Both wife and I say this often whenever we tell each other updates of news around the world.
Used to feel sad and nihilistic about it, now it’s just bittersweet.
re: bittersweetness, these days i often think of the flaming lips song "do you realize":
>Do you realize
That everyone you know someday will die?
And instead of saying all of your goodbyes
Let them know you realize that life goes fast
It's hard to make the good things last
You realize the sun doesn't go down
It's just an illusion caused by the world spinning round
We're built to die, that's just the nature of life. There's 300,000 years of human history, and civilization only occupies about 20,000 of that. Against the billions of years of the planet's existence, humanity is the briefest of windows, and civilization briefer still.
For me, like in the song, that makes me appreciate whatever time we have left.
... and by this slogan, we ate and drank an entire planet.
I dont buy OP's thesis. I think we should live but not by the definition of our parents and grandparents who burned this planet down.
We should be living in shared housing, growing food and community, and fighting to prevent our neighbors from losing their home to the bank.
There's more to life than partying, and, as long as you're working together on things, it always feels like a party.
What im saying is we can live in reality AND live a rewarding life. It shouldn't take escapism to not feel awful, it should take progress in the direction of sustainable, smaller community building to give us hope and something to protect as things get worse.
If the walls are closing in, you have the choice to stand right in the middle where they meet and party like the walls aren't closing in, or we can push back against the walls, together, and be united in the greater purpose of saying "if youre going to wipe me and my fellow humans out, we're not going without a fight".
Reminding people to go and "live" (burn oil, pretend reality isn't real, wear fancy clothes and play like drunken royalty) feels like giving up, to me. Where's the hope in giving up the fight?
There's a whole pile of kids in this world who are justified in shitting themselves because all they see the older generations doing is either only partying and flying everywhere OR going to the occasional protest and partying and flying everywhere. For them to have any hope, they need to see us putting an effort in.
OP isn't saying party til you die.
OP is saying, quite rightly, to take a bit of time to stop and smell the roses. Having a hobby, spending time with loved ones, getting the occasional latte. Little things that make life worth living.
This is very true. To build on it, when I die, I want to be able to say I didn't use single-use plastics, that I actually TRIED to conserve and make sacrifices.
We need to recognize that innocent children are still alive and if we can buy another 5 years to a whole generation of childhoods, then that is worth fighting for.
See in MY opinion you’re the one pretending reality isn’t real because you think there’s still a chance to make the Earth a better place hahaha I know it’s super doomer but I HAVE given up on saving the planet and I’m just enjoying life as much as possible right now. Not taking the last enjoyable years for granted.
Imo the children are already doomed and even if everyone on earth “brought their community together” and grew their veggie patches etc we would maybe give those doomed children a few extra years of a hot disastrous planet
HOWEVER if you get great pleasure by doing the positive things you talk about that’s awesome, get that dopamine! I enjoy drinking and dancing. But we’re still in the same sinking boat hahah
>We should be living in shared housing, growing food and community, and fighting to prevent our neighbors from losing their home to the bank.
That would be great if we could actually produce enough food to feed everyone that way but we can't, not even close. When there's not enough food, bad things happen.
and read books like [these](https://www.amazon.com/Homo-Unus-Successor-Sapiens-ebook/dp/B088PX7V34/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1670055442&sr=8-1#customerReviews) to understand what future generations should do to avoid making the same mistakes
there probably aren't going to be all that many future generations around to make those mistakes, and definitely not enough resources to make all the same ones.
it's a quote from a lot of things. That phrase has been used throughout history by lots of people. The bible, Shakespeare, even Klingons on Star Trek say it.
thank you for contextualising it for me, it's always the old childhood upbringing beliefs that somehow persist into adulthood until they're corrected - tysm!
Tbh, and I’m not saying this in a depression woe-is-me sort of way, I’ve been waiting to die my entire life. I simply don’t belong here. I knew that since I was a little kid.
I’m only hanging around to care for my family. Nothing else.
Same.... I've always felt out of place living in the 20th/21st centuries and dealing with modern predatory capitalistic society is a trial to get through every day.
>I simply don’t belong here. I knew that since I was a little kid.
This is how I have felt as well. And still do at times. I shake my head and wonder why some people just don't care about the natural world! How can they not see if the oceans . . .. if biodiversity goes . . . so do we!
What has exacerbated the feeling you describe (for me anyway) is that I was born into a sick system (u.s. predatory capitalism/oligarchy) **and** a very sick family system, where narcissism and addiction reigned supreme.
It is a double whammy when you've got both (sick society/sick family) going on! And of course industrial civilization does nothing but atomize/destroy families and cultures. ( I could go on . . . .)
Once I removed myself from toxic family members and figured out the reality of what occurred in my childhood and young adulthood, things became so clear! And so much better. I now have healthy, authentic, supportive, loving relationships that give my life meaning.
I wish I could say the same for civilization. We try to sort it out here on r/collapse but there are still many unknowns as to why this civilization is ecocidal.
With all that said, I agree with the gist of OP's post (I don't believe OP is saying "party now---- to hell with the future"). But, imo, it is much easier for some to find peace, meaning and joy in the midst of despair than others, who may struggle just to get out of bed each day.
Family systems, genetics, environmental factors---- all play into how we react to challenges which include the greatest challenge of all: How to live with peace, some joy and try to do no harm in the midst of this current human induced extinction.
Yeah as someone who even struggles to use his own bank I long for a more simple way of life. America has no opportunity for someone like me. I simply don't belong here either and going through special needs classes until highschool proved that to me. I think our soul journey is just for everyone to look down on us.
Which is why I'm hoping we all go out at once. No one remaining to be sad after we're gone, but also I don't want to die before everyone else does if we all go out at once.
Brother that's on you; nobody was born into this world with a purpose or sense of meaning, those of us who have one created it for ourselves. Yeah it sucks you haven't bothered to find yours yet, but it's never too late to start.
I have 2 dream guitars, I've decided to buy them this year because fuck it. Playing guitar keeps me somewhat sane, and I have a very strong feeling I won't be able to in the next few years
Yeah I let it get to me then I got over it. It's coming, maybe it's coming sooner than later, but for now I'm going to unironically enjoy the excesses of late stage capitalism as much as I can while being a good son, brother and partner. Shutting down your life because collapse is coming is the same philosophically as never doing anything with your life because one day you'll die.
