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I think honestly this isn’t a system we created and thus don’t “deserve”. The thing is that we’ve been taught to be cynical hyper-individualistic, hedonistic, lazy jerks. It comes from everywhere. You’ve been taught that your traditions are old and stodgy and nobody cares about them anymore. You’ve been taught that your ancestors were rotten, terrible people who genocide their way around the globe. You’ve been taught that striving is pointless and that the rich will keep you down. You’ve been taught to deconstruct everything, but never to construct.
There are lots of reasons for it. Some are hyper-consumption: if you lose access to a community in which someone can solve your problem for free, then you have to buy that service somewhere. You don’t know someone who can cook and you don’t know how to? Door Dash. Daycares are essentially replacements for extended family. It used to be that if both parents needed to work, grandparents were close by and retired and the kid could stay in a place where he’d be safe and with a loved one. Now you hire a company who pays strangers less than $20 an hour to do the same. Go down the list of home repairs, car repairs, lawn maintenance, and a lot of services replace community.
The other part is that traditional systems are terrible for governments who want to control their populations. A strong community doesn’t need or want much government interference. The Amish have their communities in pretty good order without too much need for the state to come in and control them. They don’t need welfare because they have their church to help those in need.
The final thing is the issue of legitimacy. Legitimacy comes from the people. But in order to get people to vote for whatever it is that you want, job one is to convince them to want it, or convince them that they’ve always wanted it, or that “good people” are like this. So people vote as they’ve been taught to do. You have to be taught to believe in an atomized society with no deep connections so that you’re more willing to accept the breakdowns, less willing to trust community.
Thank you. I... Guess I should say something else but actually I'm just thanking you because you voiced one of my frustrations eloquently. People making worse versions of things because the good version is patented, people creating deadweight loss to get rid of to reap the benefits... or inducing unnecessary paradigm shifts so that they can be at the top of the transition team...
I guess I really do believe that theres no actual way to create more value for people. The modern amish have everything they need really. What was the point of all this junk we made? The medicine is nice yes. The food. The energy. I don't mind the AIs, though people trying to sell them to us is just another example. Take away friends, replace with 20$/month subscription. The cars... seemed nice but slowly grow to disgust me as I see how the travel distances expand to match their speed, keeping me only farther from other people. The trinkets and stopwatches and beer umbrellas add spice... but it turns to ash in my mouth without someone to share them with.
I don’t think it’s the technology. It’s the mindset that comes through the media that’s teaching everyone to defect, that everything is rotten, and that you should focus on yourself and getting yours. And when 300 million of us get that from the firehouse of media, we act on it. And the results are pretty clear. When no one is trustworthy, and nothing is worth protecting, you get defections.
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I think you’re assuming the conclusion. The economic forces which make babysitters and dishwashers ubiquitous wouldn’t disappear if we’d never started critiquing imperialism.
I also think your view of the past is rose-tinted as hell. 1700s America wasn’t an endless quilt of Amish communities, waiting to be tempted out of Eden. It was a hungry, dirty, disease-ridden frontier just starting to climb the curve of industrialization. Communities weren’t solving each others’ problems “for free.” They were paying their dues on their own social contract.
We've seen a remarkable, unprecedented increase in GDP per capita in the last 200 years. However, the GDP gains may overstate the actual gain in wealth. In 1800, someone would take part in fulfilling but unpaid labor such as child rearing or food preparation. This is not measured in GDP because no goods or services were exchanged. Nowadays, the equivalent person might use daycare and Door Dash while they pursue their higher paying job as a laptop worker for a big nonprofit. More GDP is being created by the commoditization of previously unpaid work even if no more value to society is being created.
So maybe GDP per capita has increased 5,000% but real wealth has only increased like 2,000% or something. We're vastly better off now than before, but imagine how much better things could be with stronger communities.
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