This definitely feels like a huge time of change and also of death. Death of the old ways of being in many ways. All this rapid change & growth can create ripples of positive change for those that feel them & feel able to cope with them.
There’s a lot more talk of learning to deal with impermanence & uncertainty, which are signs of human growth. Not easy at all, but needed in these times.
There’s so many people being drawn to slowing down, meditating, yoga, reading books , being in nature that this is creating a counter balance to this tech fervour. We just don’t hear about it in the news.
And even the newspapers are looking back into what they have created & into how they address the way they report.
I don’t buy into this doom forever, as it’s just a shift we have to go through. Sometimes we need to hit rock bottom as a society and individuals, before we decide it’s not working for us / me & make changes.
The governments are showing their true hands now, that was always there, and yet always covered up by lies. That they are not there for the people & that really gives each of us a chance to delve deeper into who we want to lay trust in. Outside authority, inner authority and / or the universal energies (god).
All the social media channels are the same now. Even linked in. Just all the same stuff going around & around. It gets really boring, so I see a lot of benefit in nostalgia.
Of looking into what felt good & what we can adapt and implement now. I don’t use ticktoc, but I can still feel these urges of links to the past that were comforting.
Not an easy time to live in, but I get the strong sense that planting good seeds now, will reap rewards later on. And each of us has to do that for ourselves. Leaning into our own intuition of what feels right.
The true definition of nostalgia, however, is likely closer to a homesickness for a place and time that no longer exists or, more appropriately, never really existed in the first place.
So I would not confuse "nostalgia for 2025" to be sentimentality for the actual 2025 -- just a false version of it that serves emotional needs in the "present" (future).
You could argue that the current U.S. White House administration is doing exactly today that with museums, history, medical research, art, etc. by trying to gaslight citizens about their shared history.
No matter how complicated and digitally enhanced our society becomes, we remain animals. I think (I hope) it will be many decades before this really changes, if it ever does. I think soon we will see cultural reactions to modernity and the loneliness and neurosis that often seems to accompany it. Technology isn't the only factor here, but technological change is driving cultural disintegration and widespread unhappiness. The left doesn't have an answer for this, and is invested in maintenance of the status quo, and so it's beginning to become a political issue. That (politicization) may be the prelude to an inflection point.
We will see (ARE seeing) people intentionally restricting their access to technology. Will this kind of limited abstention become mainstream? It might seem hard to believe right now but I believe that it will. We could heal a huge share of our society's dysfunction if we intentionally ignored the signals of the market (buy, earn, download, watch, stream, click) in an organized fashion. The 'organized' part of that is the tough part. It's difficult to build a culture from nothing, in order to simply to improve the subjective experiences of its members. It's difficult to adopt cultural practices and norms that have been eroded by powerful forces, even if those old practices were regionally almost universal less than a century ago. Cultures don't change to make people happier. They DO often change in the context of political and military struggles, and that is why I believe the politicization of this issue is possibly a prelude to organization. If a political party (or a coalition, or an army, or a country) makes the rejuvenation of the family and the community a priority, even at the cost of technological integration and economic growth, we'll be well on our way. Trimming the size of government, dethroning technocracy and bureaucracy, abolishing transfer programs and bureaucracies... all of these things could open up a space for communitarian flourishing.
Things will have to get much worse before there's a general sense of urgency to take this kind of project on, but birth rates will continue to fall, Western countries' cultures and populations will continue to die and be replaced by outsiders, adolescents will continue to descend into misery and pathology, and the emptiness of the contemporary world will continue to grow. Perversions, loneliness, anxiety, depression, ennui... these are not the markers of a healthy civilization. All of the relevant trendlines (those which indicate happiness and fulfillment) point downward. And now this is quickly becoming a class issue. The educated people seem determined to continue their progressive project, relying on credentials for income and privilege and bureaucracies for social needs, but the rest of society is quickly losing faith in the credentials, and losing patience with the bureaucracies. Across the board our regime of regulation and administrative program and social support is failing, and badly. Worse every day.
We might see a new politics and culture based firmly upon the foundational biological and social attributes of humans. We're animals who need to spend our time active and outside, and who require close-knit communal groups and children and personal challenges for psychological health. We gradually moved away from that condition but the gradual exit turned into a sprint 2-3 decades ago, and now the sprint is accelerating. It's an uncomfortable fact for defenders of the status quo to acknowledge: our current trajectory is psychologically and financial unsustainable. Technology can't solve these problems... it's not even trying. Our options seem to be reform (which is impossible under our current system) or collapse. Right now, we have a massive complex of programs and tools and research which is devoted to addressing the symptoms created by the absence of natural elements of human life (physical activity, friendship, family life, pair bonds, community, nature, sex- and group-based identity). It doesn't seem to be working. Perhaps soon we'll simply focus on replacing the missing pieces in our culture, rather than trying to devise ever more elaborate substitutes and work-arounds. Technology can help, but it can't help unless it's used sparingly and with intention, towards larger goals. Pursuing profit and technological engagement and connection is ends in themselves will only make us sicker and more miserable. Eventually, people will have had enough.