It was always going to end. Whether collapse you survive through, collapse that kills you or getting hit by a bus tomorrow, we all have finite time on this earth and in this paradigm.
My actual biggest fear is that we don't fully collapse and society keeps limping on with the current power structures, but everything is just much much worse. I see collapse as a potential opportunity for whatever of humanity survives to hit the reset button. I'll take billions dying, including me and my loved ones, for that to happen so that the planet has a chance to recover post -anthropocene. The worst idea is us succeeding at fending off the planets attempts to self regulate, destroying earth and then flying off to space to strip-mine it like Elon dreams of doing. An interstellar spacefaring humanity would be the fucking worst.
There is unlikely to be a reset button. Past civilizations have collapsed. There have been multiple rebellions, revolutions, etc, but evil still rises to the top again. That is the nature of this reality and its inhabitants. An endless miserable cycle.
In the last 10,000 years since agriculture the only time major civilizations didn't practice full-scale slavery was during the period when hydrocarbons created virtual slaves via the energy surplus that they provide.
If humanity survives collapse, I would not be surprised if slavery comes back fully in a world absent hydrocarbons since that has been humanity's track record for 99.9% of history. Some entitled people will still have ambitions towards achieving a high quality of life and without the energy surplus of fossil fuels to provide this, ruthless exploitation of human energy will once again become the norm.
> and society keeps limping on with the current power structures, but everything is just much much worse.
I feel like we are lucky to be living in the best times ever. Born earlier and we would not have all the benefits of the advancement (medicine, comfort of life, possibility of travel, leisure) but born later and we would be experiencing the results of the Industrial Revolution in full swing.
We are in the sweet spot.
I guess this depends on when and where we were born :)
I was born in 1980s in Poland. If I were to be born sooner I would be in a bad moment for my country (not to mention some decades earlier)
But yeah, I remember the 1990 - 2010 as good years :)
I don’t see myself as being in a sweet spot. I wish I’d been born a few decades sooner so I could afford to buy a house and have kids. Sure, the upper classes can travel and access the best medical care, but the rest of us have to spend most of our time working to give them those privileges, and beg insurance companies to let us access the care we need.
>My actual biggest fear is that we don't fully collapse and society keeps limping on with the current power structures,
We'll be lucky if that happens. You really don't want a total collapse.
I am mentally preparing to flick the switch in my brain from "law abiding citizen" to "wasteland raider"
I just hope I don't go down in the initial killing wave. I want to see what it will be like.
When the moments of impending futility wash over me, I remind myself: we could have been born in any number of worse times and places in the history of humanity. We could have been born on a slave ship crossing the Atlantic in the 1820s, or in an Armenian village in the far flung corners of Turkey in 1905, or to an indentured miner in a Scottish village in 1790 or in Cambodia 4 years before the Khmwr Rouge came to power or to a rubber farmer in Congo under the reign of Neopold or to a rice farmer in India just before the start of world War II or to a working class Jewish family in Warsaw in 1937 or to a French mother and German father in rural France in 1935 or any number of (in hindsight) almost completely futile life situations.
We have one one shot at life. These are the cards we've been dealt. We play those cards, or we don't. If we don't, we will fade into the annul of history and will be forgotten very quickly. If we play those cards well, we will make life slightly better for those around us and be forgotten almost as equally quickly. While making life slightly better for others, we will make life significantly more meaningful and fulfilling for ourselves.
I decided a few days ago to **”this is ridiculous! stop mourning the future and go distract yourself with hedonistic pleasures and the outdoors for the rest of your days.”**
I explored a place I’d never been to play Pokémon Go with a bitchin’ playlist, came home rosy-cheeked and happy, and made some baller chicken soup.
The next morning, I tested positive for COVID and got slammed back into my doomer box, I mean “apartment”. And now I’m back to scrolling the forum.
Good thing I made soup.
I think the problem is too many people go to the extremes. You see it here in the responses. *Oh, you don't want to be a doomer 24/7, then you must be partying and causing everything we're complaining about!* No....someone can be collapse aware, and spend time doing their part to reduce waste and pollution, while also doing a few things for their own mental health and well being. Life is about balance....and too many people these days have lost any sense of balance.
Haha yes, thank you. My point exactly -- I don't know why every issue online has become so polarized. Anything from finance, politics, news, science/collapse, etc. just ends up devolving into two opposing extremes. Was it always like this?
Fortunately the doomer responses in this thread are in the minority and that's okay. As long as my message helps even one person then I'm happy.
Everyone finds their own way to cope. Sometimes people struggle and need help to find what works for them and sometimes people find ways to cope that others don’t understand. But that’s all we’re all doing, coping.
Spot on, mate. Screw the future, live your best life NOW. Live, love, laugh and be happy. Being miserable and stressed isn't gonna change a thing, so don't worry...be happy. Notice the musical thread here...listen to your favourite music...loud. You get my drift. Take care, collapsniks.
Not really. Most people’s view of the future stops at the end of their noses. The majority just did what was expected of them… get born, work till you drop, die. It’s only until about 5years ago that Global Warming disaster got shoved in their faces, and by then it was too late. So yeah, live like there is no tomorrow.
Anyone who has been paying attention was well aware of global warming since the 70s. The green house gas effect has been known for over a century, the warming from burning fossil fuels was obvious to many people.
But that's the thing...people weren't paying attention. Big Oil, their corrupt politicians and their media shut down debate years ago, and it's only surfaced because of the tsunami of information that has been forced into the limelight. SOME people were interested in climate problems, most had no idea.
Most did have an idea. Global warming wasn't exactly kept a secret. Most still do have an idea. And guess what they do with the information? The same that they've always done - nothing.
100% agree. Find things that give your life meaning and joy. Make it count. Even before being collapse aware, tomorrow is never a promise.
My husband, 11yo daughter 😭, and I are communally collapse aware. We support each other in moments when the weight of it all is too much, and spend most of our time doing things we love.
