idiotic people who think nothing of world issues or even issues in our own government. Is this wrong? — Lucielle Randall

You cannot do much about your government. However, since there are 200+ of those, as an individual, you can certainly pick the one that disturbs you the least. Hence, I have abandoned the so-called western democracy in which I used to live in search of better pastures, which I confirm to have found in Southeast Asia.

One of the most powerful tools against intrusive regimes that stick their noses into your private life and otherwise none of their business, is simply: JURISDICTION SHOPPING

Businesses do that all the time. If some government wants too much money in some place, then just put up the activity in another place. It works like a charm, and it certainly, duly reins in the arrogance.

Many people in the past fought for rights and liberties — Lucielle Randall

Do you mean the socialist-style labour conflicts of the erstwhile industrial factory-worker society? They were called the proletarians, because all they had was a wife an kids. So, what is the result of all the strife and agitation for their "rights"? Nowadays, they systematically get divorce-raped by the powers that be, and almost never have wife and kids. So far, so good, for the so-called "progress" that they claim to have made. Seriously, I do not particularly want to live in the soviet, factory-worker paradise of the so-called "western democracies". Even places like China, and certainly Vietnam, offer a more pleasant lifestyle than that.

We are becoming livestock for the rich and powerful to prey upon and we are allowing it! Aren't we awake? — Lucielle Randall

The fact that the population is gullible, is not the fault of the rich. The ones who are easily manipulated, will get manipulated. That is just one of the laws of nature.

Is there any possible way to help those in need, and revive us, the younger generation, to become the leaders our world needs? — Lucielle Randall

In the so-called "western democracies"? No, they are addicted to Ritalin, which they use for their imaginary ADHD problems. Furthermore, a great number of them are gender-confused. They simply do not want to make a choice as to whether they are male or female. I may be mistaken, but I somehow believe that all of that won't fly high.

You see, the dirty, little secret is that society is based on a very simple process. Men have 17 times more testosterone in their blood than women. So, men need sex all the time, while women only see it as possibly nice to have, while they can more easily do without. So, the boys need to offer some compensation to make up for that disparity. So, they need to work, make money, and pay these bribes. That is why men put in an inordinate amount of effort in trying to succeed professionally.

If you throw gender confusion into the equation, the entire scheme falls apart. Why would you have to bring home the bacon, when your gender confusion says that you could be both man and woman, or neither? Hence, the society-building efforts will inevitably come crashing down. You can already notice it from the fact that the labour force is disintegrating already. The society as you know it today, will no longer be possible in the future, because there is nobody who will volunteer to keep it afloat. So far so good for these dead-end, so-called "western democracies".

Despite all this devolution, stupidity, idiocy, and so on, YOU managed to overcome all. Why are you not one of the many devolved, degenerate morons?

The answer, of course, is that most people, including you, have not been degraded. The average person never had a heroic age of thought, art, industry, brilliant invention, and so forth. In fact, most people -- including everyone from the decidedly inferior to the decidedly superior -- have ever experienced a personal age of heroic achievement.

Most people, like somewhere in the upper 90s percent range, get up, go through the day doing what they are obligated to do, and at the end of the day, sleep. They persist; they endure; they keep working. That is what it takes for brilliant smart asses like you and me to even exist.

The People are not stupid. The People are merely busy getting through their day, taking care of their children, doing their job, and so on. Be grateful for their efforts.

Is there any possible way to help those in need, and revive us, the younger generation, to become the leaders our world needs? Will change ever come? Will society ever wake up? — Lucielle Randall

One of the things society needs to wake up from is the myth of leaders. As if the person out front knows where they are going. No They are simply the most crazed, most desperate of us. We do not need leaders because there is nowhere to go.

You are your neighbour's neighbour; therefore love your neighbours. Keep your neighbourhood tidy and healthy. The rest is mere admin. Message ends.

We as humans have made many technological break throughs over the past decades, but having us rely on such technology is simply dulling the human brain essentially making us idiotic people who think nothing of world issues or even issues in our own government. — Lucielle Randall

It is, of course, an age-old plaint about people getting stupider, weaker, more corrupt, etc. etc. But if you are being serious and not just idly moaning, then have you actually bothered to establish the truth of this claim?

The short answer is, yes, entropy is a fundamental law of the universe, and humans are part of the universe... meaning that unless we put in tons of energy, the default trend is allways towards more disorder. This is only partly a glib answer, as it might inspire you to appreciate a bit more the idealism in expecting an ever increasing progression.

