why is everybody so unhappy?
i noticed during covid that half the people i interacted with were having the worst day, week, month or possibly year of their life
this remains true and i’m not sure why. did we all forget how to be happy?
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Things like MKULTRA and the hegemony of neoliberalism are decades old.
We're living through the decline and fall of a civilization.
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possibly, there are certainly signs
but people have felt that way for the whole history of civilization, so i tend to discount it a little
why are my acquaintances so glum, right now?
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No, they have not. That's a frequently-stated hand wave that doesn't bear scrutiny.
We're not talking about doomsayers proclaiming the coming of the flood or old people nostalgic for the good old days.
Pre-WW1 late Victorian Europe, e.g., would seem delusionally optimistic now.
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I think you’re right that the period you mention was optimistic, but it was an anomaly, made possible by the very fast growth of the Industrial Age
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Perhaps, I'm not a historian.
But I would think based on what I do know that other golden ages of other civilizations have embodied similar energies*.
*for the advantaged few
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That’s basically what I define a golden age as! A period of widespread optimism. But you’ll agree with me that these periods tend to be exceptions in history.
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Yup. Peak of a wave.
I suppose what I think, right or not, is that we are on the far end of such a peak.
So, while things for many of us are better than they would have been in many past eras, the local context is one of slow, some places rapid, decline. Subjective QoL follows.