So how is it the best times if the last generation had it better. People are frustrated because life is getting worse due to income disparity. The same thing that caused the last bad time during the depression.
I said, “one of the best times.” There may be .001 % of times that were better than the present. Surely you can’t expect to live in the very best time of the 300 000 years of human existence.
The thing again though is if it was a case where the ones with the most made as much or really the most sacrifice. I bet not many people would be frustrated. But when you are forced sacrifice so the world can see the first trillionaire be birthed. thats a big rasberries all around.
It has always been like this relatively speaking, in post hunter/gatherer society. Except there was a very small middle class in those days The nobles as compared to the serfs were the same. Except that the serfs hung at the edge of survival whereas we have indoor plumbing, decent shelter, electricity, tv, internet, healthcare, workers rights, and the priviledge of travel.
So how is it the best times if the last generation had it better.
The sentence was “one of the best”, not “the best”, so it’s not a contradiction at all.
Ultimately my point was if the wealthy had it as relatively bad as the plebs the upset would be less. People don’t like sacrificing for people of much greater privelege having a bit more.
And because we’re facing several potential species-ending threats which hasn’t happened before 1945, and is worse now than it was then.
Bullshit. That’s just doomer hysteria. Short of an asteroid impact there isn’t going to be some apocalypse.
Climate change is just CHANGE. Things will change. Species will adapt, or die, and new species will emerge.
Sadly, change terrifies people. This is also why they refuse to ‘make things better’ even though we have the means, because that means CHANGE. ooo scary!
I mean, I didn’t say world ending, I said species ending. With climate change we have already observed species going extinct at an increasingly quick pace, and it’s hubris to think we couldn’t eventually be one of them if things continue.
Likewise, the potential for nuclear war seems less unlikely than it did 5 years ago, 10, or 20 years ago, and would wipe out many species and could potentially wipe out humanity, or enough of humanity to permanently reshape the species.
The rhetoric of the entire world ending is extremist, but it’s not sci-fi anymore to imagine that in a few generations there may be no recognizable modern humans, even if there are bipedal hominids still roaming around. It’s not even speculative to imagine a world missing many of its current species, just go to any coral reef and compare it to pictures from 50 years ago.
None of those things will end human life. It will simple be reduced. It has happened before.
Yeah, one of the things that makes us the dominant species is our ability to adapt to our environment. We’ll build underground structures and farm food underground.
What worries me is microplastics affecting fertility. It doesn’t matter how adaptable a species is if they can’t make more.
No because we feel like we are on a downward trajectory…
yep. Rand calls it neomedievalism, where we’re going back to the peasant/noble tiers
Ayn Rand???
Yeah I was like. Wait. What.
Nope! Corporation Rand
That’s the trouble. We feel like we are, but in fact, we are not. Hunger has decreased incredibly over the last decades. Infectious diseases are way down. The standard of living is way up over the last three decades. The tools and technologies available to us are far beyond what former generations even dreamed of. Global conflict deaths are down. The average lifespan has double since 1900.
Everything you’ve mentioned is going back up again.
Fun fact: when research showed that vaccination against Covid results in way fewer hospital admissions, Trump blocked the publication.
The average lifespan has double since 1900.
Which is another way of saying child mortality is down, but wait! Look what direction that is trending!
Hunger has decreased incredibly over the last decades.
Food insecurity is currently a big problem for American children and families.
Infectious diseases are way down.
We just ended vaccine mandates, ended funding for RNA vaccines, and infectious diseases are on the rise.
The tools and technologies available to us are far beyond what former generations even dreamed of.
And largely are subscription services designed to prey on us rather than make life easier. I have a robot vacuum that takes more effort and maintenance than my grandparents’ Electrolux ever did.
Starting in the year 1900 and going back 300 000 years, would you trade places with the average human on Earth?
Who cares? I can’t time travel.
Food is available but becoming unaffordable. Ownership is being taken away. Simply existing is taking all our wages and then some.
There’s no point in technological progression if it is only being used to extract my life for someone else’s gain.
The point is, you wouldn’t because any time before that, the average human worked 10 to 12 hours a day, six days a week, lived to about 50, had no doctors, no indoor toilet, no indoor water. Water was likely a long distance away and had to be carried by hand to your hovel. You were a serf or serf-like or a slave. Worker’s rights were virtually non-existant. You had intestinal parasites with no health care to relieve you. You were at the whim of the wealthy. Up to half of children didn’t make it to the age of 5. 4 % of women died in childbirth. There were no cars, no planes, no electricity, virtually no leisure time. There was minimal heat in winter, no cooling in summer. We are indeed fortunate to be living now.
