@txtom it is when it is however, I don’t think that’s what @JohnR1972 meant by it even if @BoomerSpooner has a different take on withholding knowledge. I’ve heard such things as well and I know it’s true there are people who want to gate keep knowledge.
however as someone whose income relies on book sales… ban all other media for everyone across the board!!!! Tax breaks for readers!!! Telegrams need to be punishable by death. 😂😂😂 There’s your dystopian world.
@JohnR1972 I agree. The two main problems with instant communication is 1) ratings, being the first 2) propaganda, agendas - a lie will be halfway around the world before the truth has even put on it's shoes.
It is sometimes the motivations behind the use of the technology that is flawed, more than the technology itself.
@stormydaycuddle Correct. I wasn’t disagreeing with @JohnR1972, I was disagreeing with the author he cited. And the view I have has been made many times before. Technology as a democratizing force for information is nothing new, nor is the idea that information is power and those who control information control power. The fact that access to higher education and information was denied in our history to many is a fact. I was using it as to why there are weaknesses in the author’s argument.
That’s the great thing about academic books…they encourage dialogue through civil agreement, compromise, and disagreement which advances epistemology. Being dismissive and snarky about the history of race and environment advances nothing and says a lot about what I was saying in the earlier post about education.
@BoomerSpooner I do agree. People who think they are the only ones smart enough to consume free thought tend to be the exact opposite. Ignorance is blind.
@stormydaycuddle Well put again.
Thankfully, our country has addressed many of its social ills internally, over time. Unfortunately, there are many other places around the world--today--where regional ethnic minorities and women are still treated as 2nd class citizens, or worse--and usually worse.
Critical thinking and a broad education are indeed instrumental in knowing that no one race or class has a monopoly on being the oppressors, or the oppressed.
Yeah. You just agreed with my original premise. This is much better than snark.
The problem behind books is the same thing. Mein Kampf was a book that many Germans bought into. Which gets back to my point that it is on the reader to discern and research what has just been infused into their intellect, knowing that truth is always in the eye of the beholder and their particular perspective, culture, motivations and desires. Knowing that one does not have a monopoly on the truth creates a space where the reader and author have a dialogue of thought, rather than the reader purely being a vessel of blind acceptance whether they receive the author’s message through book, tv, internet or AI.
You just agreed with my original premise. This is much better than snark.
The idea of technology being misused (information technology or otherwise) isn't anything new. That's widely understood. Snark doesn't have anything to do with it.
Yet you chose to be snarky first and then edited that post before agreeing and rehashing my points. It’s called baiting no matter how you paint it and it is why @stormydaycuddle called out the post.
Furthermore, technology being misused is Postman’s point but he blames it for societal breakdowns, such as the proliferation of distorted information. I was pointing out that technology has democratized information which is a good thing unless you feel the king and his knights should be the only gatekeepers of information and the serfs should never have access.
@stormydaycuddle I'm undergoing personal training on how to participate in forums without going after douchebags. Once complete, I'll re-engage
You have been doing great and I have missed your posts and sense of humor on the forums.
@TxTom I've seen that argument before, that other places are worse than the US so clearly the US is doing fine. It's just a deflection, especially as the US keeps getting worse and worse.
@BoomerSpooner I appreciate the support! I enjoy your's as well.
you chose to be snarky first and then edited that post
My edit was only to add
EDIT: /s
@Drewski1138
those of us in the US live in a world of abundance that we take so much for granted. Most of us here have multiple sets of clothes, we’ve eaten 2-3 meals in the last 24 hours, and most of us have a roof over our heads, not to mention all the luxuries like computers in our pocket... We got it real good comparatively speaking.
Exactly.
I would only add that we have it so good in this country, many people have the luxury of creating their own personal crises.
@txtom and yet here we are gatekeeping. Acting as if we are the only ones who can see straight.
Have you been to a major city lately or lived at minimum wage? Have you ever been physically harmed by a partner or sent a child to bed hungry. Have you ever been beaten or oppressed for being a white male? Have you ever made less because of your gender? The list goes on and on. Willful ignorance should be criminal.