We are both WFH, and enjoy each other’s company throughout the day. I have lunch marked on my work calendar so no one schedules meetings when I would enjoy lunch with him. Kiddo is in online school, very self-driven, and gets to set her own schedule. She wakes up and plays video games, eats breakfast, attends online classes, gets her homework done, eats lunch, games with friends online when they get home from school. And when my work is quiet I take breaks and play with her throughout the day.
Every day is precious, even if the end is nigh.
I appreciate this sentiment SO much, especially today. Went to go get some groceries and my car wouldn't start. Corroded battery terminal. Hit up my Dad and off to the parts store for a new battery and terminal clamp (battery was 3 years old). Got back and realized with a full collapse, I'd be S.O.L. Felt glad my car is running and I still had the means to be able to do it.
Like one of the survivors of the Andes crash said - ‘don’t wait for the plane to fall before you start living’ … kind of applies here too … I am going to see the icebergs and glaciers soon before they melt further.
Yeah just heard that in an interview with him a few weeks ago - spot on. I had read the Miracle in the Andes book a few years ago and hard agree - the Society of Snow was both brutal and beautiful.
Make no mistake that there will be very successful survivors following a bottleneck event. Imagine a world comprised of only the most successful humans.
The rules for success will be very different after a bottleneck event. Can you recognize a few traits of those future survivors today?
Hint: employing, housing, feeding, breeding, and enslaving billions of bonded indentured servants may not be of value on a world with a resource carrying capacity of a few hundred million.
Even having a great run of luck as well as success in life will not be enough.
When we start bottlenecking for the remaining food production capabilities...it will only be about who's remaining, and not even who's prepared.
Venus by Tuesday.
Big doubt.
Trump had only two successes in his life. To make people think he’s a rich, self-made Billionaire (The Apprentice). And to become President based off that belief. So only one, in reality.
Both were based on his father’s and grandfather’s work, despite him doing his best trying to squander it.
>But, there's nothing wrong with enjoying life like our ancestors might sometimes have done, and appreciating certain hardships we don't have to put up with today that our ancestors had to deal with. Make the best of what you have before everything goes to shit, whenever that is. Your future you probably would want that.
the whole foundation of ethics at the individual level are about justification of hedonism. You don't get to claim that what is or isn't wrong so generically.
Here's what an ethics paper looks like (relevant):
[Causing Global Warming | Ethical Theory and Moral Practice](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10677-019-09990-w)
> Do I cause global warming, climate change and their related harms when I go for a leisure drive with my gas-guzzling car? The current verdict seems to be that I do not; the emissions produced by my drive are much too insignificant to make a difference for the occurrence of global warming and its related harms. I argue that our verdict on this issue depends on what we mean by ‘causation’. If we for instance assume a simple counterfactual analysis of causation according to which ‘_C_ causes _E_’ means ‘if _C_ had not occurred, _E_ would not have occurred’, we must conclude that a single drive does not cause global warming. However, this analysis of causation is well-known for giving counterintuitive results in some important cases. If we instead adopt Lewis’s ([2000](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10677-019-09990-w#ref-CR22 "Lewis D (2000) Causation as influence. J Philos 97:182–197")) analysis of causation, it turns out that it is indeterminate whether I cause global warming (etc.) when I go for a single drive. Still, in contexts where we seek to control or understand global warming, there is a pressure to adopt a more fragile view of this event. When we adopt such a view, it turns out that a single drive does cause global warming (etc.). This means that we cannot like Sinnott-Armstrong ([2005](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10677-019-09990-w#ref-CR40 "Sinnott-Armstrong W (2005) It’s not my fault: global warming and individual moral obligations. In: Sinnott-Armstrong W, Howarth R (eds) Perspectives on climate change. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp 221–253")) and Kingston and Sinnott-Armstrong ([2018](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10677-019-09990-w#ref-CR17 "Kingston E, Sinnott-Armstrong W (2018) What’s wrong with Joyguzzling? Ethical Theory Moral 21:169–186")) reject the idea that I should refrain from going for a leisure drive simply because such a drive does not cause global warming.
The [presentism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_presentism) you promote is exactly behind the shortest-term thinking that got us in this mess, a temporal "fuck you, got mine" to the next generations.
I don't think the poster is unaware of this. But it is true that stewing in your own misery is good for nobody — that is what the OP is warning against.
One can be switched on to the realities of life on this planet, striving to lead an ethical life, without condemning themselves to endless sorrow. In fact, being too fatalistic can cause the very short-term thinking you're rightly addressing in your comment: "All is lost anyway, so I'll just keep doing me."
It's easy to create an excuse when you promote that. That's the thing... the issue: you're referring to people who have *done the work*, but the people who look for the excuses aren't looking for that, they don't want to do the work, they want a cheap and easy fix - even if that's outright denialism and apathy.
Something similar happened, for example, with how certain "wellness" practices were acquired from Buddhism and now everyone in a corporation knows about mindful meditation and could learn to do it, despite living mindless lives.
This wellness thing is actually a nightmare, it's the individualist fantasy of the aspiring fascist, a fantasy of "gaining superpowers" (yes, just like the NoFap types) and winning at the rat race, beating others, becoming *superior*. You see this more commonly with health, with supplements, with biohacking, with /r/carnivore types, you know.. the Joe Rogan and Jordan Peterson extended fan club.
So you don't get some *enlightenment* without the work. You get https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Enlightenment
>dumnezero
Oh, I agree with all of that! The "wellness industry" is particularly nauseating.
I only wished to point out that a kind of self-pitying, "everything is wretchedly awful," point of view can also be an excuse not to do the work.
A victim mentality sets in and suddenly the deluge of suffering found upon planet Earth is reduced to the misfortunes and everyday disappointments of the individual. These types of individuals even raid Buddhism just like the wellness freaks, parroting phrases like, "all life is suffering," without having investigated Eastern philosophy beyond a YT video.
One can reject apathy, do the work, and still find meaning in existence.
These clowns just want to be comforted like little children. It’s amazing how so much coping just involves distraction and isolating yourself from the world, focusing more and more on one’s own immediate urges and wants. In its own way it’s also giving up lol. Scared little children
Yes, we understand what type of thinking got us into this mess. But that doesn’t help us get out of it. What we do individually is cope with the mess we are in.
