Okay, the moral panic over birth rates continues, with now cell phones being blamed for it.
And honestly, as someone addicted to tech myself, i couldnt care less. The reason this is a problem is because of the problem of infinite growth. We insist we need more workers to fund social security, and if we cant fund the programs as there arent enough young people working, then this will cause the economy to implode. OH NO NOT THE ECONOMY!
Honestly...I'll be blunt. We havent needed everyone working for a long time now. And in an age of increasing automation and AI taking jobs, we need to work even less. All of our social and economic problems come down to our fixation with work. We are insisting on creating jobs so people can earn a paycheck, because we have this moral revulsion against giving people money directly. We literally created consumerism in the first place, because the wealthy feared a future in which workers no longer wanted, or needed to work, and consumers no longer wanted to consume. And I did have another article planned on consumerism and planned obsolescence based on this video, but that kinda got sidelined, but to sum it up, yeah, Windows basically keeps people on a loop of planned obsolescence to get people to buy more hardware, even if their current hardware is fine. But you cant make money if your current hardware is fine, so we need to constantly create new wants and needs so people can keep consuming. it's why we got articles complaining about how people are keeping their devices for too long and how that's bad for the economy. Everything is bad for the economy. Fricking EVERYTHING good, IMO, is bad for the economy. If you arent constantly working, consuming, and popping out kids to create new humans to constantly work and consume and generate revenue, you're bad for the economy.
So that's where this fricking moral panic comes from. And again, my attitude, F the economy, the economy exists for us, we dont exist for it, we shouldnt be slaves to it, work is a means to an end, not an end in itself, and GDP growth isnt the end all be all of everything. You know good old human centered capitalism. So im not on the same page as these people. AT ALL. As I see it, technology has allowed us to meet everyone's needs with relatively little effort, the big problem with the current system is the distribution of resources, since most wealth goes broadly to the top 20% and more specifically the top 1% or 0.1%, and oh will you look at that, the problem is me because im too busy surfing the internet to one to raise the next generation. Yeah, well, F you guys.
I mean, I admit it, I'm childfree. I am so for selfish reasons. Nothing about having kids is appealing to me. NOTHING. Of course, to my knowledge, only 20% of people are actually "childfree" like I am. Most would probably have kids if they could. But I do think the economy has been screwing us. We cant afford to raise kids properly, and after all of that "dont have kids if you cant afford them" crap, now we're getting mad at people for...being responsible? You cant win either way, but that's the point, the whole system is designed to blame you no matter what you do. It's not designed to be analyzed critically. it's designed to moralize and blame YOU for not living up to ITS impossible standards. because let's face it, if the system had to face the consequences of its behavior, that would necessitate REAL change. So no, let's just blame the people for not doing things the right way, after telling them they've been doing it wrong for decades and they deserve to be miserable if they dont follow a certain morality.
And on cell phones, yeah, they're addictive, eyah, they've changed human relationships. However, with millennials, I really do think that it's primarily an economic thing. With zoomers, we can argue differently. I will give the "its the cell phones" people the benefit of the doubt here. The internet as we know it has RUINED dating and destroyed relationships as we know them. People dont go out and meet each other any more. Everything is done through apps and social media, the environment is toxic. Men are lonely and turning into alt right incels and dudebros, women man hating hyper feminists, it's not healthy. And a lot of it is social media and algorithms. Im not saying all tech is bad, but yeah, these changes don't exactly facilitate human dating and courtship, and I am concerned how gen Z and alpha will end up due to this stuff.
I dont think it's AS bad as the anti technology crowd makes it out to be. Vaush (see video above) and a lot of people like him just seem to have this weird anti technology streak recently. And some people have this weird idea of like "meeting people in real life and doing things in person and putting your phone down is always better." Yeah yeah yeah. You can keep saying that, but have you ever considered that I just find "IRL" activities boring? And I always did. I was always that kid who had their nose buried in a game boy, or a book, or as i got older, the internet, computers, and evnetually smart phones.
And you know what? Maybe I do regret it a little bit. I have to admit my life satisfaction went down since I started spending most of my time online, and there is at least one IRL relationship I regret not really pursuing due to my fixation with the internet. But at the same time, again, IRL is BORING. It really is to me. And even if not for the internet, id replace it with retro games, or tv, or books, or something else. Ive always been that kind of person to be fixated on SOMETHING. It is just autistic behavior for me. SO yeah.
but thats also why i say im different than most people. Most people arent me, and i understand that. Only about 2% of people are autistic, although perhaps this internet age is raising that somewhat, at least manifesting autism like symptoms in people. Either way, if thats what people wanna do with their lives, thats what they wanna do. And I feel like the people who complain are mostly the types who hate technology, or are older and don't "get it", or they're economist types who think if you arent spending all your time working and consuming that you're wasting your time and the downfall of civilization is coming because corporations arent making their quarterly profits. Ya know? And life doesnt exist for us to work. If anything, maybe the internet finally offers that answer for what people do with their time when they no longer have to work. Seriously, thats why we spend so much time keeping people hooked into work. And we never treat that as a pathology. It's only the stuff that doesnt make rich people money that we complain about. And yeah, that's how I see it. So I don't think this is a huge problem.
No comments:
Post a Comment