And the whole ‘other races have oppressed people too we don’t have a monopoly’… we sure have tried. And it doesn’t make it okay.
This is called rationalizing and it’s anything but. It simply shows how big of blinders someone wears.
There are huge atrocities that are over looked. When I was 8 my dad threw me into a table cracking my head open(just one example) I ate nothing but PBJ, and bean burritos for 17 years of my life or a lot of times nothing at all. The world I lived in as a child still exists. There’s still room for it. And it’s widespread.
They have commercials that run constantly about how to sign your child up for free lunch so they don’t go hungry playing on the radio all over the country. They don’t do that because it’s one child or two. They broadcast it over major radio stations because it’s COUNTLESS children.
It’s an atrocity in and of itself to turn such a blind eye.
Just because SOME are fortunate enough to afford to live in lala land doesn’t mean the rest of us are. Homelessness is at a record high unseen since The Dust Bowl.
Take a trip to a major city. Portland is practically Gotham now and San Francisco has practically been wiped off the map. But… of course we’re okay so it doesn’t matter right? Those situations have reasons that make it okay to ignore their suffering.
Please go on… rationalizing suffering is proving my point.
I understand the perceptions about this world and life being relatively better than other times, but let's not pretend that we live in a utopia either. tho that would be a nice thread to add.
I do like the discussion here. Tho it's getting heavy at times. Signs that we might live in a dystopia after all. lol
My dad constantly posts memes on his Facebook about how we shouldn't provide aid to people who are struggling because they are just lazy and don't want to work.
I roll my eyes at every one.
@Mike403 Oof. lol
But isn't dystopia typically associated with authoritarianism? It's not simply the existence of suffering. It's more of a planned, organized type of suffering designed to control others.
@jplemmon I believe that's a literary convention of dystopia but not necessarily a requirement .
@jplemmon Yes it can be that but it can also be the breakdown of a a government or society—anarchy. I think the main ingredients to qualify for a dystopia is a world or society full of suffering, cruelty and mayhem.
Gotcha, but it still seems to require more than just suffering itself. There is some extreme element of government dysfunction at play that isn't there for the most part, regardless of whether government functions "well".
@jplemmon I would agree. Government would have had to collapse or become too dictatorial for a dystopia to bloom.
@jplemmon
I completely agree.
And despite life being comparatively good here, nobody's claiming it's a utopia, or people don't have problems.
@stormydaycuddle I can say "yes" to some of those questions. As for your examples of Portand, San Feancisco, and other major cities, a lot of that is a result of politics and voting, in particular, grievance politics. Local city leaders in these places have devastated local law enforcement. Now there's massive increase drug use, crime, and human trafficking.
Most of this is politics, and a result of what people are voting for.
But, per forum rules, we're not allowed to discuss politics.
What everyone is missing is every definition of the word dystopia is not defined by rule or government but rather by suffering. This suffering can come by rule of the government but it is also associated with environmental disaster, war, mass disease etc. So authoritarianism is only one possibility. The only reason people reach for authoritarianism as a definition of dystopia is because of books and movies such as 1984 or The Hunger Games. However, Mad Max occurs after Nuclear War, and there have been countless movies and books portraying disease such as zombie movies and shows after an unchecked disease caused mutations. Fanciful or not, these are all dystopias.
People called the Great Depression a dystopia at the time and for many individuals this was not wrong.
@txtom explain to me where you’re not rationalizing suffering? You did it again. Reasons don’t make it okay to ignore it. Or gloss over it as not part of the whole. Cherry-picking leads only to delusion.
Thinking, “well, it’s not my fault so I can exclude and overlook it as part of the picture” is EXACTLY what I’m talking about.
Blinders to the max. Point once again proven.
Don't mind me... just passing through.
@Mike403 Cute cat! 🐈 what were we talking about?
@stormydaycuddle I'm finished explaining my point on this thread. I'm not advocating for suffering, but I'll accept the criticism for failing to adequately explain myself.
EDIT: remove "rationalizing" for more accurate clarification.