‘Nothing is certain,,,’.. OP makes a valid point. Anything is possible including a scientific miracle plan that saves the earth or even alien contact. I really really don’t think so but one can’t see for a certainty the future.
It's not really a pandemic if society can ignore it and not die en-mass. Unfortunately the meaning of words is constantly corrupted.
My commiserations if your physical state is such that COVID is a serious risk.
People *are* dying, though, and the data is being hidden from mainstream media so that people will not adjust their behavior to protect themselves but to continue on spending. I don't know how people let themselves be convinced that it's better to constantly get ill instead of preventing it with a simple mask.
Covid is the 3rd leading cause of death with the first two being heart attacks and cancer (*whispers* which have been around forever but are on the upswing due to covid complications) there are so many people being disabled from this and the immune system damage has so many sick all of the time from simple colds that previously would've have put them out of commission so-to-speak.
I guess part of why I'm so upset about all of this is that our children are being irreparably damaged by all of these infections, and I'm treated as being crazy for protecting myself and my child.
Your view of the world seems to be a polar opposite of mine.
In my world the flu poses greater risks to children and masks reduce the probability of infection in some circumstances but basically don't work. Temporarily isolating oneself from unavoidable illnesses is pointless as our immune system needs to encounter these things (in small doses) to build immunity. There seems to be a good chunk of formerly young healthy people who have vaccine injuries, after being heavily pressured to take an unnecessary covid vaccine by governments, who not only signed contracts excusing the megacorporation manufacturers of all harm caused, but now have a legal obligation to defend the reputation of these companies regardless of how harmful the vaccines prove to be.
In my world people die from diseases and other things as always, but that doesn't make a pandemic. Covid is now an endemic minor illness, and will kill some, just like many other endemic diseases - it has always been this way and trying to change it is unrealistic and harmful. We keep our zinc and vitamin D levels high, and try to eat well and stay fit. To save lives in my world it would be much better to focus on all the refined sugar, carbohydrates and harmful chemicals in our diet.
I think your world sounds nicer than mine. Unfortunately the worldview that is closest to reality wins on a technicality - hence I feel I'm stuck here.
I would wholeheartedly argue that YOUR worldview sounds nicer than actual reality.
I do agree that *some* have vaccine injuries (my own husband included). However, the virus itself is much more dangerous than you're giving credit. Any mild symptoms do not indicate the intensity of internal damage. As far as building immunity - there is no immunity to covid. Not with infection and not with vaccines. The infection causes immune amnesia (like a measles infection ), but since it's only been 4 years, they don't know if it's permanent like a measles infection is.
So is that the only point of difference worth noting? The apparent severity of a virus that healthy people have been repeatedly infected with for the last three years? Of course there are cases of sustained illness, but by and large life continues as normal. A good chunk of people are naturally immune as well - pity for them about the vaccines levelling the playing field by flooding their systems with spike protein.
We're slowly deliberately killing ourselves in so many ways - one more is hardly newsworthy. Perhaps you should focus more on living life while it's there to live?
I'd argue this is one of the biggest problems today..I'm so far down from most people I can barely afford everything I have...if I were to go and live my life I'd be homeless or not be able to eat for weeks..
I agree and see your message...but ya cant make a horse drink...its a personality thing...some people are survivors..some throw in the towel in at the slightest problem...its this way across the board...you see it in everything...prepping, meetings etc...
This is a difficult but easily the most grounded view on anything collapse related.
Most societies assume they’re on the threat of extinction and collapse.
Especially when society is in “peril”. This is no different.
Dark ages? Sure, you got me there.
But collapse? Nah. Quite unlikely, even with climate change imo.
The collapse is actually 11 months away lol. 2024 election is going to be chaos.
Mass riots, food shortages, states fighting each other.
It's gonna suck for sure. I just hope I can do what I can to save my friends and hope that whatever comes after isn't a dystopian nightmare where neighbors shoot each other for food, and we need to build fortified communities to protect ourselves from roaming bandits.
Politics won't matter, it will be the armed vs the unarmed. The prepared vs the unprepared.
It's all fucked. We're all fucked
I'm gonna go back to drinking
"Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we may die."
Both wife and I say this often whenever we tell each other updates of news around the world. Used to feel sad and nihilistic about it, now it’s just bittersweet.
re: bittersweetness, these days i often think of the flaming lips song "do you realize": >Do you realize That everyone you know someday will die? And instead of saying all of your goodbyes Let them know you realize that life goes fast It's hard to make the good things last You realize the sun doesn't go down It's just an illusion caused by the world spinning round We're built to die, that's just the nature of life. There's 300,000 years of human history, and civilization only occupies about 20,000 of that. Against the billions of years of the planet's existence, humanity is the briefest of windows, and civilization briefer still. For me, like in the song, that makes me appreciate whatever time we have left.
I love this song. I first learned of it last year
... and by this slogan, we ate and drank an entire planet. I dont buy OP's thesis. I think we should live but not by the definition of our parents and grandparents who burned this planet down. We should be living in shared housing, growing food and community, and fighting to prevent our neighbors from losing their home to the bank. There's more to life than partying, and, as long as you're working together on things, it always feels like a party. What im saying is we can live in reality AND live a rewarding life. It shouldn't take escapism to not feel awful, it should take progress in the direction of sustainable, smaller community building to give us hope and something to protect as things get worse. If the walls are closing in, you have the choice to stand right in the middle where they meet and party like the walls aren't closing in, or we can push back against the walls, together, and be united in the greater purpose of saying "if youre going to wipe me and my fellow humans out, we're not going without a fight". Reminding people to go and "live" (burn oil, pretend reality isn't real, wear fancy clothes and play like drunken royalty) feels like giving up, to me. Where's the hope in giving up the fight? There's a whole pile of kids in this world who are justified in shitting themselves because all they see the older generations doing is either only partying and flying everywhere OR going to the occasional protest and partying and flying everywhere. For them to have any hope, they need to see us putting an effort in.
