Venting “the idea of a better future sustained me—now I…find it difficult to be productive”

[Concorde]

Reassuring in the worst way possible, and in a way that has nothing to do with the shambles of my career, I'm not alone.

"I hadn't fully grasped how the idea of a better future sustained me – now I, like many others, find it difficult to be productive"
Theresa MacPhail for The Guardian via Jason Kottke

 

[badatparties]

I find it hard to want to be productive in a planet full of apes that want to do nothing but dehumanize and murder each other all day long.

 

[RosebyAnyName]

I relate to this. I spent my whole life working hard and looking forward to the future, now it feels like it wasn't worth it. Things just keep getting more expensive, people are getting more paranoid, the economy is getting worse, it's hard to feel like things will be worth sticking around for.

 

[DeathByBananabread]

"When I asked Himmelstein if our current inability to think about the future is unique, he said it seems worse now than in the immediate aftermath of 9/11."

another quote from the same article. chilling, but almost not-surprising in it's accuracy.

the rest of the article, while trying to be hopeful or maybe trying to offer solutions, talks about how people in similar times basically went into crisis-mode. yeah. might as well kill myself, fuck this.

 

[Concorde]

9/11

I, for one, was no big fan of 9/11.

The United States of today reminds me of then only inasmuch as I'm seeing the place with eyes that are more disappointed in this place than I previously thought possible. A reckoning.

There are not many places where schoolchildren are taught their country is the best. (US, North Korea, where else?). The US's many aggressive failures are difficult to not take as personal failures and harms to my own self-esteem. Which is ridiculous.

 

[Dejected 55]

There are not many places where schoolchildren are taught their country is the best. (US, North Korea, where else?). The US's many aggressive failures are difficult to not take as personal failures and harms to my own self-esteem. Which is ridiculous.

It all feels a little inversely proportional too... I mean, the harder you have to teach kids how "great" it is to be in your country... feels like that must mean it isn't that great.

I'm not talking where people take things for granted and don't appreciate what they have... that's different. But, the over-propagandizing and fetishizing of how great your country is... feels like something that countries that aren't that great, ran by people that are corrupt, love to do.

 

[Concorde]

It all feels a little inversely proportional too... I mean, the harder you have to teach kids how "great" it is to be in your country... feels like that must mean it isn't that great.

I'm not talking where people take things for granted and don't appreciate what they have... that's different. But, the over-propagandizing and fetishizing of how great your country is... feels like something that countries that aren't that great, ran by people that are corrupt, love to do.

Love it or leave it. Jk

Def not serious. And I def hear that too often. I'm almost sure non-USA people never ever hear that.

And yes, no one ever had to sell me on the-sky-is-usually-blue propaganda. Unlike the fake bestness of the US, the blueness of the sky needs no apologists.

Just my rhetorical complaining that no one on this fucking website should be subjected to:
God I hate this country. How is it sooooooo uniquely fucked up despite having so many commonalities with less awful places? Or is the US just what every place will become as capitalism consumes my real homeland (Earth)?

 

[Dejected 55]

Love it or leave it. Jk

Def not serious. And I def hear that too often. I'm almost sure non-USA people never ever hear that.

And yes, no one ever had to sell me on the-sky-is-usually-blue propaganda. Unlike the fake bestness of the US, the blueness of the sky needs no apologists.

Just my rhetorical complaining that no one on this fucking website should be subjected to:
God I hate this country. How is it sooooooo uniquely fucked up despite having so many commonalities with less awful places? Or is the US just what every place will become as capitalism consumes my real homeland (Earth)?

Yeah... "If you don't like it leave... go back where you came from... etc" is a popular thing. I've heard folks on both sides use it, though it's mostly popular from the Republicans at the moment. If you are non-white, you'll hear this whether you are a natural-born US citizen or a recent immigrant... there are lots of white immigrants in the US who will not hear this... though, there was a time not so long ago when Italians and Irish and other more-white folks got similar treatment. This country has a dark history of prejudice that isn't limited to just brown people like the modern version.

Meanwhile, even the white folk get told to leave too... if they don't like it... just not told go go back "where they came from" because that falls flat. Irony in play, of course, is the same folks who will tell you to leave if you don't like something in the US... are the same folks loudly/proudly declaring how we let people protest here, but other countries kill you for protesting. It's like... people have forgotten how words and irony works... and they don't think anyone notices when they say stupid/conflicting shit that makes no sense.