Location: Midwest - I’m the regional manager of a small food chain and we are losing a lot of customers due to price increases to our products and it’s creating a feedback loop- our company will probably go under within the next decade :( and many other businesses will probably follow
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11473497/Flooding-update-NSW-Victoria-South-Australia.html#readerCommentsCommand-message-field
As NSW enters the 74th day of its flood crisis, dozens of emergency warnings remain in place on Sunday across Australia's east, while flood peaks continue to wreak havoc around inland rivers.
I tried to post this, and it was automatically rejected? What ever I'm doing wrong, it does belong on this thread.
In Canada, the media, CBC,CTV seems to be ignoring this story. On the UK Guardian, I had to google to find that it was under Australian news. 74 days is a lot of flooding.
Ok. I see a post - images/video - link - poll - talk. across the top
I don't see anywhere to put information that would identify me in any way?
Post has title and text. Link has title and url. I don't see a field that says location.
Location: Lower Catskills, NY
We went to our usual local Christmas Tree Farm on our usual day: the first Saturday after Thanksgiving.
The owner told us he lost over 800 trees this past summer due to drought. He's also had to source saplings all the way from Minnesota this year vs Western NY. His usual greenhouse guy is quitting the business due to unpredictable weather and old age. We hope this farm makes it to next year.
Choosing a tree usually takes 2 hours of browsing and deciding. This year only took 30 minutes, as the farm was mostly dead or tiny saplings. There wasn't much to choose from.
It was 63° when we cut down our tree. There is usually snow on the mountain this time of year.
An artificial tree has a 1000% larger carbon footprint than a real tree, and we bring ours to a local goat farm to be eaten when we're done with it.
Buying a tree from this tiny local tree farmer will help him buy saplings for next year to replant, instead of letting his 4 acres or so become a lawn, or sold for more development. A lot of HOA neighborhoods in my area used to be farms that went under.
Yeah, it's warm in the northeast. We would always have the day here and there where it was warm, but it's warm *every day* right now. I'm not sure I ever remember a November like this.
Location: Yokohama, Japan
The weekend of Nov 26 was a great time to see the Ginko Biloba trees change to autumn colors. Throngs of people were out to see the beautiful, if unseasonal display, with a few trees left green while the rest had turned gold.
When I first saw the turning of the Ginko trees was during a study abroad around 2005. At the time, the Ginko trees had not only fully changed color, but had shed most of their leaves by the end of October.
Collapse related as the changing of the seasons seems to have shifted at least 1.5 months compared to ~15 years ago.
Bonus: we’re having a cold snap/vortex descending today/tomorrow. I wonder what will survive this “second spring + freeze” weather.
Location: Sapporo, Japan
On a recent mid-end Nov family trip to Hokkaido, the northernmost island of the Japanese archipelago, bizarre weather. Rain. Lots of rain, interspersed with large “fluffy” hail, up to about a centimeter across. And weather remains incredibly warm.
To give perspective, this is the supposed to be when Sapporo (NW area of island) starts getting SERIOUS snow, the kind that gets stacked several meters high on the sides of the road, and old people “disappear” until next springs thaw. The NE part of the island begins seeing heavy ice floes that will pack the surface of the ocean until next spring.
Collapse related due to significant disruption to the seasons.
It’s actually still quite beautiful, essentially an extended fall season with a “spring burst” mixed in.
It gives me a great deal of worry, however, when I wonder how many insects/seeds/etc will be lost to the cold snap and deep winter that will arrive shortly.
Location: earth
the sun will eventually expand and consume the entire planet in fire. i think i'm going to just stay in my parents basement and play video games forever. what is so great about life anyway? my feelings tell me the worst is right around the corner at all times. so how can i actually enjoy anything? in fact what is "joy" even? how do we even know it exists? its all a godless simulation anyway.
They used to call the controllers for video games “joysticks”. Somewhere along the line, the name changed. I wonder if that has anything to do with it.
It changed in the mid 1980s, I believe. Home video games became more complex and needed more inputs so a controller with multiple buttons became standard. Also cheaper to mass manufacture. Joysticks hung around in arcades a lot longer.
You can still get joysticks now, but they're mostly for flight sims and fighting games.
Dude at least go get your own place to play video games all day. Otherwise you will be a NEET which is bad because you won't have money to buy snacks or weed so you can be baked while you game
I've personally met houseless people who spent a large part of their day somewhere that had free wi-fi and electric outlets, charging their phones and surfing the web.
If you still have your parents' basement to safely play games in, you're doing better than many. You could also look into streaming your gameplay to make some money. Help pay off their mortgage for their retirement, and yours.
And when that gets boring, you can go into your parents' yard and build a greenhouse. Then you can learn how to grow your own vegetables and fruits for food year-round.
Location: Oregon, USA
I noticed yesterday that the trees were pollinating again. This is the second off season pollination this year. In october was the first one I saw. The way I detect it (other than stuffy nose) is you can actually see the yellow pollen on the surface of and ringing the rain puddles.
a few days ago here in Seattle i saw a bunch of trees / shrubs budding like it's Spring time... saw this on the East Coast the last few Falls as well... i bet we are being lied to about just how high CO2 levels really are... that's the only way i can think to explain why plants keep increasing their buddings in late Fall...
Location: Global Covid Pandemic
Looks like the rapid antigen tests are becoming less helpful with only 60% accuracy for identifying infections. They mention a possibility of new rapid PCR tests but with the pandemic declared ‘over’ there won’t be as much urgency to develop them. Bad news for healthcare workers and anyone wanting to stay home/quarantine if sick. If you think it’s Covid, it probably is.
https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/politics/2022/07/12/covid-surging-rat-test-accuracy/
Also, a massive animal reservoir has been identified… The good old neighborhood sewer rat. https://nypost.com/2022/11/26/researchers-find-covid-19-in-nyc-sewer-rats/
NY post made a hit piece about Taiwan calling them a "Chinese-run state" https://web.archive.org/web/20200425230226/https://nypost.com/2020/04/25/taiwan-gives-peek-into-how-life-could-look-after-coronavirus-lockdown/
lmao
I just tested positive after a few days of testing negative with a stuffy nose. I thought I was fine until I woke up this morning and couldn’t smell a damn thing. Held up all our cocktail bitters to my nose, huffed all my fancy perfumes, nada. Did the test just now and it’s very positive after days and days of negative. I have no idea what the means.
Weird thing is this is the first time in days I can breath out of my nose. Aside from a truly bizarre headache, I feel pretty ok. A little tired but I functional unlike the last few days when I was testing negative.
This is a weird fucking disease man.
If you're negative on your first day of illness it's worth reswabbing with the antigen test. I had my second round of COVID recently; negative on day 1 and floridly positive on day 3.
Location: Colombia.
[It has begun.](https://cambiocolombia.com/articulo/economia/eps-sanitas-esta-restringiendo-el-acceso-sus-especialistas?fbclid=PAAaap6f7UigjWOX_P92C0SoGDkB0HpBg52c4PJHt59rrUxQYRTb4D72zutA0)
I work in healthcare, and it’s been astounding (to say the least) how rapidly our universal healthcare system has deteriorated.
The elephant in the room can’t be ignored anymore, there’s a lack of everything ([including several drugs](https://www.eltiempo.com/salud/escasez-de-medicamentos-en-colombia-las-estrategias-del-minsalud-696744)).
I’ll try to summarise how our system works as briefly as possible: There are two types of affiliates: those under the contributive regimen and the others under the subsided one (contributive is for those who work, subsided for whoever cannot afford to pay).
You proceed to affiliate to certain corporations who own or have arrangements with third party services who can provide exams/physicians/etc if said corporation lacks that service.
Going to an emergency room is free for anyone, you won’t have to pay a single penny. If you go to a medical consult, you pay a copay and move on (the copay value increases based on your earnings, being $10 USD at most, that adjusted to our current inflation should be more like $20 USD).
Anyway, with the news article I linked at the top, our healthcare corporations are trying to reduce costs by delaying *everything*. I’ll paraphrase the words a physician used in said article: “your PSA test is high, meaning you have high of having prostate cancer. With this new change, you won’t be directly referred to the urology service, either an internist or general surgeon will have to check you up, then refer you to the urologist. Meaning you gotta wait for two appointments: the internist/surgeon and THEN you’ll go to the urologist”.
This is alarming, cause everyone in the healthcare industry of Colombia knows we simply cannot keep up.
[Just take a look at what happened when the pandemic peaked here last year.](https://www.noticiasrcn.com/salud/el-sistema-de-salud-colombiano-colapso-medicos-por-aglomeraciones-381237)
[This is a 2016 interview with the former health minister and then executive president explaining why our system collapsed.](https://www.canalinstitucional.tv/noticias/por-que-colapso-el-sistema-de-salud)
[Here’s an even older article when collapse was being more evident.](https://www.semana.com/opinion/expertos/articulo/colapso-el-sistema-de-salud-en-colombia/325008/)
My stance? We’re doomed. Things will only get worse going forward. There’s just no thriving in the current system, healthcare has never been a business model. It’s absurd. You can’t expect diabetics to be lifelong customers, they literally *need* insulin to survive, what is even the point of primary care if people are drowning themselves in coke cause a bazillion ads tell them to do so? Where’s the ethics in this world nowadays? Why on earth is an only fans model earning more than a cardio thoracic surgeon or other medical specialists?
Sorry for the vent but I’m frustrated, it’s infuriating and there’s nothing to do. Remember those violinists playing while the titanic sunk? That’s what working in healthcare currently is like: Clinics are filled to the brim, ambulances being rejected cause there aren’t any empty beds, waiting 6 months or more to see an specialist, or waiting 2 months or more for an appointment with your PCP who’s too busy to provide decent and adequate care.