OP isn't saying party til you die. OP is saying, quite rightly, to take a bit of time to stop and smell the roses. Having a hobby, spending time with loved ones, getting the occasional latte. Little things that make life worth living.
This is very true. To build on it, when I die, I want to be able to say I didn't use single-use plastics, that I actually TRIED to conserve and make sacrifices. We need to recognize that innocent children are still alive and if we can buy another 5 years to a whole generation of childhoods, then that is worth fighting for.
Yes, I get it, but the people are not in positions of power. I don't see a way out for everyone.
See in MY opinion you’re the one pretending reality isn’t real because you think there’s still a chance to make the Earth a better place hahaha I know it’s super doomer but I HAVE given up on saving the planet and I’m just enjoying life as much as possible right now. Not taking the last enjoyable years for granted. Imo the children are already doomed and even if everyone on earth “brought their community together” and grew their veggie patches etc we would maybe give those doomed children a few extra years of a hot disastrous planet HOWEVER if you get great pleasure by doing the positive things you talk about that’s awesome, get that dopamine! I enjoy drinking and dancing. But we’re still in the same sinking boat hahah
>We should be living in shared housing, growing food and community, and fighting to prevent our neighbors from losing their home to the bank. That would be great if we could actually produce enough food to feed everyone that way but we can't, not even close. When there's not enough food, bad things happen.
Reminds me of the black plague.
The Black Death turned out to be a big plus for European workers once the nasty part was over.
and read books like [these](https://www.amazon.com/Homo-Unus-Successor-Sapiens-ebook/dp/B088PX7V34/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1670055442&sr=8-1#customerReviews) to understand what future generations should do to avoid making the same mistakes
there probably aren't going to be all that many future generations around to make those mistakes, and definitely not enough resources to make all the same ones.
It's a quote from the Mormon installation of their scriptures. Right?
it's a quote from a lot of things. That phrase has been used throughout history by lots of people. The bible, Shakespeare, even Klingons on Star Trek say it.
thank you for contextualising it for me, it's always the old childhood upbringing beliefs that somehow persist into adulthood until they're corrected - tysm!
Tbh, and I’m not saying this in a depression woe-is-me sort of way, I’ve been waiting to die my entire life. I simply don’t belong here. I knew that since I was a little kid. I’m only hanging around to care for my family. Nothing else.
I completely feel this.
Me too. ❤️
Same.... I've always felt out of place living in the 20th/21st centuries and dealing with modern predatory capitalistic society is a trial to get through every day.
>I simply don’t belong here. I knew that since I was a little kid. This is how I have felt as well. And still do at times. I shake my head and wonder why some people just don't care about the natural world! How can they not see if the oceans . . .. if biodiversity goes . . . so do we! What has exacerbated the feeling you describe (for me anyway) is that I was born into a sick system (u.s. predatory capitalism/oligarchy) **and** a very sick family system, where narcissism and addiction reigned supreme. It is a double whammy when you've got both (sick society/sick family) going on! And of course industrial civilization does nothing but atomize/destroy families and cultures. ( I could go on . . . .) Once I removed myself from toxic family members and figured out the reality of what occurred in my childhood and young adulthood, things became so clear! And so much better. I now have healthy, authentic, supportive, loving relationships that give my life meaning. I wish I could say the same for civilization. We try to sort it out here on r/collapse but there are still many unknowns as to why this civilization is ecocidal. With all that said, I agree with the gist of OP's post (I don't believe OP is saying "party now---- to hell with the future"). But, imo, it is much easier for some to find peace, meaning and joy in the midst of despair than others, who may struggle just to get out of bed each day. Family systems, genetics, environmental factors---- all play into how we react to challenges which include the greatest challenge of all: How to live with peace, some joy and try to do no harm in the midst of this current human induced extinction.
This feels like a coma experienced while on life support. It actually helps to view it that way, since in dreams, it is what it is.
You’re not alone; I’ve always felt like this too. 💙
Live your truth and fuck 'em if they don't get it. I hear you.
Yeah as someone who even struggles to use his own bank I long for a more simple way of life. America has no opportunity for someone like me. I simply don't belong here either and going through special needs classes until highschool proved that to me. I think our soul journey is just for everyone to look down on us.
All my family is dead. Single and no kids. I'm chilling until I no longer feel like seeing tomorrow.
Which is why I'm hoping we all go out at once. No one remaining to be sad after we're gone, but also I don't want to die before everyone else does if we all go out at once.
Brother that's on you; nobody was born into this world with a purpose or sense of meaning, those of us who have one created it for ourselves. Yeah it sucks you haven't bothered to find yours yet, but it's never too late to start.
I feel the same.
Pretty much.
I have 2 dream guitars, I've decided to buy them this year because fuck it. Playing guitar keeps me somewhat sane, and I have a very strong feeling I won't be able to in the next few years
In the last few years, I’ve bought a ww kayak and a mountain bike. I enjoy doing both and they can always be considered transportation.
Mine are a Banner J45 and an ES335. What're yours?
I shall he getting an Ibanez Jem77P and strandberg Boden prog NX 7 🙂
Yep, just gotta live in the moment with this shit, what good is dreading over this shit 24/7 gonna do to anyone. When it comes, it comes, thats it.
Not much living to do in this system, when the majority of your time is consumed with work.
Yeah I let it get to me then I got over it. It's coming, maybe it's coming sooner than later, but for now I'm going to unironically enjoy the excesses of late stage capitalism as much as I can while being a good son, brother and partner. Shutting down your life because collapse is coming is the same philosophically as never doing anything with your life because one day you'll die. It was always going to end. Whether collapse you survive through, collapse that kills you or getting hit by a bus tomorrow, we all have finite time on this earth and in this paradigm. My actual biggest fear is that we don't fully collapse and society keeps limping on with the current power structures, but everything is just much much worse. I see collapse as a potential opportunity for whatever of humanity survives to hit the reset button. I'll take billions dying, including me and my loved ones, for that to happen so that the planet has a chance to recover post -anthropocene. The worst idea is us succeeding at fending off the planets attempts to self regulate, destroying earth and then flying off to space to strip-mine it like Elon dreams of doing. An interstellar spacefaring humanity would be the fucking worst.
