I think that everything that can be known about us or the nature of our existence currently exists and has always existed. Knowledge is discovered, not invented. As a result of this thought, I’m on the endless pursuit of running thought experiments. Given X constraints under Y conditions, what can we probably discern about the nature of reality, if only with regard to the practical implications? I’m starting to get burnt out on news because, as with most things, I’m starting to see a very depressing pattern. When the world around us starts crashing, it’s always predicated on someone being willfully ignorant.
On the surface, it seems naïve to rally against the “stupid people.” You get the “well who’s really stupid, who are you to judge” conversation. You get model court cases where you present your side, they present theirs, and everyone loses because no one pointed out that it’s possible to argue for years under no or bad logic.
There are tell-tale behaviors of people who don’t know what the hell they’re talking about. There are explicit actions and statements the ignorant make. I could watch a hundred interviews and pick out the liar or the half-truth teller every time by simply sorting and counting instances in their language. Why can’t others seem to see it?
This honesty thing is lost on us. People don’t know how to tell the truth or hear the truth so they simply pass themselves between the various groups looking to take advantage. They squeeze the world into their tiny perspective and declare absolutes in utter disregard to reality, let alone nuance. Meanwhile the thinkers warn, the scientists inform, the peaceful campaign yet are all silenced because money reigns. The powerful have created a culture where what you have or the luxuries you can afford “win.” The part about you buying into their game is their real victory.
These campaigns against Wall Street, secret and not-so-secret bailouts, attacks on unions and education, debate about how your charitable donations are being used….name your issue, the center of the controversy is monetary. Who gets it and why. I so rarely see, if ever, discussions of human responsibility; instead its name calling, pointing fingers, scapegoating. They allow the issue to become obscure in the first press release, with the first interview until there's no telling how far the discourse degrades.
We’re so dumb we can’t learn or appreciate just how dumb we are. We’ve had an economic model for the past 60 years that has always degraded into “kill for freedom and democracy.” We try to apply mathematical models onto populations and pretend that there aren’t instantly things to be said about how they won’t apply. Or worse, we know they won’t work and persist in them anyway. In the mainstream, there’s no discussion about the human psychology behind people who hold terrible or oppressive ideas and how they’re used. There’s no discussion about how unhelpful the rhetoric is or the fact that it’s even rhetoric.
We’re quick to judge and conceptualize things in a sound bite. I click through a montage of the dead famous and accomplished and each one’s life is summed up as “So-and-so, philanthropist, died August 20, 2011.” What an insult to their motivations, to their potential message. If I'm remembered as anything less than an "Everythingist" something went wrong. We say things like “right to work” and “national school choice” and pretend they aren’t complete misnomers. We reinforce our delusions every time we repeat the script. Every time we give it a stage, that’s all we come to know, the only thing we can manifest. From Congress to shitty fast food jobs, until you raise the level of discourse and act in deliberate and informed ways, all you can do is manifest hatred and complaints and pass the problems onto the next person.
I’ve been told I’m naïve or dumb for what I expect from people. I, who [somehow!] is basically peaceful, accepting, desperate to get informed and work towards something that matters, I observe and draw conclusions, I don’t accept an ideology and proclaim it’s the only way. I manifest my will and my views in relationships, writings, and work. I am the kind of selfish that understands I’m “alone” in a social and real context. For me to disregard the potential for others is to deny my own. For me not to respect your ability to make good or bad decisions is to deny my own. I may be the result of a seemingly random confluence of forces, but what I currently am is mine to choose. The very fact of my life is the standard I expect from the world.
I don’t want to lose sight of the point of struggling. I kind of just want to sit and think. Or maybe just sit and breathe. The same story gets old. It’s the same ignorance and fear. I know I keep writing the same blog too.