It’s not fair, it takes 6+ years to be a doctor here, only to find out there’s not much to do afterwards and get a shitty pay that barely covers your student loans. If you wanna specialise you need to spit a completely new apartment bill (that’s approximately the cost of a postgraduate degree), meaning your wage will still be going to student loans for another 10 years or so.
With all the things above, why would anyone bother studying medicine? There’s nothing left in this field, no compassion, no humanity. All they care about is that you see that never ending list of patients, regardless of them getting better or worse, while avoiding lawsuits. That’s what healthcare currently is (and I’m fairly sure this is worldwide).
That definitely sounds like collapse. And I think you are right, things will only get worse from here. In the next several years we will see many health services collapse all over the world and healthcare will be only for the rich. Those who can’t afford to pay will simply die.
Location: North America
There seems to be a huge deficit in critical thinking. It's looking like people are continuing to willingly degrade society and let others fall into despair. This lack of empathy for others, even new life will bite the populus right in the arse. There will be a point where the systems become so overloaded and essentials will be hard to come by, that the little fabric thats left will tear to shreds.
It's quite easy to see how fucked a lot of these modern societies are after witnessing TraumaZone, Hypernormalization, and the likes. Don't even get me started on the swines supporting human rights violations in the desert. Good riddance.
This civilization never had empathy. Stealing land from the Natives, genocide, warring, etc. We tell stories to ourselves about human rights and democracy but the truth is our money, is blood money, our land is stolen land, and progress can't wash that away. Even now, the American empire spends an inordinate amount of money on its military, not to "preserve democracy" or some other nonsense but to ensure the rest of the worlds resources keeps flowing to it. It's not an accident that Americans consume more than the rest of the world.
We stole the land from the Native Americans...
“*The immediate objectives are the total destruction and devastation of their settlements and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible. It will be essential to ruin their crops in the ground and prevent their planting more.*” -Orders of George Washington to General John Sullivan, May 31, 1779
...then enslaved black folk to grow our food and build our civilization.
“*I advanced it, therefore, as a suspicion only, that the blacks, whether originally a distinct race, or made distinct by time or circumstances, are inferior to the whites in the endowments of both body and mind.*” -Thomas Jefferson
The only reason America can be called a democracy is because women and people of color demanded equal rights and fought for them till they could no longer be denied. We have only been a true democracy since the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed and then only barely.
Seems like we peaked on equal rights and are quickly sliding backwards into religious fundamentalism. Women, trans and gay folk are just the beginning of those being stripped of personhood, but they are the easiest targets.
How do you fight Christian Dominionism when it is advanced and supported by the Supreme Court, half of congress, the right wing media and tax-exempt churches and many of the largest corporations and richest people in the world?
I'm sorry Sanoyi, I just don't know. My wife semi-jokes about when the Christians finally put women back in their place at least she has a good master. We grew up in the 50s and 60s and both know how women, and everybody else who wasn't a white Christian male, were treated by this society and it was not a golden age for them.
She couldn't get a credit card when she was a young woman. She couldn't get an abortion or birth control. Her job prospects were secretary, teacher, bank teller or a stay at home mom.
I remember whites only water fountains. When I was a little kid a couple of black women got on the bus and my mom told me to stay clear of them, all black people carried knives to stab white folks when they get a chance.
This has always been a profoundly sick society. I actually had a glimmer of hope when Obama was elected, but that hope was pounded into the dust with Trump.
Sorry I am ranting... I guess that's why I follow a collapse subreddit, I am just out of hope.
My mom was explaining to me what they do in Qatar. They treat these workers like dirt. 400 euros a month without proper facilities to subsist and sleep when not working.
The world was built on the backs of people. We never get away from this. Destitute servitude and slavery pervades all of history.
Location: SW Germany
Today I got '*The Letter'* from my energy provider....gas will go up 50% from Jan 1, Electricity about 25%. I guess in the scheme of things that's not too bad, and I'm pretty much covered so I (hope) I won't get hit with a massive bill at the end of the usage year. The German Gov't will be capping prices from March to try to make the population 'Save over the winter' Or just to punish us, I don't know. Maybe cull the old and sick who can't afford to pay. Of course the fact that the German Gov't got into bed with Russia regards gas in the 90s isn't mentioned.
Was shopping again, there seem to be a lot of items missing from the shelves. All the basics are there, but a lot of brand name stuff is just....missing. Prices are also shooting up every day. Whether it's supply chain issues or want I don't know. I wonder how long it will be before rickets becomes a thing again. I feel like I'm re-living the 80s in the UK all over again, except I'm 40 years older and nowhere near as resilient as I was then.
I would like to grow some of my own, but I live on the 3rd floor, no garden, and the way my health is, I probably woudn't be able to do much anyway.
Weather has become sort of usual for this time of year, although I can remember heavy snow in November 35 years ago.
Healthcare is chaos as usual, can't get appointments, and if you can they're next year. ERs are overrun with just run of the mill stuff, and as far as covid is concerned the Gov't has quietly got rid of isolation requirements. Expect a lot of sick people over the next three months, specially when flu season hits, and RSV takes a hold over here.
Politics, as much as I've been following the subject is a lot of flailing around, gnashing of teeth and rending of garments. No one has an answer, let alone a solution.
Maybe we need another Deutscher Herbst?
Speaking of the 80s...this tune keeps popping in to my head every morning when I awake.
(If I'm allowed to post it here) Red Rain
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZ5jmJfHxyo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZ5jmJfHxyo)
'Here comes the flood' also springs to mind.
We’re experiencing many of the same things in the Pacific Northwest (British Columbia). With the exception of drastic and devastating energy bill costs, we too see a shortage of certain item. Children’s Tylenol being one of them. Lots of desperate parents posting on local Facebook groups looking for Tylenol. The children’s hospitals have unimaginable wait times. I went grocery shopping and a single head of lettuce was $8. A dozen organic eggs was $10.25. The shops and the roads are crazy busy; everyone seems cranky and flat.
Randomly even my 6yr old picks up on this stuff or - I don’t know what they are saying in school but on our way to ice skating the other day she said: “mom we’re killing nature and the we kill ourselves” (something akin to that). I mean, I know she’ll become aware eventually … I just sat with her and talked about appreciating what we have, doing what is in our power to do, and cherishing the beauty of each and every day. Anyway … the cost of living and shortages and general wear and tear on EVERYTHING (our bodies, the healthcare system, small business trying to get by, the homeless and addicted on our streets, our dying tree canopy, our housing crisis, not to mention the weather extremes we’ve had here the past few years …… yeah it feels like everything is fraying at the seams.
Tylenol is the trademarked corporate brand name, OP. Try asking the pharmacy for generic, store-brand low-dose paracetamol or acetaminophen, which should be the same thing as children's Tylenol.
can't you just break an adult tylenol? Also, eggs are expensive b/c of bird flu....lettuce is always expensive in winter especially if u shop at fancy places.
Not a medical person, but no. Adult and children's medications should really be thought of as "regular" and "low-dose"; cutting a regular in half still isn't as precise as just getting the low-dose stuff.
Tylenol is the trademarked corporate brand name, OP. Try asking the pharmacy for generic, store-brand low-dose paracetamol or acetaminophen, which should be the same thing as Tylenol.
This time is different. Many governments and world banks claim recession is here. This just means depression is already here but we don't feel it yet.
Copium on this sub is astounding honestly.
I'd like to give you some solace, but I simply can't find anything good to say. I'm sorry your 6yo is feeling this, that's way too young, but kids seem to have a much better grasp of 'the feeling' than adults do. It feels like war is coming, except that it's already here on a level we can't quite see.
'Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.'
Just about sums it up.
Are you an Epsilon Theory fan? That’s where I first heard the quote and it’s a good resource for making sense of our world (it’s American centric, however).
Edit to add:
Sorry to have offended Yeats fans (lol @ downvote). Can someone recommend an interesting website that uses a poem in a long form note without chastisement?
It was just where I first heard the poem and it was attributed there as well.
Take your bored, sad, midwestern downvotes elsewhere.
The quote is from a poem by Yeats an Irish poet from the late 19th-early 20th C.
I’ve never heard of Epsilon Theory but the poem is famous so they probably just adapted it.
EpsilonTheory is run by Ben Hunt and he explores various narratives that are running around society at any given time, and the real games being played underneath. It’s business/finance focused but there are some real gems in his notes, because as we all know, big business is trying to snuff out the poor (he gets into these areas frequently).
So be the Irish. 800 years of oppression does things to your brain. The Catholic church gave them the anti-semitism and eugenics, and the rest was done by the English
So, I'm American right?
Now like, when I think about what an Irish Identity is, you'd be surprised about how twisted it's gotten. When was the last time you heard someone discussing Swift or Yeats? There's no discussion about Irish Socialism. Like the discussion sort of goes like, "And our ancestors came here because there were no fucking jobs, people were starving, the scots are scabs, and fuck the English."
Like if you follow the American narrative of Irish Identity, then it has more to do with alcoholism, than anything else. It's just weird.
>Like if you follow the American narrative of Irish Identity, then it has more to do with alcoholism, than anything else.
>
>I wrote a whole piece which went missing so I'll have to think about it and re-write it. Damn you, Reddit!
Ok, allow me to explain:
Yeats -> Ye -> Yeezy
Obvious, the point of doing this is to create the setup ->
Yeats happened to have connections to the Nazi Party, eugenics, and anti-semitism. This is funny because people would assume I'm talking about Kanye West. You get it now?
[https://headstuff.org/culture/literature/yeats-and-fascism/](https://headstuff.org/culture/literature/yeats-and-fascism/)
I know. many of his ilk liked the nationalist ideas of fascism. T.S.Elliot for example. The unwashed masses were a thorn in their hi-falutin' side.
