How Bad of a World Are We Really Living In Right Now? 210
New submitter Y.A.A.P. writes: Slate has a surprisingly relevant article of the state of the world today. A reasonable number of graphs and statistical comparisons show that our world is more peaceful than it has been for a long time. The article tells us that, despite what most news outlets (and political candidates) tell us, The World Is Not Falling Apart. Well, not from violence, at least.
It just seems bad because of the news cycle. (Score:5, Insightful)
The news started with
"these are the 5 worst things that happened in our city"
then it became
"these are the 5 worst things that happened in our state"
then
"these are the 5 worst things that happened in our country"
and now it's
"these are the 5 worst things that happened on the planet"
And every day, somewhere, something really bad happened.
And people have trouble determining how likely that event is going to happen to them anytime soon [normally, a lottery ticket is more likely to hit].
Re:It just seems bad because of the news cycle. (Score:5, Insightful)
And every day, somewhere, something really bad happened.
And people have trouble determining how likely that event is going to happen to them anytime soon [normally, a lottery ticket is more likely to hit].
Yes, or evaluating the chances of dying a plane crash vs. a car. (Driving your car is a LOT more dangerous.) Or the probability of a terrorist event. Etc.
People are really bad about evaluating probability, and our fears are shaped by whatever the news media can dig up about the scariest things going on.
I agree with a lot of TFA, though what's missing is the LONG-term perspective. There's a lot of graphs from the late 20th-century on showing how things (particularly violence) are trending downward, but I still remember the first time I saw a graph of the estimated murder rate over the past few centuries. Hint -- it has basically dropped pretty precipitously since the days of medieval Europe.
Granted, the numbers are more speculative, but I think most people just have no freakin' clue how dangerous and terrible life was in the past. Everybody wants to pretend to be the "lord and lady" at the Renaissance fair, but the reality for most common folk was that you struggled to grow enough food to survive the winter. Every year. You were lucky if even half of your children survived to adulthood.
And in those sorts of life-and-death situations, life was -- frankly -- "cheaper" than today. You could get a finger or hand cut off in a random bar fight or a street brawl. If you committing anything resembling a crime, the authorities would likely do it for you. If you tried to leave town, you were very likely to be robbed, stripped, raped, or killed by random "highwaymen."
The trend toward improvement has continued through most of the 20th century and into our current one. Trust me -- you do NOT want to live in a poor urban center of the early 1900s compared to one today. A lot of violence is down compared to a generation or two ago, and it's certainly a heck of a lot better than it was several generations ago. Yes, kids used to roam the street without care late at night or whatever "back in the day," but they were much, much more likely to abducted or suffer a violent attack or whatever back then than they are today. The "golden age" which people are nostalgic for never existed.
What has changed is that we are more fearful of certain things, NOT that such things (in most cases) have actually gotten worse.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Availability heuristic works in advertising too, but if you hear a thing in the news enough times, it brings it to bear sooner and with exceptional relevance in your brain's personal selection process.
And as everyone knows, scandalous gossip just sells better than than the other brand.
If you're American (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:If you're American (Score:5, Insightful)
Does the phrase "Great Depression" mean anything to you? That one took WW2 to work its way out of the economy.
Interestingly, WW2 brought us the GI Bill and the notion that pretty much anyone could go to college. Before that, it was the upper class and the very best of the commoners.
As to "food prices are way up", there are about as many indications that "real" (adjusted for inflation) food prices are down as up. Just depends on what you're buying...
The difference is (Score:3)
If you're on Min-Wage or low wage (which, judging by American Median Income at least half are) prices are nuts. When Min wage was $4/hr I could buy a dozen eggs for $0.80 cents, less if they were on sale. These days the same eggs are $3.20 off sale and $2.60 on. Chicken is the same way. Beef was a bit cheap for a while, but
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, because that communism shit is so awesome that it killed millions without even needing world wars.
Re: (Score:3)
unbridled capitalism
Here's the problem. There's no such thing in the world today as unbridled capitalism except in black markets and a few MMOs like Eve Online.