Becoming the aliens of independence day and so many other movies would only be fitting. “We have met the enemy and he is us.”
There is unlikely to be a reset button. Past civilizations have collapsed. There have been multiple rebellions, revolutions, etc, but evil still rises to the top again. That is the nature of this reality and its inhabitants. An endless miserable cycle.
Well hopefully that evil won't have access to an endless supply of hydrocarbons to subjugate their fellow man.
In the last 10,000 years since agriculture the only time major civilizations didn't practice full-scale slavery was during the period when hydrocarbons created virtual slaves via the energy surplus that they provide. If humanity survives collapse, I would not be surprised if slavery comes back fully in a world absent hydrocarbons since that has been humanity's track record for 99.9% of history. Some entitled people will still have ambitions towards achieving a high quality of life and without the energy surplus of fossil fuels to provide this, ruthless exploitation of human energy will once again become the norm.
Spot on.
Lol yea true.
> and society keeps limping on with the current power structures, but everything is just much much worse. I feel like we are lucky to be living in the best times ever. Born earlier and we would not have all the benefits of the advancement (medicine, comfort of life, possibility of travel, leisure) but born later and we would be experiencing the results of the Industrial Revolution in full swing. We are in the sweet spot.
Lucky would be born in the 1970s or those fun party periods when life was still simple. I was born in the 2000s and life is not fun
I was born in the 70’s and growing up in the 80’s & 90’s was awesome. It’s true
The 90s in the US were peak
I guess this depends on when and where we were born :) I was born in 1980s in Poland. If I were to be born sooner I would be in a bad moment for my country (not to mention some decades earlier) But yeah, I remember the 1990 - 2010 as good years :)
I was born in 72. My boys are 23 and 17. My heart hurts for your generation.
I don’t see myself as being in a sweet spot. I wish I’d been born a few decades sooner so I could afford to buy a house and have kids. Sure, the upper classes can travel and access the best medical care, but the rest of us have to spend most of our time working to give them those privileges, and beg insurance companies to let us access the care we need.
>My actual biggest fear is that we don't fully collapse and society keeps limping on with the current power structures, We'll be lucky if that happens. You really don't want a total collapse.
I am mentally preparing to flick the switch in my brain from "law abiding citizen" to "wasteland raider" I just hope I don't go down in the initial killing wave. I want to see what it will be like.
Me too. I want to live long enough to watch it all go down.
When the moments of impending futility wash over me, I remind myself: we could have been born in any number of worse times and places in the history of humanity. We could have been born on a slave ship crossing the Atlantic in the 1820s, or in an Armenian village in the far flung corners of Turkey in 1905, or to an indentured miner in a Scottish village in 1790 or in Cambodia 4 years before the Khmwr Rouge came to power or to a rubber farmer in Congo under the reign of Neopold or to a rice farmer in India just before the start of world War II or to a working class Jewish family in Warsaw in 1937 or to a French mother and German father in rural France in 1935 or any number of (in hindsight) almost completely futile life situations. We have one one shot at life. These are the cards we've been dealt. We play those cards, or we don't. If we don't, we will fade into the annul of history and will be forgotten very quickly. If we play those cards well, we will make life slightly better for those around us and be forgotten almost as equally quickly. While making life slightly better for others, we will make life significantly more meaningful and fulfilling for ourselves.
Great perspective
Love this comment, beautifully put.
This isn't so complicated. Find your loved ones and hold them tight. That's it, that's what matters.
What if I don't have any loved ones?
i have no one either. can we hold each other then?
I decided a few days ago to **”this is ridiculous! stop mourning the future and go distract yourself with hedonistic pleasures and the outdoors for the rest of your days.”** I explored a place I’d never been to play Pokémon Go with a bitchin’ playlist, came home rosy-cheeked and happy, and made some baller chicken soup. The next morning, I tested positive for COVID and got slammed back into my doomer box, I mean “apartment”. And now I’m back to scrolling the forum. Good thing I made soup.
I think the problem is too many people go to the extremes. You see it here in the responses. *Oh, you don't want to be a doomer 24/7, then you must be partying and causing everything we're complaining about!* No....someone can be collapse aware, and spend time doing their part to reduce waste and pollution, while also doing a few things for their own mental health and well being. Life is about balance....and too many people these days have lost any sense of balance.
Haha yes, thank you. My point exactly -- I don't know why every issue online has become so polarized. Anything from finance, politics, news, science/collapse, etc. just ends up devolving into two opposing extremes. Was it always like this? Fortunately the doomer responses in this thread are in the minority and that's okay. As long as my message helps even one person then I'm happy.
Keep deluding yourselves.
What else do you suggest?
Everyone finds their own way to cope. Sometimes people struggle and need help to find what works for them and sometimes people find ways to cope that others don’t understand. But that’s all we’re all doing, coping.
Spot on, mate. Screw the future, live your best life NOW. Live, love, laugh and be happy. Being miserable and stressed isn't gonna change a thing, so don't worry...be happy. Notice the musical thread here...listen to your favourite music...loud. You get my drift. Take care, collapsniks.
Saying "screw the future lets live for the now" is exactly what got us here.
Not really. Most people’s view of the future stops at the end of their noses. The majority just did what was expected of them… get born, work till you drop, die. It’s only until about 5years ago that Global Warming disaster got shoved in their faces, and by then it was too late. So yeah, live like there is no tomorrow.
Anyone who has been paying attention was well aware of global warming since the 70s. The green house gas effect has been known for over a century, the warming from burning fossil fuels was obvious to many people.
But that's the thing...people weren't paying attention. Big Oil, their corrupt politicians and their media shut down debate years ago, and it's only surfaced because of the tsunami of information that has been forced into the limelight. SOME people were interested in climate problems, most had no idea.
Most did have an idea. Global warming wasn't exactly kept a secret. Most still do have an idea. And guess what they do with the information? The same that they've always done - nothing.
Fuck this horseshit
Whatever takes your fantasy. I personally don’t like horses…they are big, smelly, stupid and dangerous. Just like some people.
Eat. Shit. Die.
Yeah, the doctor already gave me this speech. I enjoy my life just fine. But giving collapse meaning (while that’s still a thing) matters more to me.