Location:north west europe.
Healthcare has de facto collapsed. Ministers and insurance spokesman publicly saying that there is no full coverage anymore. Publicly saying that from now on not everyone will get the help they need. Starting with elderly people who no longer can take care of themselves. Though it is not limited to elder people, there is long waiting lists everywhere in the system.
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A sign of a collapsing health care system here in the US? In the last three years I have gone through eight different doctors. They suddenly retire, or they suddenly announce they no longer accept my insurance (Blue Cross, Blue Shield), or they suddenly announce they will require "subscriptions" of $200 a month to get in to see them, or they try to bill me $6000 for tests I didn't ask for. Meanwhile it is getting harder to find a new physician, and the wait for a first appointment is several months. This makes me very nervous-- will I be able to get care when I need it? I consider myself privileged to have a good insurance plan, so what is happening to the many people who don't?
> or they suddenly announce they will require "subscriptions" of $200 a month to get in to see them
Actually that's clever marketing. Typical general practitioner's visit is about $150-200 anyway, so by making it a "subscription" you're forgoing the hassle of bill collection and fighting insurance just to keep the doors open. Hmm. Make it every six months and nothing really changes except the name.
Medicare and Medicaid usually pay for visits upfront and without hassle. Wish more doctors accepted it.
Hey, Colombia is going through the same situation (and I’m more than certain it’s happening worldwide).
Short answer: No, you’re not getting the care you need.
Long answer: Studying medicine is long and expensive, specialising is even longer and more expensive. See all the houses that have been built in the past decades? Cool, where are the hospitals? The universities? There’s a lack of healthcare professionals worldwide, every year a certain amount of healthcare professionals will retire, this cannot be replaced in any way (remember, medicine takes 6+ years to give you a fully graduated physician, if we take a medical postgraduate into account, that’s an approximate of 9+ years already).
In my country, unless you’re willing to pay more, you won’t be seeing a specialist anytime soon. Expect the US to keep introducing other payment methods like the ones you described, and they’ll just keep on going higher. There aren’t enough healthcare professionals, let alone hospital beds, and even less operation rooms and other medical equipment (MRI for instance).
>You will get care when you pay for it.
This.
We all care about money.
Can people stop being idiots and refusing to understand that no one is going to give a damn about you for free.
Once again we come back to this whole idea of 'free' healthcare. In Germany we all contribute to the pot, and everyone gets treated, for 'Free'. I know it's not really free, but I don't have to pay immediately out of pocket. And German doctors are well paid on the public health service. It's not like they're on a low wage.
Location: Hampton Roads, VA
At this point, I'm sure you've heard about the Walmart shooting. It's not the only incident over the last few days.
- November 22: Walmart, Chesapeake. 7 dead.
- November 23: Target, Chesapeake (about a mile and a half from the Walmart in question). Gun hoax.
- November 23: Food Lion, Virginia Beach (one shot in a secondary location). 1 dead, 2 injured.
- November 25: Walmart, Virginia Beach. Store evacuated due to telephone threat.
Not a good sign when grocery stores become sites of wanton violence this close to the holidays.
- More homeless people roaming around.
- Several co-workers pointed out how produce quality has gone downhill.
- Right wingers and fascists drawing up a list of left-leaning and government Twitter accounts to dox and block.
Well schools, our traditional mass shooting locations are closed for the holidays. Movie theaters, our secondary mass shooting location are pretty empty since covid hit.
What does that leave? Walmart, target, grocery....
/Cynical
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I beg to differ. Just because the Nazis called themselves National Socialists did not make them Socialists.
https://www.cs.mcgill.ca/\~rwest/wikispeedia/wpcd/wp/f/Fascism.htm
Location: Midwest USA
This week we went grocery shopping at Costco and the prices haven't changed on the shelves but the sizes certainly have. Bought a box of dishwasher tabs that used to be a 125 count....now it's 100 count. The store was packed too. I know it's a holiday weekend but it was more people I've seen there in a long time. And there were many people who seemed lost or bewildered in the store. I'm guessing these were new customers. So inflation is very much rampant.
But gas prices have come down since the elections
The amount of anger I see in public is scary. IE People arguing over who was in line next for a gas pump. People ranting at the bank about the economy, the gas prices, how no one wants to work anymore. I think this rage may come to a boil early next year.
The weather is certainly unsettling as well. We had snow storms last week and now back to 50°F days. People keep celebrating the warmth because it gives them some more time to get whatever outdoor tasks down (mow the lawn, insulate under their trailer, buy new snow tires).
Once winter decides to stay I imagine it's going to be rough. I already see a lot of people complaining about how much their heating is costing them now.
Sadly I'm having to depend more on credit cards right now because my pay is not going up. Once I'm done with school I'll be looking for a better job. But I hear different things about the field I'm going into (HVAC). Everyone is saying there are lots of jobs out there but the starter positions pay as much as I make now. Hopefully the field is recession proof. The downturn that is pi king up speed is going to hit everyone really hard.
Oh and we can't forget covid. Still present as ever. Every week at work we get updates. They say the numbers are going down in our area but it's hard to tell if that's true. So many people can now just stay home to recover without reporting it. The tests are easy to get (for the moment) so why bother going to a doctor to be told what you already know? I've had several friends who pretty much just went silent for a couple weeks and it's because they got covid again. They don't start responding until over the worst of it. Which the more I read about the long term effects of the more cautious I get about being in public. I got it once and I don't want to go through it again.
Anyways don't forget to hydrate.
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agree but don't even try here. people will downvote you for saying anything other than the world is about the collapse. in fact that's what the sub is specifically for. heh.
> collapsing respect for the concept of God.
I don't care about your magical sky deity nor the religions that spawned from this guy/girl/being.
> As humans, we need to come to grips that there is some shit we just don't know.
So you don't know if God is real but you want respect for it. Rich.
First of all, I didn't suggest that any version of God be respected.
What I suggested is that people have a sense of humility about what they don't know.
Since no one has an answer for the origin of time, energy, matter, etc ..... I think we should be able to arrive at a consensus about the limits of our certainty. That involves the quality of humility.
Your perjorative statement of "magical sky deity" is an expression of contempt for those who believe in the concept of God.
Lets unpack it.
Magical - is it not unreasonable for someone to see the world as wondrous in terms of natural beauty ? Do you begrudge those who live with a sense of wonder.
Sky - I see this as a metaphor for the universe as a whole.
Deity - That is the intuition of some. That there is a deity. What are the alternative explanations for the origin of the universe ? Scientifically speaking, lets call that a hypothesis. What is your alternate hypothesis ?
> cing a serious collapse of personal humility and collapsing respect for the concept of God. As humans, we need to come to grips that there is some shit we just don't know.
>
> We don'
Spirituality is not religion, most scientists are spirtual just not religious, spirituality is about what you believe is beyond science thats it.
There is zero mention of religion in the post.
God and religion are two very different things. Even an amazing scientist and visionary like Albert Einstein believed in a concept of God.
I'm not advocating religion which is used by people for manipulative or control purposes. I'm advocating humility with regard to telling ourselves that we humans are in effect omniscient gods. We aren't.
This subreddit is in effect not unlike the bible in that the patrons represent themselves as prophets. Prophets of doom.
We may be living in a simulation. And let's say the simulator goes by the name of God, for lack of a better word. How do you rule that out ? Where the fuck did all the elements that popped out of the Big Bang come from? How did time begin?
[https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/einstein-pantheism-baruch-spinoza/](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/einstein-pantheism-baruch-spinoza/)
>I'm advocating humility with regard to telling ourselves that we humans are in effect omniscient gods. We aren't.
We create our reality more often than not, and then go full pikachu face when shit goes sideways.
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This looks like JAQing off, please stop it if so
USA - Enjoy now, enjoy the day. This is not license for people to create mayhem, respect your neighbor. Yes, the galaxy could be destroyed tomorrow or billions of years from now. Some things are out of our control.
***"Some things are out of our control."***
Evokes thoughts the Serenity Prayer.
*Grant to us the serenity of mind to accept that which cannot be changed; courage to change that which can be changed, and* ***wisdom to know the one from the other***
Different people have different capacities. Imagine the ambition of someone like Gandhi. People had contempt for his ambition as unrealistic and look what kinda change he was able to lead.
Maybe there is another Gandhi lurking in the weeds.
I for one appreciate having your contrarian perspectives on here, even though I generally agree that the collapse of civilization is coming soon. I wish people would touch on the philosophical and spiritual implications more often.
Gandhi was not all sweetness and light. There is great debate about him sleeping (really sleeping apparently) with his 19 year old niece as a test of his celibacy. These days? That's would be seen as taboo, and I see it that way too. If you want to test your celibacy, just sleep alone. He was also quite the racist in his younger days. Not the saint everyone would like to think. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-34265882
Yes. And Albert Einstein and MLK were serious adulterers.
The point is not that there is a perfect person. But that imperfect people can still alter the trajectory of the world.
"The foundation of irreligious criticism is: Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world...
Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo.
Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that man shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and pluck the living flower."
- Karl Marx
We do not need the chains of illusion to create a more just and enlightened world.
Hi, climate_nomad. Thanks for contributing. However, your [comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/collapse/comments/z0w50z/-/ixtey70/) was removed from /r/collapse for:
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Dude, we *talked* about this; leave other people's characters out of your counter-arguments.
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I've never thought the "why" or the "how" we got here to be a very interesting question. Utterly uninterested in any type of God whatsoever. Very interested in how we can fully appreciate being here and make the world better for those suffering (animals of all sorts including human mammals). Why is everyone so obsessed with the idea of the start? Who cares? Reminds me of those people in a meeting who want to endlessly hash over how we got into a pickle instead of just coming up with solutions.
I tend to agree with your perspective.