We as humans have made many technological break throughs over the past decades, but having us rely on such technology is simply dulling the human brain essentially making us idiotic people who think nothing of world issues or even issues in our own government. Is this wrong?

Personally I classify this as an epidemic of stupidity. Conscious stupidity. Many people in the past fought for rights and liberties yet nowadays adolescents only care about the world on their smart phone. We don't use the rights given to us to their full extent. We don't care of what is going on around them. The political debates, the wars, the death, things that could change our lives! Now we only care about how many followers we have on social media! Our society is becoming dead. We are becoming livestock for the rich and powerful to prey upon and we are allowing it! Aren't we awake? Aren't we alive? — Lucielle Randall

It might come as a surprise, but this is not new. More or less the same thing happened way back arround the time western philosophy began, and countless times thereafter.. when writing started to replace the oral traditions Socrates was allready lamenting everything that was being lost with that transition. Same thing with the printing press, with the telegraph and e-mails etc...Technology is disruptive, and people and societies need to time to adapt, but it never turned out to be the end of the world.

Anyway, the point is that a bit more perspective probably wouldn't hurt to adjust your expectations. That is not to say there aren't any serious problems, there are, but what we can do about it at any given time is probably more complex and difficult then you might think.

This stupidity has been prevalent throughout history - it only appears to manifest more often now, for two reasons: One, your own involvement with the current age and two, the proportionally larger amount of people inhabiting the planet.

This problem is not one born of technological reliance, as technological progress stacks old on top of older technology; each next step relying on the one before it.
No, you're merely reiterating the age old problem of apathy; a slave's mindset.

Who in their own minds is part of the degradation of society? Nobodies, including yours. Unsurprising.

@Bitter Crank said it best.

Well, we have been livestock for the rich and powerful since economic hierarchy came into being. In fact, we are actually heading towards a dystopia as I type this, the precursors of which are gross wealth inequality, deaths of despair and the resurfacing of diseases once held in check, the disintegration of the political process, and the radicalization (towards fascism), that we see in the disenfranchised population. Capitalism is in its death throws, climate change being the most obvious symptom, and capitalism's eggs have been layed inside our collective stomachs, as the neofeudal alien readies itself to burst forth and finish consuming human life as we know it. At least we get to use the internet for the time being.

Personally I classify this as an epidemic of stupidity. Conscious stupidity. — Lucielle Randall

Zombie apocalypse, here we come...

Seriously, though - somewhere along the way, we came to a conclusion based on a limited view of the universe that we’re here because we survived, and we should be hell-bent on continuing to do so. This is what we need to ‘wake up’ from.

Just finished watching World War Z, and a thought lodged itself in my mind: what was the real difference between the humans that ‘survived’ and the zombies? It was that the humans looked out for each other, that they were prepared to connect and collaborate and even to risk their lives - not so that others could survive, but in order to contribute to achieving something. Gerry didn’t make it to the end of the movie because he was better or smarter or tougher - it was because he was part of a collaborative effort to achieve something more important than his own survival. Without that collaboration, he would have been zombified many times over.

The zombies, on the other hand, appeared to work collectively to get up that wall, but they were simply hell-bent on doing what drives them individually towards survival or advantage, even if it leads them to their death. The difference is subtle, but important.

Personally, I don’t think technology results in a ‘dumbing down’ as such. It’s each generation struggling to find a use for the increased availability of mental capacity that results from collaborative efficiency.

Is there any possible way to help those in need, and revive us, the younger generation, to become the leaders our world needs? — Lucielle Randall

Awareness, connection, collaboration.

So, men need sex all the time, while women only see it as possibly nice to have, while they can more easily do without.

I mean. Thats one sexist narrative. I can direct you to many well-educated feminist writers that vehemently show that such a narrative is just another subtle bias in society, meant to protect male sexual entitlement and at the same time disempower female sexuality. Did you know that female orgasm is actually much more powerful than the male orgasm? That women's sexual drive increases with age? That perhaps, the reason this narrative continues unabated, is because men have never cared to learn about female sexuality? Because women's sexual needs and desires do not matter the same way mens do? Ie. hetereosexual sex being hyper focused on the phallus rather than on the breasts, clitoral, or vaginal stimulation? These are sexist and oppressive sexual norms being propagated by the myth you just referenced-that men need sex more. May I also add that this very myth has been used to justify instances of spousal rape and sexual harassment?
Who are you to say that I can "more easily do without" sex than you? Who are you to deny my sexuality and desires, after centuries millines of Judeo-Christian sexual repression, abuse, and shame, of female sexuality? Fuck you.

