Decedance

[Cognisant]

Decadence cannot exist without inequality, it's a measure of inequality, finery that everyone has is no longer fine but merely the new standard.

We are in the present day compared to the kings of centuries past incredibly wealthy in terms of the clothes we wear, the food we eat, the homes we inhabit, our means of entertainment, etc. But we do not see ourselves that way and oddly enough I think they would agree, a king has power, a king commands men and respect, a king can demand someone's head or their wife's honeymoon night.

I think this is a problem with human nature, that given the choice between being living a normal life in the modern day or being a medieval king/queen/whatever most people would choose the latter, that people desire prestige and power to the detriment of all mankind.

Spoiler

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEkT14RBzDI

In short humans suck, fuck you humans

 

[~~~]

What about all the NTs who would prefer to live in an alternate reality and not in the two choices presented?

 

[Pressure's Spring]

Only a vain fool would choose the role of a king lacking the ability to be one.
Hell, only an arrogant fool would think of himself in such a position.

This is probably the result of the vain idea or foolish presumption of equality. It's a barrier to estimating one's abilities in relation to the world whereby men and women end up taking up or wishing to take up responsibilities that are above their weight, it is this, which results in decadence.

Decadence is the right to overstep; a possibility which arises from freedom (not that everyone who is free over-steps), and over-stepping creates slaves out of freemen.

 

[Cognisant]

It's too hard to choose so you choose not to make a choice but that is a choice, the worst choice, the coward's choice.

It reminds me if that Spiderman movie where the Green Goblin forces him to choose between saving either Mary Jane or a container full of innocent people. Through some heroic bullshit he makes the third choice and saves everyone, achieving the optimal outcome, so basically the writers chickened out.

Likewise your third choice is so very convenient but it's just that, convenience, laziness, cowardice, my question is an examination of human nature and your third option robs it of meaning, do you think you've achieved something? No. I gave you a peak behind the veil and you ran away, did you not like what you saw?

Lol what did you see?
You would be a king wouldn't you and you're too ashamed to admit it even to yourself, rest assured you wouldn't be a king for very long, you were born to be a slave.

 

[nanook]

the slavery creating and environment destroying nightmare of capitalism is that we produce cons to create an insane demand that secures the self-importance of the conmen.

serious example: cause diseases of civilization using toxic food and misinformation about why it's important food (where du u get your brotein, bro?) - then treat people with medication and operations that could never undo the damage done by toxic food, that only suppresses symptoms and prolong a life in misery: look forward to 15 years of alzheimers, bitch. worry about whether your kids will pay your medical bills, bitch. enjoy your decadence, bitch.


minor example: sell more feature-incomplete smartphones/sneakers/etc that won't satisfy a year.

basic income creates an economy where only businesses can prevail that offer a genuine value, that everyone is honestly convinced of.

people who are against this change need to be treated an overdose of the latest pain medication.

 

[Pressure's Spring]

nanook seems to be obsessed with health and diet to an unnatural degree, and that, well, that is unhealthy. A spirit living under the fear of one disease or the other, under the inevitable and highly probable. Is that not a disease itself?

Anywho, again, if one were to be a king lacking the inner constitution, well, then we would have a king with a slavish soul. A self-respecting slave who knows his place is far more honourable. A man ought not to mistake his own motives and needs for another.

 

[nanook]

you kill your parents, your kids, your own future self, for a destructive job opportunity, because you know of no other way of economic survival. you lie about what you really accomplish and by lying you create division between you and everyone else and within yourself. you command people who say the truth into concentration camps for dissidents, make up a false diagnosis, objectify them with third person it-language, call it psychiatric supervision, etc.

none are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely think they are free. and they are also the best slave-keepers. cant even free will what products you put in your body, because you are hooked by advertisement. must lash out against everyone who doesn't consume.

 

[Rixus]

@Cogs - Firstly, the reason Spiderman was able to chose the third option was that the Green Goblin underestimated his abilities. The fact that he dropped MJ who caught herself by grabbing a bar without tearing her arms from their sockets is more dubious. Narratively speaking, whether possible or not, it was necessary to pull off the thirst choice to gain the approval of the New York civilians.

On topic, given the choice, I would not chose to be an archaic king of old. Haven't you seen Game of Thrones? The only contender to the throne with any sense got in a rowing boatg and never came back. Seriously, though, I would not want the responsibility and especially the conditions his subjects would be forced to live in - I could not live in a palace and know people were starving on the streets. And great wealth is a responsibility in itself.