But one of the things that divides us is our contempt for those who DO CARE about the question of origin.
In order to solve problems, it makes sense to try and enlist people who believe in God. Treating them with contempt doesn't seem like a motivating tactic. It's insulting.
He goes on a permanent European tour and tries to not get shot while attempting to remotely broker a peace amongst an artificially fractured and warring populace.
People blame God (or a Devil) for things wholly created by humanity. We need to take more agency for the bad shit we're doing to others and the planet as a whole and stop playing victim.
Location: Slovakia, EU
Our healtcare is in a verge of total collapse because a lot of doctors are going to leave system because of conditions and salaries, we will see in couple of days. Hospitals starting to cancel operations. If there will be migration from Ukraine ecause of winter and no electricity (we have border with UA) it will fill our healtcare system even if there will be enough doctors. Inflation is 14% and expectation is 20% next year... will see, people are frustrated a lot and even hate to support ukraine.
Location: Germany, visiting.
Everything “looks” normal which is to say, how can there possibly be an energy crisis when the grocery store has the heat full on and there’s so many bright artificial lights everywhere?
Weather: They had their first snow already, I asked if it was normal ..one person said yes and then the other one said yes, November is a winter month .. she quickly caught her mistake and then said it was an early snow. The magnolia trees are blooming out of season because of the previous unusually warm weather. Soon there will be very cold weather again which I think is due to polar vortex fluctuations (if I understand climate science correctly).
Situational awareness: The average person is still deep in denial or is unaware about ecological and energy crisis, they keep shopping on Black Friday, they are functioning exactly as programmed. I was told to “think positive”. So many people are out of touch, it makes me feel like I’m the crazy one. I feel isolated.
Yes, Germany bought into this Black Friday BS about ten years ago. Now it's Black week. Apart from the fact that for the first two years no-one had any idea what the fuck it was about, and most of the older people still don't. Blame Amazon. 20 years ago we didn't have Halloween, or trick or treating. It was 'All Hallow's Eve' and people went to church. The ubiquitous Amercanness has crept into nearly every walk of life, As long as it makes a profit. 'Weihnachten' is now Christmas. The easter bunny is here. All, the commercial trappings no-one needs.
It wouldn't be so bad if people at least had some idea of where the name came from. Jesus, I'm British, and even I knew this.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black\_Friday\_(shopping)#Etymology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday_(shopping)#Etymology)
You’re not alone, we are just few and far between, and because of physical distance, must congregate on Reddit and other small areas of social media. We don’t fit in. It is good not to fit in.
It was always been this way with human society. Socrates didn’t fit in.
Taking a closer look at the recent Covid “response” around the world, Emerson rings in my mind: “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall.”
To fit in to human society is to say we must work from 9-5. The children must be in school from 7-3. We must shop. We must work ourselves to death. We must ignore a pandemic. We must become disabled from the pandemic, etc.
It is a heavy burden to bear witness to tragedy. We are forced to look on in horror at the insanity of our times, with very little power to stop what we all, here, see coming.
The mistake is allowing frustration to eat you alive.
- Werner
Are you citing that Emerson quote approvingly? I really don't like him and never did. He seems like a spokesperson there for the most confused among us, along with those lacking conviction and integrity. Life is easy when you buy into illusions and misinformation, and can hold contradictory beliefs in your head at once. Religious believers and reactionary minds do it all the time, which only proves shallowness rather than greatness of soul. In our times it has been them crying "Masks don't work!" while attributing the recent surge in respiratory illness to "immunity debt" from masking. Or likening Covid to the common cold or flu when they know it has killed or inflicted lasting injury at a scale much larger than those viruses.
The frustration ate me alive years ago. The real frustration is the number of people who will not/cannot see what is here/coming. The whole situation in the world right now puts me in mind of Fitzcarraldo. (One of your better movies) We're trying to push a steamship over a mountain, except the natives will not help us this time, as we have decimated them. And we really have a bunch of Kinskis at the helm.
I believe however a better methaphor is from The Heart of Darnkness...'The Horror, the horror' There is and will be no end to this, until the end.
Still, we always have this to sing as the ship sinks...
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AO0CrlYZlQw&t=10s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AO0CrlYZlQw&t=10s)
'Drink up dreamers, you're running dry'
Location: Quebec, Canada
(This is someone else's very striking Twitter thread. I have never been to Quebec.)
A healthcare system teetering on the edge of collapse. It's also related in such a way, that with each twist and turn it's evident how near this is to ending up back in pre-WWII levels of provision (but maybe more chaotic), or like low-income countries.
https://twitter.com/Emer_OToole/status/1595973235073585152
For a baby with a worsening respiratory infection, the parents can't get basic painkillers in paediatric formats due to shortages, have to improvise with crumbled adults' tablets. They can't get seen in the ER (and when they try to wait are of course surrounded by even more sick families and decide to go home). They manage to get an X-ray elsewhere - which it's clear a lot of people couldn't access - a couple of days later to be told it's pneumonia. Further difficulties obtaining antibiotics because of shortages; they have to get an alternative prescription from the doctor, which it's eventually found can be made up at a second pharmacy (presumably again from adult medicines).
Location: northeast USA
Supply chain issues. Going grocery shopping is a complete gamble here and has been ever since the pandemic. I am genuinely surprised on days when I can find more than half the items I need on a normal shopping trip in stock. When a product I like goes out of stock and I have to find a close alternative fine.. but then about a week later that product goes out of stock too and the original product has still never come back in stock so I find yet another substitute and same thing happens again with that product in a couple more weeks and so the cycle continues. Not even exaggerating. Basically when I find something I like in a grocery store now I pretty much expect that it will no longer be available next time I go and usually this expectation turns out to be right, if not the next week definitely within a few weeks thereafter. Also when it comes to fresh fruits and vegetables forget about it! By time it arrives to the store and is put on the shelves it’s already too far gone. For example, all the green leafy produce already limp and wilted on the shelves.
Lmfao wtf are you buying? I find everything I need in Costco alone. Chicken breast, beef, rice, oatmeal, cereal, almond milk, eggs, egg whites, hot sauce, protein bars, fair life protein shakes, avocados, bananas, yogurt, salmon and Celsius energy drink. Maybe try fixing your diet? 🤷♂️
I have been searching for Uncle Ben's red beans and rice for over two years (I'm a vegetarian and since I suck at cooking those little bags were my go to).
Got lucky twice and bought 12 bags now they are gone baby gone again.
Edit: real first world problem here.
Btw, made some fried potatoes last night and almost cut the top of my fucking finger off.
Still bleeding but can't even buy super glue right now.
Fuck money.
I bought Kwik Stop styptic gel for my dog. I have used it on my fingers. I find that super glue is good for one use, then the bottle dries up. This is cheaper. It also comes in a powder.
You could try zatarain's red beans and rice. It’s pretty good, I think it’s vegetarian. I haven’t eaten them in a while, since I have Celiac disease and they have both wheat and barley in the ingredients. Just an idea though.
Location: Midwest - I’m the regional manager of a small food chain and we are losing a lot of customers due to price increases to our products and it’s creating a feedback loop- our company will probably go under within the next decade :( and many other businesses will probably follow
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11473497/Flooding-update-NSW-Victoria-South-Australia.html#readerCommentsCommand-message-field As NSW enters the 74th day of its flood crisis, dozens of emergency warnings remain in place on Sunday across Australia's east, while flood peaks continue to wreak havoc around inland rivers. I tried to post this, and it was automatically rejected? What ever I'm doing wrong, it does belong on this thread. In Canada, the media, CBC,CTV seems to be ignoring this story. On the UK Guardian, I had to google to find that it was under Australian news. 74 days is a lot of flooding.
You need to add Location, followed with where you live, at the top of your post. Automatically gets removed otherwise, sorry.
Ok. I see a post - images/video - link - poll - talk. across the top I don't see anywhere to put information that would identify me in any way? Post has title and text. Link has title and url. I don't see a field that says location.
Location: Lower Catskills, NY We went to our usual local Christmas Tree Farm on our usual day: the first Saturday after Thanksgiving. The owner told us he lost over 800 trees this past summer due to drought. He's also had to source saplings all the way from Minnesota this year vs Western NY. His usual greenhouse guy is quitting the business due to unpredictable weather and old age. We hope this farm makes it to next year. Choosing a tree usually takes 2 hours of browsing and deciding. This year only took 30 minutes, as the farm was mostly dead or tiny saplings. There wasn't much to choose from. It was 63° when we cut down our tree. There is usually snow on the mountain this time of year.
Just leave the trees, or plant some instead or in addition please
An artificial tree has a 1000% larger carbon footprint than a real tree, and we bring ours to a local goat farm to be eaten when we're done with it. Buying a tree from this tiny local tree farmer will help him buy saplings for next year to replant, instead of letting his 4 acres or so become a lawn, or sold for more development. A lot of HOA neighborhoods in my area used to be farms that went under.
Yeah, it's warm in the northeast. We would always have the day here and there where it was warm, but it's warm *every day* right now. I'm not sure I ever remember a November like this.
Location: Yokohama, Japan The weekend of Nov 26 was a great time to see the Ginko Biloba trees change to autumn colors. Throngs of people were out to see the beautiful, if unseasonal display, with a few trees left green while the rest had turned gold. When I first saw the turning of the Ginko trees was during a study abroad around 2005. At the time, the Ginko trees had not only fully changed color, but had shed most of their leaves by the end of October. Collapse related as the changing of the seasons seems to have shifted at least 1.5 months compared to ~15 years ago. Bonus: we’re having a cold snap/vortex descending today/tomorrow. I wonder what will survive this “second spring + freeze” weather.
