OpenStars

I dunno, it is a plutocracy now, but why wasn't it a democracy when it started?

Well I did say that people would demand it... which as you correctly point out, is by no means a guarantee that corporations would want to accept.

I mean sure, that too but... what would it accomplish really? There is an arms race, but look at Bill Gate's house... exactly (first, where is it, second, which one(s), third, they are on like entire HUGE islands, fourth they can move the whole thing at a moment's notice, fifth there are other defensive options too, etc. etc. etc.), plus there will always be the "collaborators" who will say "but no, they are the JOB creators" as if that justifies doing, or not doing, anything at all.

Anyway, tech has reached the point that we can put it inside of our very bodies, to hide & power it, plus with CRISPR the tech flat-out becomes our bodies. At least, if you are talking about the stuff available to ~~billionaires~~ trillionaires, whereas to us "normies" all we get are cellphones to mollify & pacify us, yay (and even that privilege comes at the cost of also tracking us, plus can be taken away if we do not cooperate fully or fast enough).

Anyway, tech is neither Good nor Evil, it simply is - and automation isn't the problem, though it could be part of the solution, e.g. if it were to solve climate change for us?

Best I can offer is this:

I believe it is a self-portrait of Donald Trump's clone from 2040?

People have tried that before - every attempt at a utopian society has failed. e.g. perhaps someone will bring "homemade milk", and after the 99th time people begin to relax and whoopsie forget to check it, then a large portion of the group gets exposed to a serious illness, maybe many die, the problems with communal actions get revealed.

Or else that person decides to get REALLY serious with their milk, and people decide to help chip in each week to defray the costs... and voila, capitalism is rediscovered!:-D

Though for the therapeutic benefits alone, it's probably mostly worthwhile - and anyway I'm cynical and bitter so please don't let that stop you:-). Probably the fact that you can see people's faces that would be affected by everyone's actions may make the difference?

I am not a historian, but I get a sense that perhaps the intellectuals at least seemed to think that democracy (in the USA specifically, but also perhaps everywhere?) were just waiting to see how this grand "experiment" turns out. So there has practically always (since 1776 when the fire of democracy was re-ignited in the world after its long hiatus) been this expectation that we might someday fail, and each time something highly challenging comes around they likely re-visited that thought that perhaps it would be soon?

The difference is that this time, it's for real. Even if there were solves already in-place for both globalization and automation, how would climate change be dealt with? I am not saying that it's a 100% certainty - nothing ever truly is, until it has already happened - but I am agreeing with you that there seems less room for hope than ever before, that our way of life will survive intact.

I predict, for instance, that people will start demanding that their employers offer them housing. They might even start demanding longer-term contracts. In essence, they WANT slavery, as opposed to what is coming: anarchy & lawlessness. What good is "freedom" when you have no home, no job, no food, and can't do what you want anyway? This whole "government = bad" idea will cause many people to take refuge in the only other thing that offers even a glimpse of a good(-ish) life: enslavement to corporations. In return they will house, feed, and clothe you - if only barely - and you will in turn commit your very soul to looking after their needs rather than your own, including devoting every waking moment of... oh my, we are already there! (except without the "taking care of you part")

So much so that their name literally changed (to GQP).

In their "defense", they don't want people to learn much of anything, except obedience. :-(

For the same reason that the January 6 protesters call themselves "patriots", dumb anti-vaxxers call themselves "smart", violent people call themselves "peaceful", naive conspiracy theory believing idiots call themselves "woke", etc. It is easy to think that you know the answer, and really, Really, REALLY hard to acknowledge how little we truly know. Likewise we all want to think of ourselves as the "good" people, and it's a super tough pill to swallow that we are not.

Which ironically is what many people say that Christianity is truly about:

There is no one who does "good", no, not one single one. All have missed the mark, and fallen short.

- Jesus

Thank you for sharing that.

