Wow, yep, extremely well put. It's hard to overstate the harm being done by this trend to turn despair and pessimism into some sort of intellectual/moral stance. I spend more time than is psychologically healthy reading comments by people who have absolutely nothing to add to a discussion but the sense that everything is awful and we're …
Wow, yep, extremely well put. It's hard to overstate the harm being done by this trend to turn despair and pessimism into some sort of intellectual/moral stance. I spend more time than is psychologically healthy reading comments by people who have absolutely nothing to add to a discussion but the sense that everything is awful and we're all doomed.
These are the same people who aren't content to recognise that there's racism in America and get to fixing it. They want an unequivocal, never-ending, (and purely symbolic) affirmation of how hopeless everything is.
See the writing of people like Umair Haque for a perfect example of how this can be monetised.
What I find especially interesting is what happens when their worldview is challenged by the fact that the world actually isn't all bad. All those people who were just *certain* that Trump would win a second term, or that Chauvin wouldn't be convicted, or that COVID would destroy the world, there's never a moment of self examination when they're proven wrong. Just straight on to the next bit of doomsaying.
p.s. Yep, I also learned recently that you can't edit comments. It's infuriating😅
Wow, yep, extremely well put. It's hard to overstate the harm being done by this trend to turn despair and pessimism into some sort of intellectual/moral stance. I spend more time than is psychologically healthy reading comments by people who have absolutely nothing to add to a discussion but the sense that everything is awful and we're all doomed.
These are the same people who aren't content to recognise that there's racism in America and get to fixing it. They want an unequivocal, never-ending, (and purely symbolic) affirmation of how hopeless everything is.
See the writing of people like Umair Haque for a perfect example of how this can be monetised.
What I find especially interesting is what happens when their worldview is challenged by the fact that the world actually isn't all bad. All those people who were just *certain* that Trump would win a second term, or that Chauvin wouldn't be convicted, or that COVID would destroy the world, there's never a moment of self examination when they're proven wrong. Just straight on to the next bit of doomsaying.
p.s. Yep, I also learned recently that you can't edit comments. It's infuriating😅