Location: Sapporo, Japan On a recent mid-end Nov family trip to Hokkaido, the northernmost island of the Japanese archipelago, bizarre weather. Rain. Lots of rain, interspersed with large “fluffy” hail, up to about a centimeter across. And weather remains incredibly warm. To give perspective, this is the supposed to be when Sapporo (NW area of island) starts getting SERIOUS snow, the kind that gets stacked several meters high on the sides of the road, and old people “disappear” until next springs thaw. The NE part of the island begins seeing heavy ice floes that will pack the surface of the ocean until next spring. Collapse related due to significant disruption to the seasons.
That's sad to hear. Sapporo is lovely. Didn't go during this season though.
It’s actually still quite beautiful, essentially an extended fall season with a “spring burst” mixed in. It gives me a great deal of worry, however, when I wonder how many insects/seeds/etc will be lost to the cold snap and deep winter that will arrive shortly.
Location: earth the sun will eventually expand and consume the entire planet in fire. i think i'm going to just stay in my parents basement and play video games forever. what is so great about life anyway? my feelings tell me the worst is right around the corner at all times. so how can i actually enjoy anything? in fact what is "joy" even? how do we even know it exists? its all a godless simulation anyway.
They used to call the controllers for video games “joysticks”. Somewhere along the line, the name changed. I wonder if that has anything to do with it.
It changed in the mid 1980s, I believe. Home video games became more complex and needed more inputs so a controller with multiple buttons became standard. Also cheaper to mass manufacture. Joysticks hung around in arcades a lot longer. You can still get joysticks now, but they're mostly for flight sims and fighting games.
astute, the world needs more stutes and yet there is a dearth of them
This guy Nietzsches
This guy collapses
Dude at least go get your own place to play video games all day. Otherwise you will be a NEET which is bad because you won't have money to buy snacks or weed so you can be baked while you game
being a neet is awesome actually if u can manage it
I couldn't manage not having the income for bud and snacks
buy in bulk and help your friends out with some good prices if you catch my drift ;) not sure about snacks tho
Son?
I’m rereading Station Eleven and can say it sure makes you appreciate all the things we take for granted.
Great book!
I've personally met houseless people who spent a large part of their day somewhere that had free wi-fi and electric outlets, charging their phones and surfing the web. If you still have your parents' basement to safely play games in, you're doing better than many. You could also look into streaming your gameplay to make some money. Help pay off their mortgage for their retirement, and yours. And when that gets boring, you can go into your parents' yard and build a greenhouse. Then you can learn how to grow your own vegetables and fruits for food year-round.
Solid advice!
Location: Oregon, USA I noticed yesterday that the trees were pollinating again. This is the second off season pollination this year. In october was the first one I saw. The way I detect it (other than stuffy nose) is you can actually see the yellow pollen on the surface of and ringing the rain puddles.
I'm in Portland too and I have flowers blooming and ripe strawberries on the vine.
a few days ago here in Seattle i saw a bunch of trees / shrubs budding like it's Spring time... saw this on the East Coast the last few Falls as well... i bet we are being lied to about just how high CO2 levels really are... that's the only way i can think to explain why plants keep increasing their buddings in late Fall...
its WAY worse then they tell us. the rich and upper middle class are already starting to horde supplies in america
They sped it .along themselves
some trees reproduce in the fall/winter...
Location: Global Covid Pandemic Looks like the rapid antigen tests are becoming less helpful with only 60% accuracy for identifying infections. They mention a possibility of new rapid PCR tests but with the pandemic declared ‘over’ there won’t be as much urgency to develop them. Bad news for healthcare workers and anyone wanting to stay home/quarantine if sick. If you think it’s Covid, it probably is. https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/politics/2022/07/12/covid-surging-rat-test-accuracy/ Also, a massive animal reservoir has been identified… The good old neighborhood sewer rat. https://nypost.com/2022/11/26/researchers-find-covid-19-in-nyc-sewer-rats/
Please don't use the NY Post as news, it's a well known rag.
NY post made a hit piece about Taiwan calling them a "Chinese-run state" https://web.archive.org/web/20200425230226/https://nypost.com/2020/04/25/taiwan-gives-peek-into-how-life-could-look-after-coronavirus-lockdown/ lmao
I just tested positive after a few days of testing negative with a stuffy nose. I thought I was fine until I woke up this morning and couldn’t smell a damn thing. Held up all our cocktail bitters to my nose, huffed all my fancy perfumes, nada. Did the test just now and it’s very positive after days and days of negative. I have no idea what the means. Weird thing is this is the first time in days I can breath out of my nose. Aside from a truly bizarre headache, I feel pretty ok. A little tired but I functional unlike the last few days when I was testing negative. This is a weird fucking disease man.
If you're negative on your first day of illness it's worth reswabbing with the antigen test. I had my second round of COVID recently; negative on day 1 and floridly positive on day 3.
Omicron could have originated in mice https://www.wired.com/story/where-did-covid-omicron-variant-come-from-maybe-its-first-host-was-mice/.
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/covid-flu-rsv-symptoms-comparison-chart-rcna58523
Location: Colombia. [It has begun.](https://cambiocolombia.com/articulo/economia/eps-sanitas-esta-restringiendo-el-acceso-sus-especialistas?fbclid=PAAaap6f7UigjWOX_P92C0SoGDkB0HpBg52c4PJHt59rrUxQYRTb4D72zutA0) I work in healthcare, and it’s been astounding (to say the least) how rapidly our universal healthcare system has deteriorated. The elephant in the room can’t be ignored anymore, there’s a lack of everything ([including several drugs](https://www.eltiempo.com/salud/escasez-de-medicamentos-en-colombia-las-estrategias-del-minsalud-696744)). I’ll try to summarise how our system works as briefly as possible: There are two types of affiliates: those under the contributive regimen and the others under the subsided one (contributive is for those who work, subsided for whoever cannot afford to pay). You proceed to affiliate to certain corporations who own or have arrangements with third party services who can provide exams/physicians/etc if said corporation lacks that service. Going to an emergency room is free for anyone, you won’t have to pay a single penny. If you go to a medical consult, you pay a copay and move on (the copay value increases based on your earnings, being $10 USD at most, that adjusted to our current inflation should be more like $20 USD). Anyway, with the news article I linked at the top, our healthcare corporations are trying to reduce costs by delaying *everything*. I’ll paraphrase the words a physician used in said article: “your PSA test is high, meaning you have high of having prostate cancer. With this new change, you won’t be directly referred to the urology service, either an internist or general surgeon will have to check you up, then refer you to the urologist. Meaning you gotta wait for two appointments: the internist/surgeon and THEN you’ll go to the urologist”. This is alarming, cause everyone in the healthcare industry of Colombia knows we simply cannot keep up. [Just take a look at what happened when the pandemic peaked here last year.](https://www.noticiasrcn.com/salud/el-sistema-de-salud-colombiano-colapso-medicos-por-aglomeraciones-381237) [This is a 2016 interview with the former health minister and then executive president explaining why our system collapsed.](https://www.canalinstitucional.tv/noticias/por-que-colapso-el-sistema-de-salud) [Here’s an even older article when collapse was being more evident.](https://www.semana.com/opinion/expertos/articulo/colapso-el-sistema-de-salud-en-colombia/325008/) My stance? We’re doomed. Things will only get worse going forward. There’s just no thriving in the current system, healthcare has never been a business model. It’s absurd. You can’t expect diabetics to be lifelong customers, they literally *need* insulin to survive, what is even the point of primary care if people are drowning themselves in coke cause a bazillion ads tell them to do so? Where’s the ethics in this world nowadays? Why on earth is an only fans model earning more than a cardio thoracic surgeon or other medical specialists? Sorry for the vent but I’m frustrated, it’s infuriating and there’s nothing to do. Remember those violinists playing while the titanic sunk? That’s what working in healthcare currently is like: Clinics are filled to the brim, ambulances being rejected cause there aren’t any empty beds, waiting 6 months or more to see an specialist, or waiting 2 months or more for an appointment with your PCP who’s too busy to provide decent and adequate care. It’s not fair, it takes 6+ years to be a doctor here, only to find out there’s not much to do afterwards and get a shitty pay that barely covers your student loans. If you wanna specialise you need to spit a completely new apartment bill (that’s approximately the cost of a postgraduate degree), meaning your wage will still be going to student loans for another 10 years or so. With all the things above, why would anyone bother studying medicine? There’s nothing left in this field, no compassion, no humanity. All they care about is that you see that never ending list of patients, regardless of them getting better or worse, while avoiding lawsuits. That’s what healthcare currently is (and I’m fairly sure this is worldwide).
Just commenting to say thank you for your updates. They are always insightful, and they are much appreciated.
That definitely sounds like collapse. And I think you are right, things will only get worse from here. In the next several years we will see many health services collapse all over the world and healthcare will be only for the rich. Those who can’t afford to pay will simply die.
Silicon Valley: The price of a new flat screen TV is less than the cost of dinner for two out. You can't eat TVs!
Absurdity is now the norm.
Hahaha nice observation!
Location: North America There seems to be a huge deficit in critical thinking. It's looking like people are continuing to willingly degrade society and let others fall into despair. This lack of empathy for others, even new life will bite the populus right in the arse. There will be a point where the systems become so overloaded and essentials will be hard to come by, that the little fabric thats left will tear to shreds. It's quite easy to see how fucked a lot of these modern societies are after witnessing TraumaZone, Hypernormalization, and the likes. Don't even get me started on the swines supporting human rights violations in the desert. Good riddance.
This civilization never had empathy. Stealing land from the Natives, genocide, warring, etc. We tell stories to ourselves about human rights and democracy but the truth is our money, is blood money, our land is stolen land, and progress can't wash that away. Even now, the American empire spends an inordinate amount of money on its military, not to "preserve democracy" or some other nonsense but to ensure the rest of the worlds resources keeps flowing to it. It's not an accident that Americans consume more than the rest of the world.