Re: (Score:2)
Contrast that with the 70s, 80s and 90s where apart from an oil scare and a dip when manufacturing moved overseas things were mostly on the up and up.
You've got some serious selection bias going on. 70's - massive racial unrest over injustice, much worse than today, 80's drugs and gang related crime - much worse than it is today, 90's - just the beginning of the downward trend of the bad things that we're seeing even less of now. Since the 80's the average percentage of the household budget spent on food has gone from 17% to 11%. In the 50's it was 30% and in 1900 it was 45%.
Re: (Score:2)
The news started with
"these are the 5 worst things that happened in our city"
then it became
"these are the 5 worst things that happened in our state"
then
"these are the 5 worst things that happened in our country"
and now it's
"these are the 5 worst things that happened on the planet"
And every day, somewhere, something really bad happened.
And people have trouble determining how likely that event is going to happen to them anytime soon [normally, a lottery ticket is more likely to hit].
In another few centuries, those supernovae in the Andromeda Galaxy will be front page news!
Re:It just seems bad because of the news cycle. (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't blame the news cycle. Do we really needs news headlines like: "People all over the world go about regular business, all goes fine"?
No, we don't need articles like that, which would be pointless.
What we do need (and what I think TFA is arguing for) is perspective. Whether you're talking about overall violent crime rate, child abductions, campus rape, whatever -- the general trend over the past couple decades has been DOWN.
Yes, there are still terrible things happening. And we should work to try to make things better. But there's a difference between focusing on the bad things to make the world better and just being an irrational pessimist with no perspective of history.
I say this as someone who used to be an irrational pessimist. I was the sort of person back in my early 20s who thought, "I can't imagine ever having children -- I mean, who would bring a child into a world that's so terrible?"
I look back at that perspective and realize that my viewpoint was shaped by the news. It was shaped by the continuous clamor of politicians trying to make things sound worse and worse because it was to their advantage in making a case that they were the answer to improvement.
There's more and easier access to information now, and more important stuff is being reported, and that's a good thing. Keep the bad news coming.
Agreed. But maybe -- just maybe -- it might be good to have the news in perspective once in a while. Not "People go about their daily business, and all's fine," but at least an acknowledgement of "Terrible thing X is happening. We still need to improve a lot, but let's just note things have been moving in the right direction on issue X for the past 30 years" or whatever.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The reply that you'll get is one based on zero-tolerance: "even one [murder, rape, war, etc] is too much" and "never, never again." That things are getting better is irrelevant if you can push the emotional buttons for the counter-argument: "with our technology and our historical perspective, we should be advanced enough to ensure that [X] never happens again."
It's words like "never" and "ensure" and "guarantee" that keep progress from gaining acceptance: until we meet unreasonable expectations [which we n
Re: (Score:2)
I was the sort of person back in my early 20s who thought, "I can't imagine ever having children -- I mean, who would bring a child into a world that's so terrible?"
I feel guilty for bringing children into this world dominated by NSA spying, government corruption and conspiracy, and pollution of the climate. My children are looking at a terrible terrible future of enslavement while a select few end up partying and being irresponsible on my children's work.
Re: (Score:2)
Resident of Sweden here, who's already addressed this issue in another discussion [slashdot.org].
Where's the premise? (Score:2)
What does "bad" mean?
I figure "now" ostensibly means the 21st century.
Re: (Score:3)
And I figure "now" means 2015. Since we won't know much about how things are in 2075 for another 60 years....
Re: (Score:3)
And I figure "now" means 2015. Since we won't know much about how things are in 2075 for another 60 years....
Now is 2014. TFA is almost a year old.
Things are looking up (Score:5, Insightful)
The truth is we are living during the safest, most prosperous times in human history.
The media gives us a (false) perception that the world is collapsing under war, civil unrest and terrorism. The reality is that now, more than ever before, people are more likely to die form old age than from a violent death.
Crime is down worldwide. So is hunger, war, rape and genocide.
The world is far from perfect and the Syrian crisis is very real and should not be minimized. But as tragic as things are in the Middle East, what is happening there is the exception, not the rule.