This definitely feels like a huge time of change and also of death. Death of the old ways of being in many ways. All this rapid change & growth can create ripples of positive change for those that feel them & feel able to cope with them.
There’s a lot more talk of learning to deal with impermanence & uncertainty, which are signs of human growth. Not easy at all, but needed in these times.
There’s so many people being drawn to slowing down, meditating, yoga, reading books , being in nature that this is creating a counter balance to this tech fervour. We just don’t hear about it in the news.
And even the newspapers are looking back into what they have created & into how they address the way they report.
I don’t buy into this doom forever, as it’s just a shift we have to go through. Sometimes we need to hit rock bottom as a society and individuals, before we decide it’s not working for us / me & make changes.
The governments are showing their true hands now, that was always there, and yet always covered up by lies. That they are not there for the people & that really gives each of us a chance to delve deeper into who we want to lay trust in. Outside authority, inner authority and / or the universal energies (god).
All the social media channels are the same now. Even linked in. Just all the same stuff going around & around. It gets really boring, so I see a lot of benefit in nostalgia.
Of looking into what felt good & what we can adapt and implement now. I don’t use ticktoc, but I can still feel these urges of links to the past that were comforting.
Not an easy time to live in, but I get the strong sense that planting good seeds now, will reap rewards later on. And each of us has to do that for ourselves. Leaning into our own intuition of what feels right.
The true definition of nostalgia, however, is likely closer to a homesickness for a place and time that no longer exists or, more appropriately, never really existed in the first place.
So I would not confuse "nostalgia for 2025" to be sentimentality for the actual 2025 -- just a false version of it that serves emotional needs in the "present" (future).
You could argue that the current U.S. White House administration is doing exactly today that with museums, history, medical research, art, etc. by trying to gaslight citizens about their shared history.
The before time is always slipping away!
No matter how complicated and digitally enhanced our society becomes, we remain animals. I think (I hope) it will be many decades before this really changes, if it ever does. I think soon we will see cultural reactions to modernity and the loneliness and neurosis that often seems to accompany it. Technology isn't the only factor here, but technological change is driving cultural disintegration and widespread unhappiness. The left doesn't have an answer for this, and is invested in maintenance of the status quo, and so it's beginning to become a political issue. That (politicization) may be the prelude to an inflection point.
We will see (ARE seeing) people intentionally restricting their access to technology. Will this kind of limited abstention become mainstream? It might seem hard to believe right now but I believe that it will. We could heal a huge share of our society's dysfunction if we intentionally ignored the signals of the market (buy, earn, download, watch, stream, click) in an organized fashion. The 'organized' part of that is the tough part. It's difficult to build a culture from nothing, in order to simply to improve the subjective experiences of its members. It's difficult to adopt cultural practices and norms that have been eroded by powerful forces, even if those old practices were regionally almost universal less than a century ago. Cultures don't change to make people happier. They DO often change in the context of political and military struggles, and that is why I believe the politicization of this issue is possibly a prelude to organization. If a political party (or a coalition, or an army, or a country) makes the rejuvenation of the family and the community a priority, even at the cost of technological integration and economic growth, we'll be well on our way. Trimming the size of government, dethroning technocracy and bureaucracy, abolishing transfer programs and bureaucracies... all of these things could open up a space for communitarian flourishing.
Things will have to get much worse before there's a general sense of urgency to take this kind of project on, but birth rates will continue to fall, Western countries' cultures and populations will continue to die and be replaced by outsiders, adolescents will continue to descend into misery and pathology, and the emptiness of the contemporary world will continue to grow. Perversions, loneliness, anxiety, depression, ennui... these are not the markers of a healthy civilization. All of the relevant trendlines (those which indicate happiness and fulfillment) point downward. And now this is quickly becoming a class issue. The educated people seem determined to continue their progressive project, relying on credentials for income and privilege and bureaucracies for social needs, but the rest of society is quickly losing faith in the credentials, and losing patience with the bureaucracies. Across the board our regime of regulation and administrative program and social support is failing, and badly. Worse every day.
We might see a new politics and culture based firmly upon the foundational biological and social attributes of humans. We're animals who need to spend our time active and outside, and who require close-knit communal groups and children and personal challenges for psychological health. We gradually moved away from that condition but the gradual exit turned into a sprint 2-3 decades ago, and now the sprint is accelerating. It's an uncomfortable fact for defenders of the status quo to acknowledge: our current trajectory is psychologically and financial unsustainable. Technology can't solve these problems... it's not even trying. Our options seem to be reform (which is impossible under our current system) or collapse. Right now, we have a massive complex of programs and tools and research which is devoted to addressing the symptoms created by the absence of natural elements of human life (physical activity, friendship, family life, pair bonds, community, nature, sex- and group-based identity). It doesn't seem to be working. Perhaps soon we'll simply focus on replacing the missing pieces in our culture, rather than trying to devise ever more elaborate substitutes and work-arounds. Technology can help, but it can't help unless it's used sparingly and with intention, towards larger goals. Pursuing profit and technological engagement and connection is ends in themselves will only make us sicker and more miserable. Eventually, people will have had enough.
https://jmpolemic.substack.com/p/the-new-right