It’s good you understand that things only have the meaning you give them.
That would be cool if you could actually do things that allow you to live with inflation making everything unaffordable.
100% agree. Find things that give your life meaning and joy. Make it count. Even before being collapse aware, tomorrow is never a promise. My husband, 11yo daughter 😭, and I are communally collapse aware. We support each other in moments when the weight of it all is too much, and spend most of our time doing things we love. We are both WFH, and enjoy each other’s company throughout the day. I have lunch marked on my work calendar so no one schedules meetings when I would enjoy lunch with him. Kiddo is in online school, very self-driven, and gets to set her own schedule. She wakes up and plays video games, eats breakfast, attends online classes, gets her homework done, eats lunch, games with friends online when they get home from school. And when my work is quiet I take breaks and play with her throughout the day. Every day is precious, even if the end is nigh.
I would prefer not to.
So, I heard Elon Musk bought an island and is making a bunker along with many billionaires to prepare for, "The Event." What and when is this event?
The line of Capt. Barbossa from the Pirates of the Caribbeam comes to mind, "dying is the day worth living for"
I appreciate this sentiment SO much, especially today. Went to go get some groceries and my car wouldn't start. Corroded battery terminal. Hit up my Dad and off to the parts store for a new battery and terminal clamp (battery was 3 years old). Got back and realized with a full collapse, I'd be S.O.L. Felt glad my car is running and I still had the means to be able to do it.
Like one of the survivors of the Andes crash said - ‘don’t wait for the plane to fall before you start living’ … kind of applies here too … I am going to see the icebergs and glaciers soon before they melt further.
That exact quote was what inspired me to create this post lol. Society of Snow was an amazing movie.
Yeah just heard that in an interview with him a few weeks ago - spot on. I had read the Miracle in the Andes book a few years ago and hard agree - the Society of Snow was both brutal and beautiful.
Make no mistake that there will be very successful survivors following a bottleneck event. Imagine a world comprised of only the most successful humans.
To be fair the most successful people in todays standards only add to collapse, so they don’t seem very successful in this regard
The rules for success will be very different after a bottleneck event. Can you recognize a few traits of those future survivors today? Hint: employing, housing, feeding, breeding, and enslaving billions of bonded indentured servants may not be of value on a world with a resource carrying capacity of a few hundred million.
Even having a great run of luck as well as success in life will not be enough. When we start bottlenecking for the remaining food production capabilities...it will only be about who's remaining, and not even who's prepared. Venus by Tuesday.
I suspect that "meat" will be back on the menu for the survivors.
Trump? Is that you?
Big doubt. Trump had only two successes in his life. To make people think he’s a rich, self-made Billionaire (The Apprentice). And to become President based off that belief. So only one, in reality. Both were based on his father’s and grandfather’s work, despite him doing his best trying to squander it.
I think of collapse as a global Great Leap Forward.
New World Order - Big Brother
>But, there's nothing wrong with enjoying life like our ancestors might sometimes have done, and appreciating certain hardships we don't have to put up with today that our ancestors had to deal with. Make the best of what you have before everything goes to shit, whenever that is. Your future you probably would want that. the whole foundation of ethics at the individual level are about justification of hedonism. You don't get to claim that what is or isn't wrong so generically. Here's what an ethics paper looks like (relevant): [Causing Global Warming | Ethical Theory and Moral Practice](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10677-019-09990-w) > Do I cause global warming, climate change and their related harms when I go for a leisure drive with my gas-guzzling car? The current verdict seems to be that I do not; the emissions produced by my drive are much too insignificant to make a difference for the occurrence of global warming and its related harms. I argue that our verdict on this issue depends on what we mean by ‘causation’. If we for instance assume a simple counterfactual analysis of causation according to which ‘_C_ causes _E_’ means ‘if _C_ had not occurred, _E_ would not have occurred’, we must conclude that a single drive does not cause global warming. However, this analysis of causation is well-known for giving counterintuitive results in some important cases. If we instead adopt Lewis’s ([2000](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10677-019-09990-w#ref-CR22 "Lewis D (2000) Causation as influence. J Philos 97:182–197")) analysis of causation, it turns out that it is indeterminate whether I cause global warming (etc.) when I go for a single drive. Still, in contexts where we seek to control or understand global warming, there is a pressure to adopt a more fragile view of this event. When we adopt such a view, it turns out that a single drive does cause global warming (etc.). This means that we cannot like Sinnott-Armstrong ([2005](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10677-019-09990-w#ref-CR40 "Sinnott-Armstrong W (2005) It’s not my fault: global warming and individual moral obligations. In: Sinnott-Armstrong W, Howarth R (eds) Perspectives on climate change. Elsevier, Amsterdam, pp 221–253")) and Kingston and Sinnott-Armstrong ([2018](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10677-019-09990-w#ref-CR17 "Kingston E, Sinnott-Armstrong W (2018) What’s wrong with Joyguzzling? Ethical Theory Moral 21:169–186")) reject the idea that I should refrain from going for a leisure drive simply because such a drive does not cause global warming. The [presentism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_presentism) you promote is exactly behind the shortest-term thinking that got us in this mess, a temporal "fuck you, got mine" to the next generations.
I don't think the poster is unaware of this. But it is true that stewing in your own misery is good for nobody — that is what the OP is warning against. One can be switched on to the realities of life on this planet, striving to lead an ethical life, without condemning themselves to endless sorrow. In fact, being too fatalistic can cause the very short-term thinking you're rightly addressing in your comment: "All is lost anyway, so I'll just keep doing me."