Re: (Score:2)
One major difference is that we now have the power to have a human-initiated ELE.
Re: (Score:2)
Things were great in early 1914 too.
* We've lost privacy.
* We've lost 12 minutes per hour of our entertainment to advertising.
* The quality of fruits and vegetables are down for most people.
* There's a growing set of food intolerance diseases- most likely due to issues with the food.
* If we have another widespread war- it's going to be fast and horrific compared earlier wars.
* If we have another financial panic get thru- it's going to be worse than the great depression.
* If a terrorist group gets hold of in
Re: (Score:2)
In 1940, there was no entertainment as you imagine.
So radio, films, plays, books, and concerts didn't exist?
Professional music performances were rare to non-existent outside a dozen world class cities.
What?
There was no Radio,
Huh? [wikipedia.org]
no TV,
LOLwhut? [wikipedia.org] (Mmmmmmmmmm Godwin mmmmmmmmmm...)
On a personal note, my grandfather proposed to my grandmother during intermission at the movies about a year before the Berlin Olympiad, in 1935. And they lived in a little coal-mining town in Kentucky you probably never heard of, that had a population of about 3000 people. Definitely not a "world-class city".
few dance opportunities,
Huh?
books were expensive and rare, etc.
Poppycock, etc.
I have difficulty believing anyone could be so completely ignorant of h
Re: (Score:2)
In 1914, there was no entertainment as you imagine.
So radio, films, plays, books, and concerts didn't exist?
Note the correction of the year. 1940 was obviously a typo, the discussion was about 1914.
Radio was demonstrated but not used commercially in 1914. No, films didn't exist. Plays and concerts did, but high-quality productions were pretty much limited to major cities. Books, yes.
books were expensive and rare, etc.
Poppycock, etc.
I have difficulty believing anyone could be so completely ignorant of history. But apparently you are.
Compared to today, yes, books were expensive and rare. Most everything was dramatically more expensive than it is today, in terms of what a person with the median income could afford, and that included books. In 1914 most homes had
Re: (Score:2)
Is this supposed to be code for something?
"Film at eleven" (Score:2)
Coincidentally (Score:5, Interesting)
I just finished watching the movie Tomorrowland yesterday. It was a bit of a let-down ... good acting, but the story made the movie weaker than it should have been.
But, hidden within it was this very insightful gem:
"In every moment, there is the possibility of a better future. But you people won't believe it. And because you won't believe it, you won't do what is necessary to make it a reality. So you dwell on this all-terrible future and resign yourselves to it for one reason: Because that future doesn't ask anything of you today." -- David Nix / Hugh Laurie
We like being pessimists when it comes to our future. When we imagine a brighter future, then we are responsible for doing what is necessary to create it. But when we imagine a bleaker future, there's nothing we have to do to make it a reality. We can just live as hedonists until our passing.
Re: (Score:3)
What a load of jizz.
History is full of people who tried to make the world a better place - and succeeded.
And for every famous one there's a thousand others making tiny pushes in the right direction.
Re: (Score:2)
We know exactly what we have to do for a better future. True it is not a complete set of steps which leads from the now to a better future, but we know at least a dozen of things to do to allow a better future to emerge. First, we have to get rid of carbon emissions. We could do that must faster if we would really care, but we do not and we obviously do not care about our kids and grand kids. Second, we need to transform our production industry in a cyclic economy. We also know how to start going there. How
Home (Score:2)
Your perception of how good or bad the world is probably depends most on what's going on inside your home and inside your head.
Despite bad things that happen (which is nothing new, of course) the world is definitely on the good side of the bell curve. Positively above average. Maybe it's the proximity to Thanksgiving, with my family around me and everybody healthy and the Bears beating the Packers, but I feel pretty good about the world now. I can feel pain from all the bad things in the world, have thos
Re: (Score:2)
That actually made me snort-laugh.
You might as well have said "parapsychology studies".
Percentages vs raw numbers (Score:2, Interesting)
Clearly we are getting better at stuff, but for certain things, raw numbers are more important than percentages.