I digress.

You sound angry for some reason. I'm angry too. But I'm also one this "stupid" generation you speak of...I consider myself pretty politically literate for someone my age, I mean I've been reading political theory since age sixteen, feminist theory since fourteen, history since, eh, middle school? At age twenty I am moving across the world to pursue law school with a speciality in environmental law...Of course, I agree, I am a minority in my cohorts, in fact I face great persecution in some of my social circles for this knowledge.

Here I will list some reasons I find compelling for why there is a "downward" spiral so to speak, or at the very least, as I do agree that every period of history has its turbulence, what is causing the turbulence of our time.l

1. Complacency: People aren't stupid. They are complacent and distracted by, as @Bitter Crank pointed out, the daily toils of living, which are, nonetheless excaberated by the RIGGED SOCIO-ECONOMIC system (in America at least) that is forever shrinking the middle class, cutting taxes and social benefits, and the regressive right is forever shouting false propaganda to make it all seem desirable, when really, it is only desirable to the major corporations and the bureaucratic 1% keeping all the world's wealth. People don't know any better.

2. Lack of education: Critical thinking (philosophical) skills are not taught in public schools. You are taught to follow rules, to follow instructions, to obey authority. These are not skills for successful innovation/problem solving/or even, to an extent leadership. They are meant to keep the system intact. Those students who are less easily swayed-who do not conform, usually drop out or fall through the cracks eventually. They turn to substances, have turbulent home lives, and very little support. They also probably have learning issues, the same ones you just mocked as "made up" are really, very real, and well documented throughout history...just historically undiagnosed until now. They are also still undiagnosed, especially in women and girls, and these account for countless other problems.

3. Cultural a-sociality and paranoia: As a culture, we now fear for our children's safety in ways historically, was unheard of. Children are not allowed to walk places by themselves, go to the park by themselves, or even play on certain "older" playgrounds due to liability issues/parents deeming it as "not safe". The school down the street from me tore down the playground and has replace it with, well, 3 large wooden poles. Thats it. Thats "safe". Bubble wrapped kids? What does that lead to?

HMMMMMM....
Have you considered that the reason children are so "glued to their smart phones" and "video games" because that's their only chance at real uninhibited social interaction and exploration? The real world isn't safe anymore. And when children are raised with this paranoia, like I was, we are a lot less likely to grow into adults who feel comfortable communicating and socializing with strangers.

We don't care of what is going on around them.

We don't know what is going on around us. We are distracted by celebrities, by mainstream propaganda (news), we are not taught the literacy or skills needed to even understand. The people in power don't want us to understand. Social media is addicting, especially when a digital iOS world is all you have ever known, we didn't get the luxury of board games and real social interaction growing up...it also ruins focus by hijacking the brains reward centre. With regards to food; we don't have the options or the knowledge

I suggest you look up Greta Thunberg, she's a fifteen year old Autistic activist nominated to win the Nobel Prize. Sorry we're so "useless".

I see now you deleted your paragraph on how transpeople are somehow a "problem" because they can't "decide what gender they want to be". Good choice, since many trans and LGBTQ youth are at the forefront of some of the most powerful social movements of this century so far-these minority and oppressed groups have been the backbone for some of the very rights we say we "take for granted".
Lastly, on the topic of rights, the American GOP is currently trying to rob women of their hard-fought right to abortions. This has angered every women I know, and I'm not even American. It's not the 20-year olds who are taking away these rights, taking these rights for granted, it's the 50 something year-old white men who are so threatened by social process and equality (read: taking back the wealth they made off the backs of women, migrants, and the poor) they feel the need to go backwards.

I would appreciate if you stop deleting your original points. That is mere cowardice in my opinion. If you go to all this effort to start a thread in order to discuss your opinions/beliefs, then you have to be prepared to defend your beliefs, and have an academic discussion about it. I have taken the last hour to formulate a well-thought reply to your query, only to see that under the pressure of (people disagreeing with you)? You have omitted your original points. Please just admit you were wrong then, or get off this forum if you are not going to argue and discuss fairly. We are philosophy people, not a political Twitter account.