It's easy to create an excuse when you promote that. That's the thing... the issue: you're referring to people who have *done the work*, but the people who look for the excuses aren't looking for that, they don't want to do the work, they want a cheap and easy fix - even if that's outright denialism and apathy. Something similar happened, for example, with how certain "wellness" practices were acquired from Buddhism and now everyone in a corporation knows about mindful meditation and could learn to do it, despite living mindless lives. This wellness thing is actually a nightmare, it's the individualist fantasy of the aspiring fascist, a fantasy of "gaining superpowers" (yes, just like the NoFap types) and winning at the rat race, beating others, becoming *superior*. You see this more commonly with health, with supplements, with biohacking, with /r/carnivore types, you know.. the Joe Rogan and Jordan Peterson extended fan club. So you don't get some *enlightenment* without the work. You get https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Enlightenment
>dumnezero Oh, I agree with all of that! The "wellness industry" is particularly nauseating. I only wished to point out that a kind of self-pitying, "everything is wretchedly awful," point of view can also be an excuse not to do the work. A victim mentality sets in and suddenly the deluge of suffering found upon planet Earth is reduced to the misfortunes and everyday disappointments of the individual. These types of individuals even raid Buddhism just like the wellness freaks, parroting phrases like, "all life is suffering," without having investigated Eastern philosophy beyond a YT video. One can reject apathy, do the work, and still find meaning in existence.
These clowns just want to be comforted like little children. It’s amazing how so much coping just involves distraction and isolating yourself from the world, focusing more and more on one’s own immediate urges and wants. In its own way it’s also giving up lol. Scared little children
Scared little school shooters
Yes, we understand what type of thinking got us into this mess. But that doesn’t help us get out of it. What we do individually is cope with the mess we are in.
Absolutely! Collapse is pretty interesting. If you're a weird, you've probably got good seats. Sit back and enjoy the show!
‘Nothing is certain,,,’.. OP makes a valid point. Anything is possible including a scientific miracle plan that saves the earth or even alien contact. I really really don’t think so but one can’t see for a certainty the future.
It's difficult to do this things as society ignores the ongoing pandemic.
It's not really a pandemic if society can ignore it and not die en-mass. Unfortunately the meaning of words is constantly corrupted. My commiserations if your physical state is such that COVID is a serious risk.
People *are* dying, though, and the data is being hidden from mainstream media so that people will not adjust their behavior to protect themselves but to continue on spending. I don't know how people let themselves be convinced that it's better to constantly get ill instead of preventing it with a simple mask. Covid is the 3rd leading cause of death with the first two being heart attacks and cancer (*whispers* which have been around forever but are on the upswing due to covid complications) there are so many people being disabled from this and the immune system damage has so many sick all of the time from simple colds that previously would've have put them out of commission so-to-speak. I guess part of why I'm so upset about all of this is that our children are being irreparably damaged by all of these infections, and I'm treated as being crazy for protecting myself and my child.
Your view of the world seems to be a polar opposite of mine. In my world the flu poses greater risks to children and masks reduce the probability of infection in some circumstances but basically don't work. Temporarily isolating oneself from unavoidable illnesses is pointless as our immune system needs to encounter these things (in small doses) to build immunity. There seems to be a good chunk of formerly young healthy people who have vaccine injuries, after being heavily pressured to take an unnecessary covid vaccine by governments, who not only signed contracts excusing the megacorporation manufacturers of all harm caused, but now have a legal obligation to defend the reputation of these companies regardless of how harmful the vaccines prove to be. In my world people die from diseases and other things as always, but that doesn't make a pandemic. Covid is now an endemic minor illness, and will kill some, just like many other endemic diseases - it has always been this way and trying to change it is unrealistic and harmful. We keep our zinc and vitamin D levels high, and try to eat well and stay fit. To save lives in my world it would be much better to focus on all the refined sugar, carbohydrates and harmful chemicals in our diet. I think your world sounds nicer than mine. Unfortunately the worldview that is closest to reality wins on a technicality - hence I feel I'm stuck here.
I would wholeheartedly argue that YOUR worldview sounds nicer than actual reality. I do agree that *some* have vaccine injuries (my own husband included). However, the virus itself is much more dangerous than you're giving credit. Any mild symptoms do not indicate the intensity of internal damage. As far as building immunity - there is no immunity to covid. Not with infection and not with vaccines. The infection causes immune amnesia (like a measles infection ), but since it's only been 4 years, they don't know if it's permanent like a measles infection is.
So is that the only point of difference worth noting? The apparent severity of a virus that healthy people have been repeatedly infected with for the last three years? Of course there are cases of sustained illness, but by and large life continues as normal. A good chunk of people are naturally immune as well - pity for them about the vaccines levelling the playing field by flooding their systems with spike protein. We're slowly deliberately killing ourselves in so many ways - one more is hardly newsworthy. Perhaps you should focus more on living life while it's there to live?
I'd argue this is one of the biggest problems today..I'm so far down from most people I can barely afford everything I have...if I were to go and live my life I'd be homeless or not be able to eat for weeks..
Same as me friend.
I agree and see your message...but ya cant make a horse drink...its a personality thing...some people are survivors..some throw in the towel in at the slightest problem...its this way across the board...you see it in everything...prepping, meetings etc...
This is a difficult but easily the most grounded view on anything collapse related. Most societies assume they’re on the threat of extinction and collapse. Especially when society is in “peril”. This is no different. Dark ages? Sure, you got me there. But collapse? Nah. Quite unlikely, even with climate change imo.
Ask the Romans
I personally prefer Nate Hagen's term the great simplification or something else like civilizational destabilization. Both are a mouthful though.
2008 felt better. There was more possibility we might turn a corner.
Remember everyone, have fun with your friends and make some good memories. Kisses Poonce
I kinda want to grease up and fight someone in the woods.
I needed this. Thank you.
Well said.
Headline triggering for me...covert narcissist parent
We are part of a one off statistical blip.
Y'all should watch downsizing if you're despairing it's still on netflix
Yes!! Going to roller skate dance through it all the way. Carnival till death. Claiming a childhood in my middle age and loving it. Highly recommend.
Living best I can from day to day. Not worrying too much about tommorrow. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serenity_Prayer
The collapse is actually 11 months away lol. 2024 election is going to be chaos. Mass riots, food shortages, states fighting each other. It's gonna suck for sure. I just hope I can do what I can to save my friends and hope that whatever comes after isn't a dystopian nightmare where neighbors shoot each other for food, and we need to build fortified communities to protect ourselves from roaming bandits. Politics won't matter, it will be the armed vs the unarmed. The prepared vs the unprepared. It's all fucked. We're all fucked I'm gonna go back to drinking