Suppose there was a just a single serial killer out there that killed one person every year for the past 25 years. Population doubles every 23 years or so. So it looks like he has cut his death rate in half, when it has actually stayed the same.
Re:Percentages vs raw numbers (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Suppose there was a just a single serial killer out there that killed one person every year for the past 25 years. Population doubles every 23 years or so. So it looks like he has cut his death rate in half, when it has actually stayed the same.
I'm not sure I understand your point here. In your hypothetical situation where the world only has one serial killer murdering people, suppose there are 1000 people at the beginning. The serial killer is killing 1 person each year, so I have a 0.1% of being murdered this year. There is also 0.1% of the population (the serial killer) which is going around killing other people.
In 25 years, if the population is 2000, now my chances of being murdered by this guy are 0.05%, and only 0.05% of our population
Is the news cycle the only explanation? (Score:2, Interesting)
Or are there other interpretations that explain why it *seems* bad?
Enduring and worsening (I don't know about the worsening part) income inequality, with automation and globalization likely to make income inequality even worse, and automation predicated by many to lead to widespread under/unemployment?
The environment getting much worse -- mass deforestation, global warming, declining fresh water supplies, much of it abetted by ever-spiraling population growth?
While it's true we don't actually worry about a
Re: (Score:3)
The environment getting much worse -- mass deforestation, global warming, declining fresh water supplies, much of it abetted by ever-spiraling population growth?
The environment is getting better. You should have seen how bad the air pollution was in the 70s, for example. Rivers have been cleaned up and come back to life since then.
Re: (Score:2)
The poorest in America are demonstrably better off today than their grandparents ever were.
That depends how you define "the poorest in America". If you mean, "the poorest 50%", then sure, I'd totally believe they're better off than their grandparents. But if you truly mean, "the very poorest people in America," that's doubtful. The rate of homelessness is much higher today than 50 years ago, largely due to the closing of mental hospitals in the 60s and 70s.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
The huge growth in income inequality over that time hasn't helped either.
Re: (Score:2)
Income inequality in the USA has increased since 1970 but is far below historically normal levels. The poorest in America are demonstrably better off today than their grandparents ever were. This is true based on housing, sanitation, health care, education, life expectancy, nutrition, entertainment, transportation, clothing, and safety from crime, natural disaster, or accident.
Kind of a mixed bag, isn't it? Historically worse income inequality suggests that whatever present gains we have made are likely to slide back to more historical norms. Given the likely trends in automation globally and trends toward outsourcing to low income nations (which may be an aggregate benefit for global growth, but in the short term tends to undermine gains in developed economies), income inequality is likely to get worse.
And there is some scholarship (http://persquaremile.com/2011/12/16/income-
Weak arguments (Score:5, Insightful)
Many charts cover only 30 years which is not really a long period in human history. Therefore, the deductions made on that charts are weak or only valid for that short time period. Beside this overall impression, I want to point out in detail the argument about democracy. There are more democracies now than in 1945 or even in 1988. However, this only looks on the name these states give themselves on paper. Many democracies suffer today from lobbying, like the US, the UK, and Germany, which has a negative impact on participation and limits real democratic processes. Furthermore, most Western democracies have an imbalance in media communication, with the all time low of FoxNews.
And it is even worse when you look at the democracies in east Europe. Especially at Hungary, where the prime minister Orban changed the constitution to limit the power of the supreme court. He also favours a illiberal democracy, which is a democracy with no minority rights. That results at the end in no democracy at all. He is also racist beyond comprehension. And Poland just elected a very very very right wing party and president. The latter already stated that judges which are critical of his doings will face disciplinary actions. So there goes the separation of powers.
Or you could look at Greece. It does not matter which government they elect, the EU commission, the ECB, and the IMF define what happens in Greece. And it looks similar for Portugal, Spain, and Italy.
Therefore, democracy is presently in the West not in a good shape. And I do not know if they counted Russia as democratic country. And the situation in India is also not that positive. So I conclude that their assessment on democracy is not correct at all.