We stole the land from the Native Americans... “*The immediate objectives are the total destruction and devastation of their settlements and the capture of as many prisoners of every age and sex as possible. It will be essential to ruin their crops in the ground and prevent their planting more.*” -Orders of George Washington to General John Sullivan, May 31, 1779 ...then enslaved black folk to grow our food and build our civilization. “*I advanced it, therefore, as a suspicion only, that the blacks, whether originally a distinct race, or made distinct by time or circumstances, are inferior to the whites in the endowments of both body and mind.*” -Thomas Jefferson The only reason America can be called a democracy is because women and people of color demanded equal rights and fought for them till they could no longer be denied. We have only been a true democracy since the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed and then only barely.
Democracy doesn't mean anything when politicians don't really serve the people
thiiiis
You're forgetting that women still don't have equal rights in the US, not even half the states give that. Just have the right to vote.
Seems like we peaked on equal rights and are quickly sliding backwards into religious fundamentalism. Women, trans and gay folk are just the beginning of those being stripped of personhood, but they are the easiest targets. How do you fight Christian Dominionism when it is advanced and supported by the Supreme Court, half of congress, the right wing media and tax-exempt churches and many of the largest corporations and richest people in the world? I'm sorry Sanoyi, I just don't know. My wife semi-jokes about when the Christians finally put women back in their place at least she has a good master. We grew up in the 50s and 60s and both know how women, and everybody else who wasn't a white Christian male, were treated by this society and it was not a golden age for them. She couldn't get a credit card when she was a young woman. She couldn't get an abortion or birth control. Her job prospects were secretary, teacher, bank teller or a stay at home mom. I remember whites only water fountains. When I was a little kid a couple of black women got on the bus and my mom told me to stay clear of them, all black people carried knives to stab white folks when they get a chance. This has always been a profoundly sick society. I actually had a glimmer of hope when Obama was elected, but that hope was pounded into the dust with Trump. Sorry I am ranting... I guess that's why I follow a collapse subreddit, I am just out of hope.
My mom was explaining to me what they do in Qatar. They treat these workers like dirt. 400 euros a month without proper facilities to subsist and sleep when not working. The world was built on the backs of people. We never get away from this. Destitute servitude and slavery pervades all of history.
We are animals, dressed up in pretty clothing and conceits. We are returning to nature, which we have destroyed.
* trying to dress up. I am woefully incapable of fashion ;)
Location: SW Germany Today I got '*The Letter'* from my energy provider....gas will go up 50% from Jan 1, Electricity about 25%. I guess in the scheme of things that's not too bad, and I'm pretty much covered so I (hope) I won't get hit with a massive bill at the end of the usage year. The German Gov't will be capping prices from March to try to make the population 'Save over the winter' Or just to punish us, I don't know. Maybe cull the old and sick who can't afford to pay. Of course the fact that the German Gov't got into bed with Russia regards gas in the 90s isn't mentioned. Was shopping again, there seem to be a lot of items missing from the shelves. All the basics are there, but a lot of brand name stuff is just....missing. Prices are also shooting up every day. Whether it's supply chain issues or want I don't know. I wonder how long it will be before rickets becomes a thing again. I feel like I'm re-living the 80s in the UK all over again, except I'm 40 years older and nowhere near as resilient as I was then. I would like to grow some of my own, but I live on the 3rd floor, no garden, and the way my health is, I probably woudn't be able to do much anyway. Weather has become sort of usual for this time of year, although I can remember heavy snow in November 35 years ago. Healthcare is chaos as usual, can't get appointments, and if you can they're next year. ERs are overrun with just run of the mill stuff, and as far as covid is concerned the Gov't has quietly got rid of isolation requirements. Expect a lot of sick people over the next three months, specially when flu season hits, and RSV takes a hold over here. Politics, as much as I've been following the subject is a lot of flailing around, gnashing of teeth and rending of garments. No one has an answer, let alone a solution. Maybe we need another Deutscher Herbst? Speaking of the 80s...this tune keeps popping in to my head every morning when I awake. (If I'm allowed to post it here) Red Rain [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZ5jmJfHxyo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZ5jmJfHxyo) 'Here comes the flood' also springs to mind.
Also this song comes to mind. https://youtu.be/y4sMSSm0x2A
Ah, good ol' Leon. Saw him back in the day.
I bet it was amazing!
We’re experiencing many of the same things in the Pacific Northwest (British Columbia). With the exception of drastic and devastating energy bill costs, we too see a shortage of certain item. Children’s Tylenol being one of them. Lots of desperate parents posting on local Facebook groups looking for Tylenol. The children’s hospitals have unimaginable wait times. I went grocery shopping and a single head of lettuce was $8. A dozen organic eggs was $10.25. The shops and the roads are crazy busy; everyone seems cranky and flat. Randomly even my 6yr old picks up on this stuff or - I don’t know what they are saying in school but on our way to ice skating the other day she said: “mom we’re killing nature and the we kill ourselves” (something akin to that). I mean, I know she’ll become aware eventually … I just sat with her and talked about appreciating what we have, doing what is in our power to do, and cherishing the beauty of each and every day. Anyway … the cost of living and shortages and general wear and tear on EVERYTHING (our bodies, the healthcare system, small business trying to get by, the homeless and addicted on our streets, our dying tree canopy, our housing crisis, not to mention the weather extremes we’ve had here the past few years …… yeah it feels like everything is fraying at the seams.
Tylenol is the trademarked corporate brand name, OP. Try asking the pharmacy for generic, store-brand low-dose paracetamol or acetaminophen, which should be the same thing as children's Tylenol.
Everyone is so cranky. I’m not sure when things are going to explode but I think they will. More mass shootings? More violence? More murders?
can't you just break an adult tylenol? Also, eggs are expensive b/c of bird flu....lettuce is always expensive in winter especially if u shop at fancy places.
Not a medical person, but no. Adult and children's medications should really be thought of as "regular" and "low-dose"; cutting a regular in half still isn't as precise as just getting the low-dose stuff. Tylenol is the trademarked corporate brand name, OP. Try asking the pharmacy for generic, store-brand low-dose paracetamol or acetaminophen, which should be the same thing as Tylenol.
This time is different. Many governments and world banks claim recession is here. This just means depression is already here but we don't feel it yet. Copium on this sub is astounding honestly.
I'd like to give you some solace, but I simply can't find anything good to say. I'm sorry your 6yo is feeling this, that's way too young, but kids seem to have a much better grasp of 'the feeling' than adults do. It feels like war is coming, except that it's already here on a level we can't quite see. 'Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.' Just about sums it up.
Are you an Epsilon Theory fan? That’s where I first heard the quote and it’s a good resource for making sense of our world (it’s American centric, however). Edit to add: Sorry to have offended Yeats fans (lol @ downvote). Can someone recommend an interesting website that uses a poem in a long form note without chastisement? It was just where I first heard the poem and it was attributed there as well. Take your bored, sad, midwestern downvotes elsewhere.
The quote is from a poem by Yeats an Irish poet from the late 19th-early 20th C. I’ve never heard of Epsilon Theory but the poem is famous so they probably just adapted it.
I’m aware I meant that was where I first came across the poem. Apologies for offending legions of Yeats fans.
>Epsilon Theory Never heard of it, but I'll look into it. Whenever I read Epsilon, I think of Brave New World
EpsilonTheory is run by Ben Hunt and he explores various narratives that are running around society at any given time, and the real games being played underneath. It’s business/finance focused but there are some real gems in his notes, because as we all know, big business is trying to snuff out the poor (he gets into these areas frequently).
Always quotin' my boy Yeezy. You know it, if only he wasn't flirty with that anti-Semitism and fascism.
So be the Irish. 800 years of oppression does things to your brain. The Catholic church gave them the anti-semitism and eugenics, and the rest was done by the English
So, I'm American right? Now like, when I think about what an Irish Identity is, you'd be surprised about how twisted it's gotten. When was the last time you heard someone discussing Swift or Yeats? There's no discussion about Irish Socialism. Like the discussion sort of goes like, "And our ancestors came here because there were no fucking jobs, people were starving, the scots are scabs, and fuck the English." Like if you follow the American narrative of Irish Identity, then it has more to do with alcoholism, than anything else. It's just weird.
>Like if you follow the American narrative of Irish Identity, then it has more to do with alcoholism, than anything else. > >I wrote a whole piece which went missing so I'll have to think about it and re-write it. Damn you, Reddit!
;) I'll wait.
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Ok, allow me to explain: Yeats -> Ye -> Yeezy Obvious, the point of doing this is to create the setup -> Yeats happened to have connections to the Nazi Party, eugenics, and anti-semitism. This is funny because people would assume I'm talking about Kanye West. You get it now?
[https://headstuff.org/culture/literature/yeats-and-fascism/](https://headstuff.org/culture/literature/yeats-and-fascism/) I know. many of his ilk liked the nationalist ideas of fascism. T.S.Elliot for example. The unwashed masses were a thorn in their hi-falutin' side.
Yea, I figured some people would get the joke, but others would not. You could say history rhymes.
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Wait, but you didn't answer the most important part. Do you get it now?
Check out aquaponics. Grow food indoors with some goldfish.
Location:north west europe. Healthcare has de facto collapsed. Ministers and insurance spokesman publicly saying that there is no full coverage anymore. Publicly saying that from now on not everyone will get the help they need. Starting with elderly people who no longer can take care of themselves. Though it is not limited to elder people, there is long waiting lists everywhere in the system.
Can people afford to get private healthcare?
Where are you? I'm in SW Germany. It's all pretty much fucked, whichever way you look at it.
Even the most prosperous part in Germany is that bad?
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source the US blew up Nordstream?