Nowadays, I may live in economic slavery and I may have to be careful of what I buy, but I get to live in relative comfort. As a peasant of old, I'd probably be dying of cholera or similar by now. We forget that while capitalism is still shit for obvious reasons, we exist in far better conditions that we used to. I can turn on my tap and get clean water without worry of it being contaminated, I don't have to worry about my children starving, or freezing in the winter. Granted, this is because I live in a decent part of the first world (relatively speaking). And yes, I'm aware that giving money to Wateraid or buying a homeless person some lunch or competing in a race to raise money for some new sensory equipment for a local autism charity is not going to change the world, that is down to the greed of the ruling class as it always has been.

 

[Auburn]

I'd much rather live in the modern world. I've grown up a little to realize it's always been bad. But the world is better now than it's probably ever been.

We always find new things to complain about. Our moral systems may be faulty but they have been evolving along with our technology. So things like rights, religious freedom, etc. You no longer get hanged for being a nonbeliever.

Anyway I agreed that human nature remains a problem, that even the coming apex of our advancement in modern life comforts can't solve. We just can't be "fully happy" (whatever that means) because we're not designed to be. We're Insatiable.

Part of that is sheer consequence of coming from an animalistic evolutionary origin, which created a cognitive arms race (and we use competition with each other too), propelling us to where we are now, through sheer dissatisfaction. Humans are designed to strive but never reach.

And while that may be unfortunate and counterproductive to us on an individual level- that dissatisfaction is necessary to keep around for us to continue evolving.

Billionaire is the new king. But kings and peasants we will always have, until we take genetic engineering into our own hands.

 

[Black Rose]

I don't need to be a king.
I have philosophy and spirituality.
The search for meaning and higher Truth.

Meditation, Health and Wellbeing.
We are heading for a golden Age.

 

[Architect]

Behavioral finance shows us that people judge their well being relative to their peer group. Given that uniform equality is statistically rare (one particular state out of trillions of possible states) that means there is most likely to be a curve on how well off people are (e.g. inequality is most likely). Finally given greater communication (e.g. the internet) people mentally create peer groups for themselves that may not exist in reality (e.g. comparing yourself to celebrities, etc). Taking these together it means that basically everybody at every level feels disadvantaged, at all times.

For example, I know people in the 1%, millionaires, who feel like they're barely hanging on. The reason is they internally compare themselves to those who are multimillionaires. And they compare themselves to the 100 millionaire no doubt.

Human being are really good at at finding ways to want more.

 

[Cognisant]

Exactly.

How do we fix that?

 

[TheManBeyond]

after going through a quite few different kind of jobs i think i cannot take it anymore
to lose 8 hours in an office + 2 in trains/buses/metro a day makes me so sick and angry with everything
i could be reading poetry, writting it, recording songs, preparing some fresh cacao milshake, watching videos on youtube endlessly, but no, i have to be sitting there in front of a computer doing a repetitive and tiring job. tho it keeps me updated in the news of the world, this is the only good part
still i could do the same on my own
hands down to those creeps refusing in the dark
i hope i can join u all at some point!

there's no way on fixing that! cog!
it's the curl of the burl

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBls6bi-Sg0

 

[emmabobary]

@Cognisant

Nothing to be fixed I think.

We´re just sophisticated animals, very sophisticated compared to the rest, but animals still.

 

[Architect]

How do we fix that?

Fix what, perceptions? Wrong department, I don't work in changing perception.

If you think the mere existence of inequality is the problem, think again. Inequality creates wealth for all, rather than the reverse, at the expense (if you want to think of it that way) that some people happen to get more than they can use, so they end up giving it away anyhow. Rather than spell it out spend some time consulting Gapminder. Cogitate on what happens to the state of the poor over time, it's spelled out in that interactive graph. Notice what happens when inequality increases in the early 20th century - see? It's like a wind that fills all sails.

 

[Auburn]

Exactly.

How do we fix that?

Genetics.

Because any sort of "fix" that is mindset-based will be fickle and socially contingent. So even if we "solved" how to live civility and equally with each other, fifty years later we could see our utopia uprooted by a lashback from repressed urges for chaos and war.

Domesticate humanity and it will feel a hunger for the primal. (think Fight Club)
Take it to the most primal and it will hunger for domestication.

We don't make sense. Not even to ourselves!
And then we wonder why it's so hard to solve the societal problem.

There are more than enough headaches and contradictions at the personal level, let alone the societal.