Re: (Score:3)
Therefore, democracy is presently in the West not in a good shape.
Compared to 1970, democracy is in very good shape. Of the countries which you mentioned, two were under a communist dictatorship (Hungary and Poland) and three under a military regime (Greece, Spain, Portugal).
It depends on the timeframe you use for the comparison. As much as I am saddened by what happened in the recent elections in Poland, Hungary or Turkey, I think that these are only bumps, and that these countries present little risks of going back to a real dictatorship.
Re: (Score:2)
I hope you are right. However, I fear that these are not just bumps. But we will see how it will look like in 20 years.
Date of TFA: 2014 (Score:2)
By Definition (Score:2)
All societies are by definition living in the "best of all times".
It is just that the definitions change to fit the times.
Calm before the storm, or before world peace (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The past in misunderstood (Score:5, Interesting)
The past is often misunderstood.
A major reason for this is selection bias. The perspectives that generally survive from the past, are the perspectives of the elites. Impoverished people could not afford to create stories, literature, artifacts which represented their points of view.
So, it is not surprising if one's intuitions about the past, when past on the surviving material, give a very biased view: It can create the impression that people lived relatively well, when really it was just the elites' lives that you're imagining.
Plain stupid reasoning (Score:2)
Because things were worse 50 years ago than they are today, it means that they will be just incredibly good in 50 years? Yeah, like we had rain yesterday and today is just a bit cloudy so tomorrow will surely be sunny.
Everybody agrees present days are probably the best humanity ever had. How how close to the apex is it? How will it be in 50 years from now? What's you argument to say it will be better?
Re: (Score:2)
We're moving into a situation where the climate changes will force people from coastal areas, both poor and rich alike. We're still polluting and depleting the Earth at an alarming rate. Furthermore, the income gap between the rich and poor is widening. There seems to very little control, and where it does exist it's often more evil than where it doesn't exist. Besides all that we're still living in between nukes and nuclear power plants and those *are* going to blowup once in a while, if history has thoug
Re: (Score:2)
You know what, I was having exactly the same thought regarding the Fermi paradox. Why don't we see alien civilization? Because we expect them to be massively large scale, and they probably aren't.
If we look at ourselves and our future. The human race might probably survive for a long time, but probably not in its current population levels. If we want some growth in our standard of living, that means more energy consumed individually, which we can't achieve at a global level. That's the gap you are talking a
Article is almost 1 year old (Score:2)
And I bet everything seemed hunky-dory in Rome.... (Score:2)
...before it was sacked. Some folks see weakness and irresolution growing in the western world. They see barbarians like ISIS rising up to fill the vacuum left by the west's loss of confidence- and they see dark ages coming again. If nothing is done, the new dark age may be 50 years out, or they may be 20 years out. (And certainly dark times have arrived for real in parts of the middle east.)
Civilizations rise because they have insights, standards and practices that are superior to those around them. Those
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, good, so maybe we have a few extra years before before the west falls to barbarians.
their "world" ignores the environment (Score:2)
These clowns manage to opine about the state of the world without mentioning "environment", " climate ", or " species ". It's nice that war and violence are down, but ignoring the fact that overpopulation, habitat destruction, and climate change have brought our home planet to the sixth great extinction event is unforgivable. The world IS falling apart, you deliberately clueless assholes.
Show us the numbers (Score:2)
The author makes some statements about declining violence and says: The only sound way to appraise the state of the world is to count. How many violent acts has the world seen compared with the number of opportunities? And is that number going up or down? As Bill Clinton likes to say, “Follow the trend lines, not the headlines.” We will see that the trend lines are more encouraging than a news junkie would guess.
But then - no numbers.
It has some details ab
Re:Yeah, but that just means... (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it just means that as education prevails, people are less prone to fall for insane cults. The people who disagree tend to be fundamentalists, communists, and Luddites.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
No, it just means that as education prevails, people are less prone to fall for insane cults.
The anti-vaccination craze? Fad ketosis dieting? Near-worship of media figures like the Kardashians? Climate change skepticism? I'd go on but that's already more than enough to refute your statement.
