The scariest thing about COVID is the lack of discussion about our rights, rights we once viewed as being strong. Even in anti COVID circles the term "rights" rarely comes up. In my country at least, civil liberties groups have hardly said a word, when this should be their time to shine. You'll not hear anything about rights in government either, even from protest parties, even though they could potentially gain new voters from it. Discussing rights here should be paramount, even for the most hardcore COVID lovers, because even if you agree with lockdowns, you should still worry about how quickly your rights can be taken from you.
I think the problem is not that most people are stupid or weak, but that they're just not very philosophical. Few people are even thinking about how dangerous it is that the executive branches of virtually every country on the planet have put their constituents under lockdown, with zero approval of the legislature. Why do we even have legislatures at this point? Where is the balance of power? And even worse, most legislatures will happily absolve themselves of their responsibilities here because they don't want the heat that comes with it. Try explaining that to an average person. It's not even on their radar.
It's to the point that in the past few years I've been completely incapable of having a normal conversation with most people. What the fuck do people even talk about now that there's nothing on the fucking television?
It's to the point that in the past few years I've been completely incapable of having a normal conversation with most people. What the fuck do people even talk about now that there's nothing on the fucking television?
Politics are the new celebrity gossip now, and people absorb it just as shallowly as they did the gossip. The founding fathers wanted an informed body politic even at the expense of an open one, but decided against it in the hopes we could have both.
Instead, we've developed the opposite: an extremely active, but uninformed citizenry that blindly follows whatever cause is fashionable for the era.
I'm not a Christian, nor do I go around attacking anyone's religious beliefs, but I always tell my close Christian friends that they are compelled by scripture to be ready to defend their beliefs, and that means devoting time to reading scripture and trying to understand it. If God wrote this book, you should probably be reading it because it's important. Same thing with politics. It has a meaningful impact on your life, you should understand it.
Everyone ignores the things that matter most. I'd say we've "become" complacent, but I think we've always been this way.
People think authoritarianism comes exclusively in the form of swastikas, skulls and crossbones. It's been sold to the masses under the guise of BLM, rainbow flags, and gender pronouns. The concept of rights are in dispute. You can't even get someone to agree rights are something that should be protected at all.
People can't even agree what rights are anymore. Half of the people in this country thino that things like healthcare and UBI are "rights", as if they have a moral entitlement to the product of other people's labor.
It stems from the rejection of capitalism, and its premise of mutual exchange of goods and services. They claim affordable housing is a right. What is affordable housing? Housing of a certain quality that they deem fit at a price earned by labor they deem fit. There is no measure that is ever consensual from those providing said goods, either directly from the service provider, if price controls are set or indirectly, if government subsidies are spent.
When you explain this to people, they will agree with your logic up to the point where it isn't "fair" for some people, because it's characterized as being "denied access" to these goods and services, when in reality, it's that the individual cannot generate enough value to/from society to barter with the goods/services provider.
I think it comes from empathy that was necessary for tribes to remain strong against other tribes, but that has been manipulated into an idea that charity is no longer charity, and a sense of shame from being dependent is now seen as the justice of reparations.
Unfortunately, this trend isn't going away, since you have midwits who want to be seen as moral paragons, hustlers who want financial exploitation, and the ignorant poor who are manipulated without regard for their own self-improvement.
The scariest thing about COVID is the lack of discussion about our rights, rights we once viewed as being strong. Even in anti COVID circles the term "rights" rarely comes up. In my country at least, civil liberties groups have hardly said a word, when this should be their time to shine. You'll not hear anything about rights in government either, even from protest parties, even though they could potentially gain new voters from it. Discussing rights here should be paramount, even for the most hardcore COVID lovers, because even if you agree with lockdowns, you should still worry about how quickly your rights can be taken from you.
I think the problem is not that most people are stupid or weak, but that they're just not very philosophical. Few people are even thinking about how dangerous it is that the executive branches of virtually every country on the planet have put their constituents under lockdown, with zero approval of the legislature. Why do we even have legislatures at this point? Where is the balance of power? And even worse, most legislatures will happily absolve themselves of their responsibilities here because they don't want the heat that comes with it. Try explaining that to an average person. It's not even on their radar.
It's to the point that in the past few years I've been completely incapable of having a normal conversation with most people. What the fuck do people even talk about now that there's nothing on the fucking television?
Politics are the new celebrity gossip now, and people absorb it just as shallowly as they did the gossip. The founding fathers wanted an informed body politic even at the expense of an open one, but decided against it in the hopes we could have both.
Instead, we've developed the opposite: an extremely active, but uninformed citizenry that blindly follows whatever cause is fashionable for the era.
I'm not a Christian, nor do I go around attacking anyone's religious beliefs, but I always tell my close Christian friends that they are compelled by scripture to be ready to defend their beliefs, and that means devoting time to reading scripture and trying to understand it. If God wrote this book, you should probably be reading it because it's important. Same thing with politics. It has a meaningful impact on your life, you should understand it.
Everyone ignores the things that matter most. I'd say we've "become" complacent, but I think we've always been this way.
People think authoritarianism comes exclusively in the form of swastikas, skulls and crossbones. It's been sold to the masses under the guise of BLM, rainbow flags, and gender pronouns. The concept of rights are in dispute. You can't even get someone to agree rights are something that should be protected at all.
People can't even agree what rights are anymore. Half of the people in this country thino that things like healthcare and UBI are "rights", as if they have a moral entitlement to the product of other people's labor.
It stems from the rejection of capitalism, and its premise of mutual exchange of goods and services. They claim affordable housing is a right. What is affordable housing? Housing of a certain quality that they deem fit at a price earned by labor they deem fit. There is no measure that is ever consensual from those providing said goods, either directly from the service provider, if price controls are set or indirectly, if government subsidies are spent.
When you explain this to people, they will agree with your logic up to the point where it isn't "fair" for some people, because it's characterized as being "denied access" to these goods and services, when in reality, it's that the individual cannot generate enough value to/from society to barter with the goods/services provider.
I think it comes from empathy that was necessary for tribes to remain strong against other tribes, but that has been manipulated into an idea that charity is no longer charity, and a sense of shame from being dependent is now seen as the justice of reparations.
Unfortunately, this trend isn't going away, since you have midwits who want to be seen as moral paragons, hustlers who want financial exploitation, and the ignorant poor who are manipulated without regard for their own self-improvement.