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[tyrannosaurus vex]

V3x you're being an ass

I apologize. Western technological civilization really is the best we can do as a species and I take back everything I said about other cultures retaining their humanity.

[Doktor Howl]

Alternatively you could realize you're not the target audience and move on as if, wonder of wonders, not everything is meant to be taken or applied by you personally or even aimed in your general direction.

By nature, I would think that this had a target audience of "all humans."

Either we have a drive for tech or we do not.  The Native Americans - in most of North America - did not have any drive for tech, because they had a low population base with an effectively unlimited supply of resources.  Same thing with the Australian aborigines, who remained almost unchanged for 60,000 years.

However, that's it.  Everyone else has/had resource shortages, and the only way to deal with resource shortages is technology.  Or you can die.

So history is in fact an arrow.  It has been for 8000 years.

[Doktor Howl]

Nyborj, you don't know my story so I forgive this transgression.

Noted, sorry.

Altered is a survivor.  Most people in her position would be dead by now, either by their own hand, or by simply not knowing how to acquire resources without a stable income.

[Doktor Howl]

V3x you're being an ass

I apologize. Western technological civilization really is the best we can do as a species and I take back everything I said about other cultures retaining their humanity.

Other cultures are just like us.  Some are even worse (ask an "untouchable" how their day went), but all have the exact same set of drives. The only actual difference between cultures is access to resources, and the ability to store enough resources to support an educated class.

There are no inherently noble cultures or classes.  All humans are assholes by default, although the occasional freak may rise above that.  Even our gestures at "noble purposes" are a statement of wealth.  "I can afford to worry about <insert cause>, because I will not starve to death by the end of the week."

The very culture we complain about is the culture that allows us to give a damn.

[minuspace]

The very culture we complain about is the culture that allows us to give a damn.

That's what I took altered to be saying when she mentioned something to the effect of "all meat on the bones is racist" back in the 'so about these riots' thread, IIRC. The fact that some are using that privilege to address systemic oppression and abuse is in itself a thing of wonder, given that it COULD undermine the vantage that permits that expression. The moral ground wins over the ethical in this case, I think, there's BEAUTY and TRUTH in that.

[Doktor Howl]

The very culture we complain about is the culture that allows us to give a damn.

That's what I took altered to be saying when she mentioned something to the effect of "all meat on the bones is racist" back in the 'so about these riots' thread, IIRC. The fact that some are using that privilege to address systemic oppression and abuse is in itself a thing of wonder, given that it COULD undermine the vantage that permits that expression. The moral ground wins over the ethical in this case, I think, there's BEAUTY and TRUTH in that.

Yeah, the thing about the arrow of history is that the rising tide may not lift all boats, but it lifts more and more boats.

It sucks if you're on a short anchor chain, though.

[altered]

Vex, I don't agree with most of Howl's response here, and I genuinely think there could be a better way of life than what we got, and I think there is not arrow of history (because all it takes is an autocratic Luddite taking control and suddenly it's feudal Europe again), but he's kind of right about the target audience part here. It's everyone. Because it APPLIES to everyone, or to no one. What's good for the goose and all that.

No matter who the target audience is, Mein Kampf is an abhorrent text with abhorrent conclusions.

And yeah, I did just compare the shit you're saying in defense of a viewpoint I agree with you on to Mein Kampf because the end result of both of them is a lot of people being fucking miserable and/or dead.

Sit with that and keep reading.

Do some soul searching while I call you a moron again, because you're letting the facts that you are not very fucking smart right now and that your supporting arguments for your core point are DETESTABLE become an attack on your moral fiber.

But these things are only truly an attack on your moral fiber if you let them be, in the sense that while any human being could think this horrid shit up and most could rationalize it into sounding like a good idea, only a monster would refuse to engage critically with it when told that they're being an asshole.

Stop being defensive and seriously think why the fuck I would say this. Why a lot of people, practically the whole forum short of the resident peacekeeper Cramulus would say this.

[Doktor Howl]

Vex, I don't agree with most of Howl's response here,

I just like technology more than I like people. 

[tyrannosaurus vex]

V3x you're being an ass

I apologize. Western technological civilization really is the best we can do as a species and I take back everything I said about other cultures retaining their humanity.

Other cultures are just like us.  Some are even worse (ask an "untouchable" how their day went), but all have the exact same set of drives. The only actual difference between cultures is access to resources, and the ability to store enough resources to support an educated class.

There are no inherently noble cultures or classes.  All humans are assholes by default, although the occasional freak may rise above that.  Even our gestures at "noble purposes" are a statement of wealth.  "I can afford to worry about <insert cause>, because I will not starve to death by the end of the week."

The very culture we complain about is the culture that allows us to give a damn.

Ok but I never said anyone was better (or more noble, or whatever) than anyone else. It is true that no culture is more noble than ours, but by the same token ours is no more noble than theirs. We are different - full stop, no value judgment necessary. I said the way we do things isn't the only way to do them and the way we think about ourselves and the world isn't the only way to think, but mostly I said that we aren't going to get better just because we get older and the fact that we are "older" in our own terms than native people all over the world doesn't mean we are better than them, or that we have achieved some state of humanity that is qualitatively superior to theirs, either. I appreciate everyone's deeply abiding need to find an axe to grind and all, but please stop putting words in my mouth.