The people who disagree tend to be fundamentalists, communists, and Luddites.
Cheap name calling. If this is the best your education can muster, it has obviously failed you.
(Although, it did get you modded highly. Another refutation of your original thesis.)
Re: (Score:2)
The anti-vaccination craze?
This is mainly a cultish behavior.
Fad ketosis dieting?
Epilepsy treatment is considered a fad?
Near-worship of media figures like the Kardashians?
Hipsters also behave somewhat cultish. See how the Apple logo triggers brain reactions similar to somebody hearing a religious sermon, for example.
Climate change skepticism?
There can never be too much skepticism. Whether you are for or against, science just doesn't work without skepticism, especially during peer review.
I'd go on but that's already more than enough to refute your statement.
No you didn't. You basically sounded like that news broadcast in V for Vendetta where that guy says "Immigrants, Muslims, homosexuals, terrorist
Re: (Score:3)
As evidence piles up there comes a point when you're simply using "scepticism" as an excuse to refuse to believe a conclusion you don't like. For climate change, that point went a long time ago. What ever reasons drive climate change "sceptics", they have nothing to do with science.
Re: (Score:2)
So what conclusion am I supposed to draw from your best counter-argument being an unrelated religious quote you don't even believe?
Re: (Score:2)
No, it just means that as education prevails, people are less prone to fall for insane cults.
The anti-vaccination craze? Fad ketosis dieting? Near-worship of media figures like the Kardashians? Climate change skepticism? I'd go on but that's already more than enough to refute your statement.
You would only be correct, if cults had a smaller membership in the past. I'll note that we've had over the past thirty years a sharp drop in both the membership and severity of communism.That directly improves the lives of about a billion and a half people living today.
Re: (Score:3)
"Less" means "not as many as before"; it doesn't mean "none". Also, as long as reality continues to defy the Warmist Cult doomerism, skepticism is the most rational choice. There are three factors lining up right now that could make the climate cool down markedly in the next 5-10 years. If that happens, it wi
Education can never replace intelligence (Score:2)
Too many people are confusing 'Education' with 'Intelligence'
***Education can never replace Intelligence***
There are so many cases where highly educated people - even Engineers / Surgeons - have joined cults
Many of the 'volunteers' for the Islamic State are highly educated people - no, they are not the ones you see in those gruesome videos, but they joined Islamic State and work as administrators / accountants / planners and keep the bureaucracy running
Another example: The cult of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh b
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
As a communist luddite, I find your comment offensive. May the full might of social justice warriors(SJW) reign down upon you.
Slashdot is supposed to be a safe place. Savage!
You forgot the fundamental
I'm a communist luddite, you insensitive clod!
Slashdot is supposed to be a place of tradition, which reminds me...
Preemptive Moo!
From the Last Year's Breaking News Today dept... (Score:2)
I like Steven Pinker, and I liked this article when I read it. But it's from December 2014! Not exactly newsfeed worthy anymore, Slashdot.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm a communist luddite, you insensitive clod!
I'm an insensitive clod, you communist luddite!
Re:Why, You! (Score:4, Informative)
Rain. May the full might of the grammar nazis rain down upon you....
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
Re: (Score:1)
The SJWs are the reason that things are getting better, actually. Did you think the rise of concern over social justice and the decrease of violence in the world at large were just coincidental?
But please, keep being angry as you watch the world slip away from your kind.
Re:Why, You! (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Why, You! (Score:4, Informative)
Do you mean those SJWs that want to repeal the First Amendment? [youtube.com]
Re: Why, You! (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you referring to the *innovation* known as the US Constitution?
There are certainly any number of things wrong with the US--but having a founding document that clearly spells out rights and freedoms for its citizenry is not among them.
Re: (Score:2)
The Magna Carta was an agreement between a king and a group of nobles, guaranteeing the rights of the latter. Not the same thing at all. But thanks for playing.
Re:Why, You! (Score:5, Insightful)
The SJWs are the reason that things are getting better, actually. Did you think the rise of concern over social justice and the decrease of violence in the world at large were just coincidental?
