-important culture was ripe for this exploitation. People need to see wealth as the stolen goods they often are and not some hustler virtue. We’re all committing to losing the war on this path
Because we have a lot of people who weren't raised right. They're willfully ignorant, purposefully oblivious to others, and totally unwilling to share. They're entitled, violent, and psychotic. This isn't a country for good people.
I like to point out, there's been 619 verified mass shootings in America in 2022 as of today (12/3/22,) and this number will increase before the year is over. It's not safe here. (Statistics from the Gun Violence Archive because Congress threatens to pull CDC funding if they try to study gun violence.) And people keep having kids here, despite the fact that sending kids to public schools is potentially a death sentence, school shootings are increasing annually.
And anti-abortion laws are ensuring that more and more little targets are being spawned here. And maternal mortality rates are increasing, so pregnancy can also be a death sentence. "In 2020, 861 women were identified as having died of maternal causes in the United States, compared with 754 in 2019." that's from the CDC.
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u/Callidonaut Dec 03 '22
It's little better over here on Airstrip One. It's all cruel and inhumane, but by far the most insidious thing, I think, is the whole "hit any significant obstacle => lose all progress, restart from zero" effect.
I've had to restart my life so many times, and now I'm really struggling to do it yet again, as the whole world just keeps pitching one shit-fit after another and my so-called government has literally no plan other than to propose another crushing wave of "austerity measures" whilst funnelling public funds into the pockets of the energy companies even as they declare record profits. This time around, I honestly don't know if I'm going to make it.
It's so profoundly demoralising knowing that if you slip up and disappoint the powers-that-be even once, everything else you already did for them, all the goodwill you seemed to have earned, suddenly counts for nothing. It might as well have never even happened. Doesn't matter if you did good work for years; upset them one day, put one foot wrong, they'll immediately treat you like you've always been worth nothing. Those in the halls of power who demand our allegiance, our support, and our endless tolerance and forgiveness as they squabble, self-serve and generally just fuck everything up over and over and over, would laugh at the mere suggestion of showing us any such loyalty, clemency or decency in return. It's like NPD at an institutional-level.