Many moons ago I thought Israel was just defending itself. For two decades now I’ve come to believe they are the problem, and are now committing wanton genocide
Americans.
I would have to say organized religion. I grew up in a pretty strict christian home, but as I grew older I began to see how much of what I had been told was just patently false and designed to manipulate and control. I have done a lot (decades worth) of studying and reading and I’m confident that the conclusions I have arrived at are correct. Of course, your mileage may vary.
Romantic relationships as promoted by society. After dating so many different types of men and always being let down, I’ve decided it’s not worth my time.
And after hearing so many stories of cheating partners doing shady shit, breaking people’s hearts, perpetrating abuse, gambling life savings away, etc., I’ve decided it’s a bunch of BS that either works for very few people, or you need to seriously compromise and overlook a lot of shit with the average person. And I’m so done with that and I’m also frustrated and jaded.
So now when I see a couple all lovey dovey i see them with derision and I start to wonder how long they have until the inevitable breakup or if one of them is doing some shit on the side.
Other than the usual ACAB and distrust of government.
Probably parents.
I used to think they actually looked out for my interests.
Now I know the harsh reality is that:
No one, not your parents, not your siblings, not even your “best” friends, literally no one will care about you. Its every person for themselvesAirbnb. I used to think they were a perfect business. Saw a gap in the market, created a decent product, invested in their users (back in the day they would even send a photographer to take good photos of your property).
Unfortunately the consequences turned out to be awful.AirBnB is almost directly responsible for the surge of housing prices in my local town, and they should die in a fire.
🌈.°`E N S H I T I F I C A T I O N’°. 🌈
The US. Believed in the “American Dream”, but the more I learned about the country, the more I grew to dislike it. It’s all a facade.
And I used to have a lot of respect for old people, but that also changed. They are just as flawed as the rest of us.
Old people who are assholes were probably always assholes. They were once young assholes and got older. Conversely, old people who are good, were probably good people when they were younger, they just got old.
Most people don’t stray far from their roots. Few are those who make a meaningful change. Some choose goodness as a goal, some get their asses kicked by life and turn bitter.
I guess the lesson is don’t be an asshole. if you are one, work toward being less of one until you aren’t one anymore. Try not to let life get you down. If all else fails, drugs.
They are just as flawed as the rest of us.
Or even more so! They also know a few social tricks to get what they want. Oh, I’ve seen it. Lol
Institutions. Courts. Media. Religion. Law Enforcement. Politicians.
The institutions are captured. The courts, media, and politicians are corrupt. Bought and paid for. Law Enforcement are just class traitors. The enforcement arm of Capital. Protecting the interests of the ruling class and taking a bludgeon to the people. Religion is a tool of control. Used to control the ignorant and guide their ire.
Idk I’m starting to think dystopia began when we figured out agriculture
Ironically this take is entirely self-validating, since this is the primary mechanism for that degradation.
The Internet. Social media in particular.
I used to be a “information wants to be free” pure techno-optimist who thought the availability of data at all times would immediately cause a massive boost in awareness, education and intelligence worldwide.
I was super wrong. It was all a mistake and it should be burnt to the ground. Yes, including this place.
It’s the Web 2.0 model of corralling people into walled garden platforms, where they’re driven insane. One day people will look back at this time and wonder what we were thinking.
I mean, in a lot of ways the social media takeover is the antithesis to freedom of information. It’s all siloed off echo chambers where it used to be free flowing, publicly available, indexable and searchable.
I still believe in the freedom of information goal more than ever, but fighting for it in the post information era is increasingly difficult (and important)
Police
Cops (1989) ruined america, taught us to trust these ass holes and they royally fucked us over.
Not making light of everything before 1989, but even after all that shit, the show painted them in a decent enough light to where people spill their guts and trust them, just because they have a uniform and they took full advantage of us.
Police propaganda goes way back before Cops (1989). Dragnet started in 1951 and inspired dozens of police procedurals that made cops look like street smart scientists who studied at the intersection of crime and humanity. In reality they are just a disappointment. ACAB
Apple, and a number of the other big tech companies as well. Shit used to be easy to use, repair, customize to your liking, etc.
Now they don’t want you to be able to fix a damn thing, plus all too many services and features and stuff have gone to the subscription model.
Fuck all with that, give us our stuff back and let us just use what we paid for.
Right To Repair!
I’m gonna say Tim Cook.
The way he signaled his authority was by sending out an email to the entire company announcing that he was expanding the company’s match program for employees who wanted part of their paycheck to go to NGOs. I thought that was a classy way of saying, “I’m in charge.” I had a lot of respect for that.
But his leadership with the App Store and regulators has been abysmal. He led Apple to make all the wrong moves, ensuring a (now active) fight with regulators instead of just making some small concessions voluntarily. It was completely unnecessary, but he just couldn’t help feeling entitled for Apple to do whatever it wants to make money. I still believe there are people in leadership positions who would choose to do the right thing, but the buck stops with Cook.
Apple might be worthy of my respect again when he’s gone.