I don't really think so. Of course, this depends on how you define an SJW, but it seems to me that the most ardent social justice supporters tend to themselves become bullies, and when they do they're worse bullies than the classic schoolyard bully. Take for example mass shaming over a single tweet, or getting people fired just because they made a mildly sexist joke. And unlike a typical bully, there's nothing you can do about it. The SJW doesn't care though, just so long as they feel better about themselves for having done it.
There is already somewhat of a precedent that public shaming runs afoul of the 8th amendment. In fact, here's a quote from Benjamin Rush, who was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence:
“Ignominy is universally acknowledged to be a worse punishment than death ... It would seem strange that ignominy should ever have been adopted as a milder punishment than death, did we not know that the human mind seldom arrives at truth upon any subject till it has first reached the extremity of error.”
Re: (Score:2)
You're trying to defend a pejorative by using an absurd caricature as a straw man stand-in for people who actually support justice. It is pretty weak sauce. I mean, think how awesome and powerful Justice must be that you have to pretend it doesn't exist in order to argue against people who support it?
Justice and Social Justice aren't the same thing. One is intended to right a wrong, the other is intended to make everybody the same. While that might sound good, it often results in knocking people down just for the crime of being successful. When taken to an extreme, (such as an SJW) it results in the examples I listed, and instead of bringing down successful people, they come down harshly upon anybody who happens to make an ill conceived but otherwise benign action.
You even throw in a True Scotsman for good measure
Not at all. I very clearly outlined wha
Re: (Score:2)
That's fuckin rich right there. Oh, wait, you actually believe that? Let me laugh even harder at your stupidity.
I'd be curious what the counter-argument actually is... if I thought there was one.
We have direct democracy where I'm from, and we have however much Justice we want. Sometimes more, sometimes less. And the people fighting for Justice are invariably the "good guys." If you disagreed about the meaning of Justice, you'd still have to agree that Justice is good. Is there a counter-argument? Is it any good?
Re: (Score:2)
Right, you describe it as a false pejorative that you use pervasively. I say that proves you don't care about Justice. And I advise you that Justice is a positive thing, not a negative thing. The meaning of the word has only changed for you. For others, Justice means what it means; "justice" doesn't mean "false justice."
Can you truly not see how that harms people who are "actually discriminated against," or how it demeans people who are fighting for Justice for people who are "actually discriminated against
Re: (Score:2)
Well, that's the reduction of the surge of violence associated with the introduction of leaded gasoline, but that only lasted a few decades. Meanwhile the falling of violence is a trend that extends far further back in history than that. For example, in the 20th century your chances of dying by violence was less than at any previous time in human history (or prehistory, as determined by weapon-inflicted skeletal damage). And that includes the tens of millions of people that died in WWI and WWII.
Re: (Score:2)
As a communist luddite, I find your comment offensive. May the full might of social justice warriors(SJW) reign down upon you.
As a liberty loving conservative I believe I should have the freedom to silence you communist luddites because highly regarded principles should only work in our favor.
Re: (Score:2)
But comrade, through technology we can achieve a true hive-mind.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Then replace "education" with "empirical education" in my previous post.
Re: (Score:3)
I'm sure you mean "education" as the indoctrination of peoples with beliefs that you yourself support of course.
Just basic literacy will help a lot. Most conflicts in the world involve illiterate soldiers on one or both sides. Modern war is very expensive, and very destructive. War almost never makes economic sense. Most countries have market economies, so if your neighbor has resources that you want, you don't need to take it by force, you can just buy it.
Re: (Score:2)
It rarely makes overall economic sense. But if you're Halliburton or Blackwater ...
Re: (Score:2)
The form of his statement makes it clear that he's saying it doesn't make sense for the sides that are fighting. You point vaguely at stuff that contains various truths, but they're not relevant to his point, don't change it any way, and you didn't even attempt to actually add anything.