He is not entirely wrong - the weaponization of such measures (e.g. gaslighting to name just one) is, if not quite "smart", then at least "tactical". i.e. even if your intelligence is about average but your emotional intelligence is roughly that of a 5-year-old, then yes indeed you can get your way using those measures. That is the largest part of the problem there: it works.

One quote calls out to me:

“It’s not viciousness,” ... “It’s natural.”

But it is entirely a whoosh moment when he understands the idea that for a lion to eat when it is hungry is not viciousness - that much of what he said is (somewhat?) true - yet entirely misses the point that when a human DELIBERATELY CHOOSES to engage in similar behaviors, especially when no hunger is involved, THAT is indeed "viciousness", essentially defined as:

deliberate cruelty or violence

Like, I get it - a homeless person might trespass to sleep somewhere that they should not be b/c they are cold. They might even steal a sandwich b/c they are hungry. That does not make it right but it is understandable. But how does Bezos or Musk not paying their workers measure up when compared to that? Why is the former called "theft" while the latter is called "just doing business"?

I struggle a LOT with the ethics of various matters in life. e.g. should I cease purchasing cheap chocolates, knowing full well that near (occasionally even actual) slave labor conditions are involved (even for those that claim to be "fair trade" or whatever - nope, it's nearly all a lie, according to that video anyway), or would that actually lead to an even WORSE outcome, to deprive those workers of that source of income, when they clearly have nothing else to turn to besides that which can offer anything close to that quality of life?

And I think I know the answer, given by another quote in the article you link to:

There’s something about Newt Gingrich that seems to capture the spirit of America circa 2018. With his immense head and white mop of hair; his cold, boyish grin; and his high, raspy voice, he has the air of a late-empire Roman senator—a walking bundle of appetites and excesses and hubris and wit. In conversation, he toggles unnervingly between grandiose pronouncements about “Western civilization” and partisan cheap shots that seem tailored for cable news. It’s a combination of self-righteousness and smallness, of pomposity and pettiness, that personifies the decadence of this era.

In other words, like Trump, people often give him too much credit. He may symbolize the turning of the tide, and he may even have fallen victim to their swings before most anyone else (at least, at a roughly similar level of power & notoriety), but he is no "driving force" of a man himself, and rather seems more like a child to me. Which notably excuses him from precisely none of his actions btw. It's just that the problem isn't so much him, as all of our society that will continue to elect people exactly like him long after he is gone.

Cancer is also "natural" I note, but it would take a severely twisted person to act like a cancer on purpose. Moreover, why would we, The People, CHOOSE to elect a Cancer to lead us?

You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.

That's what makes matters so complicated to try to address - e.g. sometimes cops are racist themselves, directly, but other times they are not and yet still any race-blind application of "enforcement" is going to merely reinforce the racist policies of society.

"Sad:-("

People said conceptually the same thing before he was elected the first time. The pictures of him besides Epstein, the accusations including one by a then-14-year-old girl that he raped her (she was in that photo too, or or at least others at the same party by Epstein), his own rather damning words seeming to support such actions, the fact that he rarely pays his workers, ALL the MANY court cases... we've seen ALL of this before.

And this time is different. The last time, they voted more for not-Hillary, but this time, many people want to vote specifically for him!? Don't underestimate the number of those who voted for Bernie Sanders in the primary but who then flipped to vote for Trump in the general election. Will this repeat now, for people upset at Biden's treatment of Israel, or how bad the economy is right now (despite the laws that Republicans passed making it this way, plus genocidally inept handling of the pandemic scenario)? Yes, plus also those who would vote Republican regardless, plus ALSO those who would have voted for Trump personally even if he had run as an independent.

So what if they start taking his properties away? That would simply drive him to spend MORE rather than less time on the campaign trail?

I strongly question this conclusion, especially from a site that just wants people to click so they'll say whatever they can to get that to happen. Best for what purpose - him losing the upcoming election? Well, just like the last time, we'll see.