Well, we have been livestock for the rich and powerful since economic hierarchy came into being. — rlclauer

Being rich can be a side effect of being a good manipulator, proficient at producing believable deceptions. Still, not all rich people have gained their wealth through deceptive manipulations. Furthermore, this view exempts the "manipulee" from responsibility, while it obviously takes two to tango.

In religion, it is the believer in false gods who is held responsible, and not the false gods. If you choose to believe the false gods, then it is you who are at fault.

In my opinion, it is preferable to place the responsibility with the party who is in a better position to do something about the problem. It makes more sense to exhort people to stop believing in lies than to get angry with the liars.

If a manipulator can rip off your money by telling you a lie, then he will, quickly, before someone else does, because a fool and his money are easily parted. Given the expectation that your money will soon be gone anyway, he will try to act faster than the other manipulators as to be the one to successfully pocket the loot.

A pod of killer whales will hastily speed in the direction of a mother grey whale with her calf, because according to their sonar signals, the calf is toast anyway. That is just a question of time. Therefore, it is a question of separating the calf from its mother, pushing it under until it drowns and then devouring it before another pod of killer whales beats them to the finish.

Just a tip: pay attention to who you are responding to, especially if you’re going to get angry and abusive. You seem to be confusing the OP with a response by @alcontali.

I won’t disagree with a fair amount of what you’ve said - I’m only suggesting you take a moment to be aware before you connect, and use the reply arrow or @ button to direct your response to the correct poster, so they’re notified. That’s all.

Cheers

I see now you deleted your paragraph on how transpeople are somehow a "problem" because they can't "decide what gender they want to be". Good choice, since many trans and LGBTQ youth are at the forefront of some of the most powerful social movements of this century so far-these minority and oppressed groups have been the backbone for some of the very rights we say we "take for granted". — Grre

↪Grre
Just a tip: pay attention to who you are responding to, especially if you’re going to get angry and abusive. You seem to be confusing the OP with a response by alcontali. — Possibility

What I wrote, was not in relation to the alphabet soup but to a new strand of articles that have appeared such as this example, "27 Percent of California Teens Are Gender Nonconforming. A new study of California youth found that more than one in four teens say their classmates view them as resisting dominant forms of gender expression."

The alphabet soup is about men who prefer to be women, or women who prefer to be men. That phenomenon was mentioned in ancient manuscripts millennia ago already. That is clearly nothing new, and nothing to be fundamentally worried about, since it has always been there. The article mentions something else altogether. It is about the current trend, which seems to be massive and wholesale, towards the complete abolition of gender. That is a whole new level of confusion. I do not believe that society can handle that.

It is about the current trend, which seems to be massive and wholesale, towards the complete abolition of gender. That is a whole new level of confusion. I do not believe that society can handle that. — alcontali

The abolition of gender would involve the abolition of psyche.
Do you think these neophiles could pull it off?

The abolition of gender would involve the abolition of psyche.
Do you think these neophiles could pull it off? — Shamshir

Well, I do not speak from personal experience, as I resolutely resigned from the ongoing experiment in the so-called "western democracies" over a decade ago. I just happened to have run into reports that mention the new phenomenon.

Even though my own kids speak English with me, they are also perfectly fluent in their mother's tribal language. They very well know that they firmly belong to, and are supposed to identify with, their mother's clan, and that I become grumpy if they ask too many questions about any so-called western democracy that I would originally have been loosely affiliated with. So, they have learned to avoid the subject.

I applied some kind of matrilinealization twist to the situation, which is some kind of hack to prevent getting my own kids dragged into an experiment that I simply do not want. They have a system of arranged marriages here. So, that should also keep the kids out of the western-style dating cesspool. As I have said before, I could only ever have hoped to solve the problem for myself. Seriously, I am not the Messiah.

Since my own kids clearly match their gender with their biological sex, I have no clue as to what it means to have "nonconforming" offspring at home, i.e. not boy nor girl, nor both, nor homosexual either, i.e. so-called "choice-resisting". I also do not know what any new articles on the subject will be reporting back in the future in terms of the ongoing genderlessness takeover. They are apparently already at 25% now.

Alright, but since gender is closely aligned with sentience - as an example - an effeminate man, who albeit characterised as proportionally 80% female to 20% male, is a man; I am asking, do you think the people in question could and would afford crippling sentience enough, in order to abolish gender?

I am asking, do you think the people in question could and would afford crippling sentience enough, in order to abolish gender? — Shamshir

I have no clue ... (seriously)

If it's any consolation, it's just another fad that'll die out like the diet fad.