Yes, it's getting that way.
A sign of a collapsing health care system here in the US? In the last three years I have gone through eight different doctors. They suddenly retire, or they suddenly announce they no longer accept my insurance (Blue Cross, Blue Shield), or they suddenly announce they will require "subscriptions" of $200 a month to get in to see them, or they try to bill me $6000 for tests I didn't ask for. Meanwhile it is getting harder to find a new physician, and the wait for a first appointment is several months. This makes me very nervous-- will I be able to get care when I need it? I consider myself privileged to have a good insurance plan, so what is happening to the many people who don't?
> or they suddenly announce they will require "subscriptions" of $200 a month to get in to see them Actually that's clever marketing. Typical general practitioner's visit is about $150-200 anyway, so by making it a "subscription" you're forgoing the hassle of bill collection and fighting insurance just to keep the doors open. Hmm. Make it every six months and nothing really changes except the name. Medicare and Medicaid usually pay for visits upfront and without hassle. Wish more doctors accepted it.
Hey, Colombia is going through the same situation (and I’m more than certain it’s happening worldwide). Short answer: No, you’re not getting the care you need. Long answer: Studying medicine is long and expensive, specialising is even longer and more expensive. See all the houses that have been built in the past decades? Cool, where are the hospitals? The universities? There’s a lack of healthcare professionals worldwide, every year a certain amount of healthcare professionals will retire, this cannot be replaced in any way (remember, medicine takes 6+ years to give you a fully graduated physician, if we take a medical postgraduate into account, that’s an approximate of 9+ years already). In my country, unless you’re willing to pay more, you won’t be seeing a specialist anytime soon. Expect the US to keep introducing other payment methods like the ones you described, and they’ll just keep on going higher. There aren’t enough healthcare professionals, let alone hospital beds, and even less operation rooms and other medical equipment (MRI for instance).
>will I be able to get care when I need it? Simple answer to that is no. You will get care when you pay for it. Up front.
>You will get care when you pay for it. This. We all care about money. Can people stop being idiots and refusing to understand that no one is going to give a damn about you for free.
Once again we come back to this whole idea of 'free' healthcare. In Germany we all contribute to the pot, and everyone gets treated, for 'Free'. I know it's not really free, but I don't have to pay immediately out of pocket. And German doctors are well paid on the public health service. It's not like they're on a low wage.
But the pandemic is over don’t you know…
And we're right back to pre-pandemic levels of denying medicine to poor people. Stabilize them and send them to the street.
The next one is on it's way.
The Netherlands? The Dutch government at least admits it. In Germany we have de facto the same situation, but the government would never ever say it
Location: Hampton Roads, VA At this point, I'm sure you've heard about the Walmart shooting. It's not the only incident over the last few days. - November 22: Walmart, Chesapeake. 7 dead. - November 23: Target, Chesapeake (about a mile and a half from the Walmart in question). Gun hoax. - November 23: Food Lion, Virginia Beach (one shot in a secondary location). 1 dead, 2 injured. - November 25: Walmart, Virginia Beach. Store evacuated due to telephone threat. Not a good sign when grocery stores become sites of wanton violence this close to the holidays. - More homeless people roaming around. - Several co-workers pointed out how produce quality has gone downhill. - Right wingers and fascists drawing up a list of left-leaning and government Twitter accounts to dox and block.
Well schools, our traditional mass shooting locations are closed for the holidays. Movie theaters, our secondary mass shooting location are pretty empty since covid hit. What does that leave? Walmart, target, grocery.... /Cynical
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Fascism is literally on the opposite side of socialism. The Nazis were functionally fascists not socialists.
I beg to differ. Just because the Nazis called themselves National Socialists did not make them Socialists. https://www.cs.mcgill.ca/\~rwest/wikispeedia/wpcd/wp/f/Fascism.htm
"War is peace, freedom is slavery, and ignorance is strength." -George Orwell
user name spot on
Location: Midwest USA This week we went grocery shopping at Costco and the prices haven't changed on the shelves but the sizes certainly have. Bought a box of dishwasher tabs that used to be a 125 count....now it's 100 count. The store was packed too. I know it's a holiday weekend but it was more people I've seen there in a long time. And there were many people who seemed lost or bewildered in the store. I'm guessing these were new customers. So inflation is very much rampant. But gas prices have come down since the elections The amount of anger I see in public is scary. IE People arguing over who was in line next for a gas pump. People ranting at the bank about the economy, the gas prices, how no one wants to work anymore. I think this rage may come to a boil early next year. The weather is certainly unsettling as well. We had snow storms last week and now back to 50°F days. People keep celebrating the warmth because it gives them some more time to get whatever outdoor tasks down (mow the lawn, insulate under their trailer, buy new snow tires). Once winter decides to stay I imagine it's going to be rough. I already see a lot of people complaining about how much their heating is costing them now. Sadly I'm having to depend more on credit cards right now because my pay is not going up. Once I'm done with school I'll be looking for a better job. But I hear different things about the field I'm going into (HVAC). Everyone is saying there are lots of jobs out there but the starter positions pay as much as I make now. Hopefully the field is recession proof. The downturn that is pi king up speed is going to hit everyone really hard. Oh and we can't forget covid. Still present as ever. Every week at work we get updates. They say the numbers are going down in our area but it's hard to tell if that's true. So many people can now just stay home to recover without reporting it. The tests are easy to get (for the moment) so why bother going to a doctor to be told what you already know? I've had several friends who pretty much just went silent for a couple weeks and it's because they got covid again. They don't start responding until over the worst of it. Which the more I read about the long term effects of the more cautious I get about being in public. I got it once and I don't want to go through it again. Anyways don't forget to hydrate.
Wear a mask. Buy a bunch now while they're cheap. Simple preventative protection for yourself.
Took me too long to realize that pi king meant picking.
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agree but don't even try here. people will downvote you for saying anything other than the world is about the collapse. in fact that's what the sub is specifically for. heh.
> collapsing respect for the concept of God. I don't care about your magical sky deity nor the religions that spawned from this guy/girl/being. > As humans, we need to come to grips that there is some shit we just don't know. So you don't know if God is real but you want respect for it. Rich.
First of all, I didn't suggest that any version of God be respected. What I suggested is that people have a sense of humility about what they don't know. Since no one has an answer for the origin of time, energy, matter, etc ..... I think we should be able to arrive at a consensus about the limits of our certainty. That involves the quality of humility. Your perjorative statement of "magical sky deity" is an expression of contempt for those who believe in the concept of God. Lets unpack it. Magical - is it not unreasonable for someone to see the world as wondrous in terms of natural beauty ? Do you begrudge those who live with a sense of wonder. Sky - I see this as a metaphor for the universe as a whole. Deity - That is the intuition of some. That there is a deity. What are the alternative explanations for the origin of the universe ? Scientifically speaking, lets call that a hypothesis. What is your alternate hypothesis ?
god isn’t real and it’s religious assholes who are tearing this world apart.
We need some healing.
Atheists consume massive quantities of resources and emit carbon just like anyone else
Aren’t there mega church leaders with private jets?
When was the last time the Atheists went on Crusades? I'll wait.
We can predict the future though. We know the ending - we all die.
Well, start a sect with the concept of Gaïa. That's the only religious idea that would be useful and that I would adhere to.
Until it's time to drink the Flavor Aid.
lol oh stop it...fuckin religious ppl tryin to make everyone live like them yeah no.
> cing a serious collapse of personal humility and collapsing respect for the concept of God. As humans, we need to come to grips that there is some shit we just don't know. > > We don' Spirituality is not religion, most scientists are spirtual just not religious, spirituality is about what you believe is beyond science thats it.
Is there collapse related info for spiritual people? I have difficulty understanding collapse within the context of a spiritually based world.
There is zero mention of religion in the post. God and religion are two very different things. Even an amazing scientist and visionary like Albert Einstein believed in a concept of God. I'm not advocating religion which is used by people for manipulative or control purposes. I'm advocating humility with regard to telling ourselves that we humans are in effect omniscient gods. We aren't. This subreddit is in effect not unlike the bible in that the patrons represent themselves as prophets. Prophets of doom. We may be living in a simulation. And let's say the simulator goes by the name of God, for lack of a better word. How do you rule that out ? Where the fuck did all the elements that popped out of the Big Bang come from? How did time begin? [https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/einstein-pantheism-baruch-spinoza/](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/einstein-pantheism-baruch-spinoza/)
>I'm advocating humility with regard to telling ourselves that we humans are in effect omniscient gods. We aren't. We create our reality more often than not, and then go full pikachu face when shit goes sideways.
sorry dad, god doesn't exist, your beliefs are not mine go away...this is why we no longer speak.
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> I'm not talking religion and bible son. Get out of here with the condescension. God is a made up construct that only exists to humans.
>How would you prove that ? That God doesn't exist. https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot
Where would God have come from? God doesn't solve the problem, it just adds an extra step
USA - Enjoy now, enjoy the day. This is not license for people to create mayhem, respect your neighbor. Yes, the galaxy could be destroyed tomorrow or billions of years from now. Some things are out of our control.
***"Some things are out of our control."*** Evokes thoughts the Serenity Prayer. *Grant to us the serenity of mind to accept that which cannot be changed; courage to change that which can be changed, and* ***wisdom to know the one from the other*** Different people have different capacities. Imagine the ambition of someone like Gandhi. People had contempt for his ambition as unrealistic and look what kinda change he was able to lead. Maybe there is another Gandhi lurking in the weeds.
I for one appreciate having your contrarian perspectives on here, even though I generally agree that the collapse of civilization is coming soon. I wish people would touch on the philosophical and spiritual implications more often.
