Want to wade into the snowy surf of the abyss? Have a sneer percolating in your system but not enough time/energy to make a whole post about it? Go forth and be mid.
Welcome to the Stubsack, your first port of call for learning fresh Awful youāll near-instantly regret.
Any awful.systems sub may be subsneered in this subthread, techtakes or no.
If your sneer seems higher quality than you thought, feel free to cutānāpaste it into its own post ā thereās no quota for posting and the bar really isnāt that high.
The post Xitter web has spawned so many āesotericā right wing freaks, but thereās no appropriate sneer-space for them. Iām talking redscare-ish, reality challenged āculture criticsā who write about everything but understand nothing. Iām talking about reply-guys who make the same 6 tweets about the same 3 subjects. Theyāre inescapable at this point, yet I donāt see them mocked (as much as they should be)
Like, there was one dude a while back who insisted that women couldnāt be surgeons because they didnāt believe in the moon or in stars? I think each and every one of these guys is uniquely fucked up and if I canāt escape them, I would love to sneer at them.
(Credit and/or blame to David Gerard for starting this. Also, hope you had a wonderful Valentineās Day!)
To be fair it is really, really mentally taxing to be a young person who cares. Youāre surrounded by a world that doesnāt. Everything is constructed to reward you if you simply stop. The effort to care is immense and the rewards are meager. The impact you can have on the world is so, so limited by your wealth, and wealth comes so, so easy if you just stop caring.
But you canāt. I mean, you canāt. If you stopped you wouldnāt be you anymore, it would destroy your soul. But it is gnawing. You could do the grift just for a bit. Save up $10k, maybe $20k. Thatās life-changing money. How much good would it do to your family? Maybe you can forget that there are other families, ones you canāt see, that would be hurt. Well no. You canāt. You are better than that. And for that you will suffer.
i donāt think of myself as a young person (iām closer to 40 than 30), but i agree with the sentiment. i often worry that itās just don quixote energy and the windmills arenāt going to thank me when iām in the ground with work experience that employers look at and scoff. š¤·
Itās the autopilot mode/nihilism that gets at one, but having a self-image as morally superior isnāt entirely honest either I think. No one can be perfect, even typing these words runs on energy partially generated by burning fossils that will lead to early deaths somewhere. These webs of interdependent existence & suffering are inescapable save for maybe a buddha. But at least have the awareness to acknowledge your own role and work to minimize your harm. Not even caring or coming up with fairytales about billions of future digital beings in sublime bliss are both just ways of turning away from looking at the tragedy of life. Maybe Iām getting overly existential, but itās late here.
Strive for excellence, not unachievable perfection.
Iām not quite sure in matters of morality competition should serve as its basis. Itās too easy to game such things, e.g. the aforementioned optimized āhyper-ethicsā of EA or buying indulgences etc. Itās too easy to see oneself as blameless based on some particular slice of life, to become a monster whilst thinking oneself morally as above all others (dictators care deeply about being seen as righteous, why do they all spend so much time on propaganda). Better to admit that everyone, including oneself, sins, and also that everyone is worthy of redemption, and to follow from that.
The motivating factor for doing right should never be that it bases oneself above someone else in any way; a better way, imo, is that moral behavior is more in accord with a sincere, unillusioned engagement with life that is aware of the interdependence of all things, the fluid boundaries of what constitutes the self and hence self-interest.
Excellence does not imply competition. I borrowed the āexcellence, not perfectionismā line from https://www.whitesupremacyculture.info/one-right-way.html