I just fundamentally disagree with you. I do not think there is any value in speaking about "responsibility." You are attempting to shift the burden of a flawed economic system onto individuals, which is right in line with neoclassical economic ideology.

In my opinion, it is preferable to place the responsibility with the party who is in a better position to do something about the problem.

As far as this line, I find it highly ironic, because if I was to adopt a view which atomized individual actors in the market place, and respnsibilize them, I would read this exactly opposite how you do in your next line. The rich and higher up in the economic hierarchy are obviously in a better position to "do something about the problem." Just thought I would mention this because it highlights the stark divergence in how we perceive the world.

a view which atomized individual actors — rlclauer

Atomizing individualism is a social disease that is rather unrelated to economic issues.

If you want a functioning kinship structure, you will need some kind of marriage policy that reinforces it. That in turn is not compatible with western ideas that promote so-called romantic-love marriages that seek to couple up people with mostly arbitrary other people.

That kind of marriage practices is exactly what prevents a stronger kinship structure from emerging. Hence, atomized individualism is a self-inflicted problem.

Nobody can save people from their own stupidity, especially not when they so staunchly believe in their wrong ideas, and from there, even double down on them. I do not understand why people keep complaining about their self-inflicted problems. I believe that people should be grateful for receiving exactly what they have asked for.

The rich and higher up in the economic hierarchy are obviously in a better position to "do something about the problem." — rlclauer

Yes, for themselves and their own relatives.

According to Islamic religious law, their mandatory contribution as charity to the wider society is limited to 2.5% of their net capital gains. I do not see why they should pay one more dollar than that. As far as I am concerned, they do not have to.

Again, we have vastly different world views. I think it is best to agree to disagree.

We as humans have made many technological break throughs over the past decades, but having us rely on such technology is simply dulling the human brain essentially making us idiotic people who think nothing of world issues or even issues in our own government. Is this wrong? — Lucielle Randall

In Plato's Phaedrus Socrates is critical of the technological breakthrough called writing, its corrosive effect on memory, and its indiscriminateness (anyone can read what is said).

In a class on business ethics there was a discussion a paper on the attitudes of the "younger generation". The students in the class were from several generations, but all but the youngest assumed that the paper was about the generation that came after their own and most agreed that standards had deteriorated since the time they first entered the marketplace. What most missed was that the paper had been written at an earlier date and referred to the same generation that so eagerly condemned the devolution of the younger generation.

In other words, criticism of the younger generation is much older than any living generation.

I imagine the artifacts of humans have advanced dramatically while the humans themselves have hardly evolved. Plus, I don’t think an organism can devolve, as if to some previous state of its evolution, though I’m sure a future point of evolution could resemble a previous one.

We as humans have made many technological break throughs over the past decades, but having us rely on such technology is simply dulling the human brain essentially making us idiotic people who think nothing of world issues or even issues in our own government. Is this wrong? — Lucielle Randall

Yes, it is wrong.

Especially the blaming the stupidity of people, or people getting stupid, as the reason for this.

People adapt to the environment and the society they live in. If that society with it's services, machines and science gives us the chance to have more leisure time, to live far longer than our forefathers and makes in general life more 'easy' compared to earlier, it surely doesn't make us more stupid. We just adapt to all those machines and opportunities and live with them. This idea (of technology dulling us down) is similar to thinking that later generations are more 'soft' than those before them because those before faced more peril and hardship in their times: something one might say and indeed has been said since Antiquity, but something that really doesn't hold to scrutiny.

We don't have learned traits that generations before of us had, but then on the other hand they didn't live in our times. Just take for example the people from the 'Age of Enlightement', the 18th Century: you really think the ordinary people from that time would be more intelligent than us? Really?

Below is a historical chart of the literacy rate in the UK, the lousy statistics we have from history about it:



It is safe to argue that people that are illiterate will have difficulties in understanding government or especially world issues as they simply aren't educated enough to know about the subjects. As subsistence farmers historical generations might be more used to farming than us, but we aren't like that simply because our environment isn't similar. Yet when the majority of people were illiterate, and went with burning witches and so on, one cannot say they were far more intelligent than us. Aggregate mental abilities of a population change very slowly, yet in the long run there has been change.

If you had in the 18th Century well known philosophers and intellectuals whose writings are still important, well, there are far more people now that can have a smart discussions on par with those intellectuals of that time.