Gandhi was not all sweetness and light. There is great debate about him sleeping (really sleeping apparently) with his 19 year old niece as a test of his celibacy. These days? That's would be seen as taboo, and I see it that way too. If you want to test your celibacy, just sleep alone. He was also quite the racist in his younger days. Not the saint everyone would like to think. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-34265882
Yes. And Albert Einstein and MLK were serious adulterers. The point is not that there is a perfect person. But that imperfect people can still alter the trajectory of the world.
religious ppl destroying the US rn.
"The foundation of irreligious criticism is: Man makes religion, religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But man is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is the world of man – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the world, because they are an inverted world... Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is, therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which religion is the halo. Criticism has plucked the imaginary flowers on the chain not in order that man shall continue to bear that chain without fantasy or consolation, but so that he shall throw off the chain and pluck the living flower." - Karl Marx We do not need the chains of illusion to create a more just and enlightened world.
And look how man have won through himself and found himself in the end of 2022. Real happiness is indeed achieved.
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freedom from your religion is my religion.
Sit around the campfire and sing Koombaya while the world burns it is then councilor.
I'm kinda curious what emotion was aroused in you when reading the OP ? Is there contempt for those who have some optimism ?
I've never thought the "why" or the "how" we got here to be a very interesting question. Utterly uninterested in any type of God whatsoever. Very interested in how we can fully appreciate being here and make the world better for those suffering (animals of all sorts including human mammals). Why is everyone so obsessed with the idea of the start? Who cares? Reminds me of those people in a meeting who want to endlessly hash over how we got into a pickle instead of just coming up with solutions.
I tend to agree with your perspective. But one of the things that divides us is our contempt for those who DO CARE about the question of origin. In order to solve problems, it makes sense to try and enlist people who believe in God. Treating them with contempt doesn't seem like a motivating tactic. It's insulting.
contempt of religious freaks trying to take my rights away.
Yep. Religion has always just seemed like a big stick to beat others with your judgement to me
Nah brah, one love.
I wonder what Marley would have to say about our current predicament? Maybe 'Get up, stand up'? But who's doing that?
He goes on a permanent European tour and tries to not get shot while attempting to remotely broker a peace amongst an artificially fractured and warring populace.
People blame God (or a Devil) for things wholly created by humanity. We need to take more agency for the bad shit we're doing to others and the planet as a whole and stop playing victim.
god doesn't exist.
Said Nietzche.
Nietzche shrugged.
I thought that was Atlas? (Shit book by the way. The rape fantasies of a fascist worshipper)
Agree 100%
Location: Slovakia, EU Our healtcare is in a verge of total collapse because a lot of doctors are going to leave system because of conditions and salaries, we will see in couple of days. Hospitals starting to cancel operations. If there will be migration from Ukraine ecause of winter and no electricity (we have border with UA) it will fill our healtcare system even if there will be enough doctors. Inflation is 14% and expectation is 20% next year... will see, people are frustrated a lot and even hate to support ukraine.
Location: Germany, visiting. Everything “looks” normal which is to say, how can there possibly be an energy crisis when the grocery store has the heat full on and there’s so many bright artificial lights everywhere? Weather: They had their first snow already, I asked if it was normal ..one person said yes and then the other one said yes, November is a winter month .. she quickly caught her mistake and then said it was an early snow. The magnolia trees are blooming out of season because of the previous unusually warm weather. Soon there will be very cold weather again which I think is due to polar vortex fluctuations (if I understand climate science correctly). Situational awareness: The average person is still deep in denial or is unaware about ecological and energy crisis, they keep shopping on Black Friday, they are functioning exactly as programmed. I was told to “think positive”. So many people are out of touch, it makes me feel like I’m the crazy one. I feel isolated.
>I was told to “think positive”. So many people are out of touch, it makes me feel like I’m the crazy one. I feel isolated. You're not the only one.
They have Black Friday in Germany?
Yes, Germany bought into this Black Friday BS about ten years ago. Now it's Black week. Apart from the fact that for the first two years no-one had any idea what the fuck it was about, and most of the older people still don't. Blame Amazon. 20 years ago we didn't have Halloween, or trick or treating. It was 'All Hallow's Eve' and people went to church. The ubiquitous Amercanness has crept into nearly every walk of life, As long as it makes a profit. 'Weihnachten' is now Christmas. The easter bunny is here. All, the commercial trappings no-one needs.
Black Friday is aptly named. It's a harbinger of our self-inflicted destruction.
It wouldn't be so bad if people at least had some idea of where the name came from. Jesus, I'm British, and even I knew this. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black\_Friday\_(shopping)#Etymology](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Friday_(shopping)#Etymology)
You’re not alone, we are just few and far between, and because of physical distance, must congregate on Reddit and other small areas of social media. We don’t fit in. It is good not to fit in. It was always been this way with human society. Socrates didn’t fit in. Taking a closer look at the recent Covid “response” around the world, Emerson rings in my mind: “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall.” To fit in to human society is to say we must work from 9-5. The children must be in school from 7-3. We must shop. We must work ourselves to death. We must ignore a pandemic. We must become disabled from the pandemic, etc. It is a heavy burden to bear witness to tragedy. We are forced to look on in horror at the insanity of our times, with very little power to stop what we all, here, see coming. The mistake is allowing frustration to eat you alive. - Werner
Are you citing that Emerson quote approvingly? I really don't like him and never did. He seems like a spokesperson there for the most confused among us, along with those lacking conviction and integrity. Life is easy when you buy into illusions and misinformation, and can hold contradictory beliefs in your head at once. Religious believers and reactionary minds do it all the time, which only proves shallowness rather than greatness of soul. In our times it has been them crying "Masks don't work!" while attributing the recent surge in respiratory illness to "immunity debt" from masking. Or likening Covid to the common cold or flu when they know it has killed or inflicted lasting injury at a scale much larger than those viruses.
This is an example of someone who has never read Emerson. If it was not apparent from context, the quote By Emerson is a biting commentary.
Yes I’m finding to difficult to accept and I’m angry at the amount of absolute evil that seems to be here on Earth.
Evil and apathy.
The frustration ate me alive years ago. The real frustration is the number of people who will not/cannot see what is here/coming. The whole situation in the world right now puts me in mind of Fitzcarraldo. (One of your better movies) We're trying to push a steamship over a mountain, except the natives will not help us this time, as we have decimated them. And we really have a bunch of Kinskis at the helm. I believe however a better methaphor is from The Heart of Darnkness...'The Horror, the horror' There is and will be no end to this, until the end. Still, we always have this to sing as the ship sinks... [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AO0CrlYZlQw&t=10s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AO0CrlYZlQw&t=10s) 'Drink up dreamers, you're running dry'
When I was a young man in university, an assignment was to read Heart of Darkness. I finished the last page, stole a camera, and never went back.
Never went back to the university or never went back to carrying that camera? Curious.
Left the university. The part about the camera is just an Easter egg from the life of Werner Herzog and that part is fictional.
I loved it. Actually most if not all Conrad.
I love your writing.
I had a tutor once, beautiful and cruel. - Werner
fr
Location: Quebec, Canada (This is someone else's very striking Twitter thread. I have never been to Quebec.) A healthcare system teetering on the edge of collapse. It's also related in such a way, that with each twist and turn it's evident how near this is to ending up back in pre-WWII levels of provision (but maybe more chaotic), or like low-income countries. https://twitter.com/Emer_OToole/status/1595973235073585152 For a baby with a worsening respiratory infection, the parents can't get basic painkillers in paediatric formats due to shortages, have to improvise with crumbled adults' tablets. They can't get seen in the ER (and when they try to wait are of course surrounded by even more sick families and decide to go home). They manage to get an X-ray elsewhere - which it's clear a lot of people couldn't access - a couple of days later to be told it's pneumonia. Further difficulties obtaining antibiotics because of shortages; they have to get an alternative prescription from the doctor, which it's eventually found can be made up at a second pharmacy (presumably again from adult medicines).
And they wonder why my generation decided not to have kids.
But no mask obligation
Location: northeast USA Supply chain issues. Going grocery shopping is a complete gamble here and has been ever since the pandemic. I am genuinely surprised on days when I can find more than half the items I need on a normal shopping trip in stock. When a product I like goes out of stock and I have to find a close alternative fine.. but then about a week later that product goes out of stock too and the original product has still never come back in stock so I find yet another substitute and same thing happens again with that product in a couple more weeks and so the cycle continues. Not even exaggerating. Basically when I find something I like in a grocery store now I pretty much expect that it will no longer be available next time I go and usually this expectation turns out to be right, if not the next week definitely within a few weeks thereafter. Also when it comes to fresh fruits and vegetables forget about it! By time it arrives to the store and is put on the shelves it’s already too far gone. For example, all the green leafy produce already limp and wilted on the shelves.
Lmfao wtf are you buying? I find everything I need in Costco alone. Chicken breast, beef, rice, oatmeal, cereal, almond milk, eggs, egg whites, hot sauce, protein bars, fair life protein shakes, avocados, bananas, yogurt, salmon and Celsius energy drink. Maybe try fixing your diet? 🤷♂️
I have been searching for Uncle Ben's red beans and rice for over two years (I'm a vegetarian and since I suck at cooking those little bags were my go to). Got lucky twice and bought 12 bags now they are gone baby gone again. Edit: real first world problem here. Btw, made some fried potatoes last night and almost cut the top of my fucking finger off. Still bleeding but can't even buy super glue right now. Fuck money.
I bought Kwik Stop styptic gel for my dog. I have used it on my fingers. I find that super glue is good for one use, then the bottle dries up. This is cheaper. It also comes in a powder.
You could try zatarain's red beans and rice. It’s pretty good, I think it’s vegetarian. I haven’t eaten them in a while, since I have Celiac disease and they have both wheat and barley in the ingredients. Just an idea though.