Are you suggesting that external profiteering means that educated soldiers would NOT want to end a conflict once they understand that it harms their own side, and has no chance to make life better for their families? Or are y
Re: (Score:3)
Just basic literacy will help a lot. Most conflicts in the world involve illiterate soldiers on one or both sides. Modern war is very expensive, and very destructive. War almost never makes economic sense. Most countries have market economies, so if your neighbor has resources that you want, you don't need to take it by force, you can just buy it.
Bad for you, worse for the other guy. Don't underestimate how much the stronger player can abuse their position until they go one step too far.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:It depends where you live in the world (Score:5, Informative)
Well, right now "this world is more peaceful" it depends where you live: Go to south america like Venezuela, Brasil, Colombia, Salvador, Mexico see the world there or go to Middle East, specially Siria and around there and see there. Go to africa and visit some countries there and see too. It isn't a "World Peaceful" there too.
This is true when compared to the first world, but untrue compared to the way things were even a couple hundred years ago. Dozens of people killed in rioting is not the same thing as one tribe systematically conquering another tribe, killing all the men, adult women, and boys, and taking the girls as sex slaves -- the sort of practice you can read all about (and apparently God approves of, according to ancient Israelite priests) in the Bible (Torah).
Re: (Score:2)
If you consider that our interpersonal relationships have been on a serious decline since the industrial revolution, the divorce rate is the highest it has ever been, children resort to violence first and diplomacy only when trying to talk themselves out of punishment, I would say we are not, in fact, in a very peaceful time at all.
There's always some bullshit reason out there why things are getting worse. But since we're talking about the children, I've heard that they've been getting worse since ancient times. Pretty soon, they'll be backtalking and uppity. That's certainly just as bad as killing 70 million people in a world war.
Re:Absence of Evidence is not Evidence of Absence (Score:5, Insightful)
What you seem to be missing is that War is a macro-aggressive, acute failure of society. Microaggression is a stealthy, sinister, chronic failure of society that is far more widespread and far more damaging to the long-term health of humanity than is an acute War that has a beginning and an end.
What you seem to be missing is that macroaggression is a real thing which kills people. Microaggression is in your head.
Re: (Score:2)
I wish I had mod points so I could give you a '+1 KO' mod!
Re: (Score:2)
What you seem to be missing is that War is a macro-aggressive, acute failure of society. Microaggression is a stealthy, sinister, chronic failure of society that is far more widespread and far more damaging to the long-term health of humanity than is an acute War that has a beginning and an end.
Others have addressed the first major flaw in this argument, which is that killing people is worse than being mean to them.
But there's another flaw, which is your apparent belief that microaggression is something new. It is definitely not. People have always been nasty to each other, and we're significantly less nasty to each other today than ever before. The notion of microaggression is perhaps the best proof: previous generations didn't even bother thinking about microaggression, because it was just nor
Re: (Score:2)
That leads to the second observation, that microagression is a matter of p
Re: (Score:2)
I don't think that the divorce rate is a good indicator for worsening relationships. I think it is more of a consequence of improvement in the standards of living and women empowerment.
Before that, couples stayed together because they had to. To oversimplify, women needed men to make a living and men needed women to take care of the housework and kids. Now, both men an women can make a living by themselves, housework is less time consuming and there are more options for single parents to take care of kids.
Re: (Score:2)
When did people start sticking an "of" into this construction? It should be "How bad a world...?"
Re: (Score:2)
If you'd actually read the fine article, you might have noticed that the author provides a breakdown of various types of conflicts, mass killings, genocides, and so on.
Re: (Score:2)
You do realise that, 20 years ago, Bill Clinton was in the White House, right?
Re: (Score:2)
Is the current issue so important that you have to win, even at the cost of making the world a less rational place? No? Then don't shout. Instead, calmly explain your viewpoint. That way you advance the cause of solving disputes through rational discourse rather than shouting the loudest, which should result in the world becoming a better place overall since being rational helps us make decisions that get us what we want
Re: (Score:2)
The current "refugee crisis" isn't didlley-squat compared to what happened in Europe and the USSR in the 1940s, when tens of millions were relocated to match the new international boundaries. (Or in China and Korea after the Japanese colonies there were disestablished.)
For starters, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]