You have to go back like 30 years to get to a pro-repair Apple
More or less yeah. Though back around 2013 or so, I was somewhat pleasantly surprised by how they designed their Mac AIO desktops, they actually were somewhat repair tech friendly.
The front glass was magnetically attached, so it only took a suction cup or two to start disassembly, and basic screwdrivers to remove the screen and get access to the motherboard, hard drive, RAM, DVD drive, etc.
And yes you could replace or upgrade parts as necessary, none of this newer soldered on storage shit they do these days.
I’ve lost a lot of respect for companies that solder on important parts that should rightfully be fairly easy to replace or upgrade.
Plus, now the big companies have taken to forcing encryption on the storage devices, effectively locking the drive to the system. Well isn’t that just cute for the backup operator that’s trying to recover your late grandmother’s family photos…
Yeah it’s pretty bleak, although there have been some moves towards right to repair in recent years.
Respecting companies is always a bit fraught though. Even the ones you like are only doing it to profit off of your niche. It’s thanks to us that they even have a profitable niche to serve
The video game industry. (Indie games are on fire lately, though.)
AA is where it’s at now. There’s still insanely good games coming out, there just not by companies like EA and Activision anymore.
In some ways I think the good development studios are the same size they’ve always been, it’s just that a new class of mainstream games has risen to profit on the masses. If you ignore those, it’s not so bad. At least not until one of the AAA publishers gets their hands on them to ruin the IP and layoff the original devs
A lot of AA studios have been cramming in a ton of microtransactions still, whereas indie is mostly devoid of it, but it definitely gets a lot better the more A’s you remove.
I am screaming at this sentence both internally and externally.
Christianity and the Democratic Party.
When did any religion deserve respect?
Sure, respect the person (to a point), but not the belief in fairytales
Same goes for any superstitious woo
Things are different when you’re raised in it.
Indoctrination is fucked
If people waited until kids were actually capable of reasoned thought before bringing up the idea of religion, it’d die out within a generation
Yup.
That’s a funny way of saying indoctrinated.
Whether you agree with religion or not, religious groups do a lot of good in the world on a daily basis.
Sure, but religion arguably does just as bad if not worse in all kinds of areas.
It touches on everything from the warped understanding of the world, to superficial gestures of kindness for loyalty in return, to substituting health care with dangerous consequences, to giving criminals a clear conscience, it promotes hateful group thinking, subjects their followers to paths of radicalization or extremism, it both promotes & is used as a tool for suppression and subjugation of others, etc, etc. Yes, religion can do good, but the underbelly is hideous.
The underbelly of human institutions are generally hideous. This does not change the fact that religious groups do good in the world daily, and that work wouldn’t be done otherwise if we simply removed religion all together.
Well, how about we flip it: why are secular organizations not recognized for the work they do? I mean, why are religious institutions getting all the credit as if they were inherently more virtuous?
The only advantage religion has is its active community that propels initiatives as part of a grand ideal. I don’t think the actual work would go undone if the project had already been established from the overwhelming support of an existing secular community. Helping others is, after all, human nature.
Numerous secular organizations get credit for the work they do. Religious isn’t more virtuous.
Go cry about your feelings elsewhere
They do good despite their superstition, not because of it
They’d be just as capable of doing good things without their invisible sky-daddy
Religious groups also do horrific things every day.
Religion is used to justify the worst things
People will always find a way to excuse their shitty behaviour, but religion gets something of a free pass because too many people want their cosmic insurance policy, so they forgive the evils of religion
How do you know any of them would do any of the good things they do without religion guiding them?
Non religious groups do horrific things every day.
Numerous things are used to justify atrocities including our global economic structures, education systems, etc.
No matter what people will do horrendous things and justify them however they see fit. Religious people do good and evil because of their faith and they are no different than anyone else doing those things for their own reasons.
They’re dumber, because they believe in the patently absurd
That’s the difference
You refuse to see the similarities and that is your problem. Stay bigoted friend.
Bigotry is hating someone for an aspect of themselves that they can’t change, like their sexuality, their skin colour, where they were born etc.
Religion is a choice
I don’t hate religious people
But I refuse to respect their beliefs any more than I do a flat-earther, or anti-vaxxer
And religious groups and individuals also do a whole lot of destructive, demented and fucked up acts of evil.
So do non religious people. Pretty easy to see the common denominator wouldn’t you say?
I think you’re not taking into account its hierarchical nature founded on unquestioning obedience, and the unearned & inherent facade of trust it has for some people. These tools aren’t available for the non-religious which is very enabling if your goal is to exploit. And exploit they have.
I think your not taking into account the hundreds of religions there are in the world, and making blanket statements about “all religious people” is at best ignorant.
I want to specify that I’m taking about all the dominant religions in the West with known charities like the Salvation Army. I don’t particularly know or care about the Hare Krishna who gather downtown once a year offering free food with an ulterior motive and practically no noticeable social impact for anyone other than themselves, for example.
I don’t think I could talk about all religions in the world, but I can safely talk about major trends and commonalities. That does not make me ignorant.
In the past I liked how easy it is when one company offer products to basically everything (i.e. Google), but now that I see the consequences, I’m somewhat disturbed.
Aaron Rogers.