Keep in mind that your average life expectancy stats include child mortality rates. If you could survive childhood, you had a good chance at living to be over 50.
Frankly, I think my dad’s generation had it better. And I think I have it better than my millennial kids. And it looks like they will have it better than my teens.
I wouldn’t probably say I’d trade places with the average person because there are a lot of poor folks who have things worse than me. But quality is life in America is getting worse.
Define better. Net worth or something?
My parents had a way worse life than mine was. Maybe yours had a better life than you?
The only people I know who seem to legit feel this way are the rich kids who are mad they won’t be richer than their parents. Like temper tantrum butthurt they won’t own a big house and a giant SUV car their parents drive. But they spend all their money traveling and drinking and eating at expensive restaurants anyway…
Home ownership, retirement. My janitor dad payed off a 5 bedroom house in a nice suburb with no education (he did not just not graduate high school he never went at all) and had a nice retirement. I have a masters and dual major bachelors and can’t afford to live in a free standing house (and luckily could not afford to have kids). travel - nope, drinking - long term less than once a year, expensive restaurants - nope, heck can’t even afford fast food at this point. Sounds to me like your social group is all rich kids. Heck I grew up with rich kids and still don’t know any.
You have a masters, in what?
The median salary for a MA holder is 95K. More than enough to afford a nice home in most places in the USA outside of HCOL. And a good quality of life.
Education but my bachelors degrees are microbiology and chemistry although I work in IT. You have to have a job to be making that and that is more difficult outside of HCOL areas. 95K in a city with a metro is barely enough to afford a place but likely not a stand alone home. Truly HCOL like new yor or san fran its have a few roomates. Aslo these jobs often do not have pensions and the people in it have serial unemployment over the course of their careers. They were not making something like that for 30 years. My father did way more than have a nice home. I mean it was kinda ramshackled but most folks would be ga ga to have it today. It was very much like the family at the start of caddy shack. That size house, single salary, with that many kids. Pension to boot. Thats a pipe dream for anyone who did not start workin in the eighties and even then unlikely. Xers are just about to start retiring and oh man is it going to be a trump show with social security barely covering medicare costs now. Combine that with no pension and savings only if someone is very successful like myself. So super successful today is < typical pleb of yesteryear.
Are you AI? You write like it.
Thats kinda funny gvien how other people complain about my writing. Usually people put stuff into ai to get a more well formatted and grammar correct writing. I think you could take a min and look at my profile and make a better determination.
your profile makes me think you are not a human being at all. nothing about you seems real. you write like child.
I don’t put enough time in my writing. I will give you that but were is this going. What are you going to do with your belief? Talk me to death.
Lmao could you elaborate please.
Humanity has been around for around 300 000 years. For the first 95 % of that, we were hunter/gatherers - ravaged by disease, tribal wars, accidents, exposed to the elements, no running water, no toilets, no doctors, no electricity, no easy transportation, the average lifespan between 25 and 33 years. For the next 4.5 % the average human was a serf, serf-like or a slave - worked 10 to 12 hours a day, six days a week(or more), no vacation, lived to about 50, had no doctors, no indoor toilet, no indoor water. Water was likely a long distance away and had to be carried by hand to your hovel. Worker’s rights were virtually non-existant. You had intestinal parasites with no health care to relieve you. You were at the whim of the wealthy. Up to half of children didn’t make it to the age of 5. 4 % of women died in childbirth. Women were treated as property. There were no cars, no planes, no electricity, virtually no leisure time. There was minimal heat in winter, no cooling in summer. It is only in the last 0.1 % of our history that we (on average) have had any kind of comfort. We are indeed fortunate to be living now.
It’s also one of the most peaceful times in human history, which is saying a lot about the past.
It will not get better until we free people from the 40+ hour work week bullshit that’s been ingrained in everyone’s heads. Not everyone needs to work, there is not enough (productive) stuff to do. You are not your job, work does not equal progress, we need artists and poets and vagabonds and tramps, art made for art’s sake not made for money (quite rare now if you think about it, because they made making art in your free time seem like a frivolity). We need a massive turn around, I don’t see how anyone can possibly think we’re in a good place. We’re less violent to each other on a personal level I suppose, and disease is down for now, but… we still have so many OLD problems that should have been fixed by now, but the people with the power don’t want them fixed so they can go fuck themselves.
I think this was the big failure of the unions. They stopped tyring to lower the work week and thus expanding their base and power. Union guys in the 80’s were salavating at bookoo overtime. It was a non sustainable way to go. I was hoping france or such would lead the way and split their weekly shifts in two. The standard by the turn of the millenium should have been 30 hours and we should be reducing it more now.
Can I get some of what you’re smoking, OP? That’s some top-tier copium.