The very culture we complain about is the culture that allows us to give a damn.

That's what I took altered to be saying when she mentioned something to the effect of "all meat on the bones is racist" back in the 'so about these riots' thread, IIRC. The fact that some are using that privilege to address systemic oppression and abuse is in itself a thing of wonder, given that it COULD undermine the vantage that permits that expression. The moral ground wins over the ethical in this case, I think, there's BEAUTY and TRUTH in that.

Yeah, the thing about the arrow of history is that the rising tide may not lift all boats, but it lifts more and more boats.

It sucks if you're on a short anchor chain, though.

History evolves, but it doesn't necessarily evolve for the better, nor does the evolution of one people's history make them - even in net terms - better than another people. In all places and at all times, there have been people who succeed and people who fail, people who rule and people who are oppressed, people who live and people who die. For all our historical evolution, we have not made an appreciable difference in that fundamental dynamic of human culture. We may feed more people, but we kill more people doing it. We may listen to more people, but we ignore more people in the process. We may include more people, but we exclude as many more. We have achieved great things but our evolution is one of scale, not of kind.

[tyrannosaurus vex]

Vex, I don't agree with most of Howl's response here, and I genuinely think there could be a better way of life than what we got, and I think there is not arrow of history (because all it takes is an autocratic Luddite taking control and suddenly it's feudal Europe again), but he's kind of right about the target audience part here. It's everyone. Because it APPLIES to everyone, or to no one. What's good for the goose and all that.

No matter who the target audience is, Mein Kampf is an abhorrent text with abhorrent conclusions.

And yeah, I did just compare the shit you're saying in defense of a viewpoint I agree with you on to Mein Kampf because the end result of both of them is a lot of people being fucking miserable and/or dead.

Sit with that and keep reading.

Maybe you read Mein Kampf, but I wrote, idk, See Spot Run, at best. Literally, standard-issue postmodernism. I am not responsible for the conclusions you draw from an overly defensive reading of my text.

Do some soul searching while I call you a moron again, because you're letting the facts that you are not very fucking smart right now and that your supporting arguments for your core point are DETESTABLE become an attack on your moral fiber.

But these things are only truly an attack on your moral fiber if you let them be, in the sense that while any human being could think this horrid shit up and most could rationalize it into sounding like a good idea, only a monster would refuse to engage critically with it when told that they're being an asshole.

Stop being defensive and seriously think why the fuck I would say this. Why a lot of people, practically the whole forum short of the resident peacekeeper Cramulus would say this.

If I am defensive it's because someone decided to cram a bunch of words into my mouth that I never said and then shout a bunch of profanity and insults at me like I'm the one who said the things they invented. :shrug:

[Doktor Howl]

Ok but I never said anyone was better (or more noble, or whatever) than anyone else. It is true that no culture is more noble than ours, but by the same token ours is no more noble than theirs. We are different - full stop, no value judgment necessary. I said the way we do things isn't the only way to do them and the way we think about ourselves and the world isn't the only way to think, but mostly I said that we aren't going to get better just because we get older and the fact that we are "older" in our own terms than native people all over the world doesn't mean we are better than them, or that we have achieved some state of humanity that is qualitatively superior to theirs, either. I appreciate everyone's deeply abiding need to find an axe to grind and all, but please stop putting words in my mouth.

History evolves, but it doesn't necessarily evolve for the better, nor does the evolution of one people's history make them - even in net terms - better than another people. In all places and at all times, there have been people who succeed and people who fail, people who rule and people who are oppressed, people who live and people who die. For all our historical evolution, we have not made an appreciable difference in that fundamental dynamic of human culture. We may feed more people, but we kill more people doing it. We may listen to more people, but we ignore more people in the process. We may include more people, but we exclude as many more. We have achieved great things but our evolution is one of scale, not of kind.

1.  Once global communication is achieved, all cultures start to merge into one monolithic bloc.  There are almost no places on Earth where you can't buy a Big Mac or get that airbender thing on the teevee.  It doesn't matter who is "better" or that anyone IS better, just who writes the best commercials.  That is all anyone needs to know about intercultural friction.

2.  If all of history was an uninterrupted series of improvements, the world would have been perfect 140 years ago, at the very latest.  Improvements are set back by assholes - sometimes the very same assholes that created the improvement, and you have to eventually do rotten things to them to get back on track.  And yeah, people still get shit on.  People still get ignored.  No matter how far we get, that's going to happen.  Why do you think there have been a total of 2 scenes in Star Trek that show the everyday life of people in the federation?  Great, everyone has enough to eat, but they're still bags of shit who act like total dickheads at each other.  This is what happens, has always happened, and WILL always happen, so long as there are weaponized apes.  The solution here is obvious.

[Doktor Howl]

Vex, I don't agree with most of Howl's response here, and I genuinely think there could be a better way of life than what we got, and I think there is not arrow of history (because all it takes is an autocratic Luddite taking control and suddenly it's feudal Europe again), but he's kind of right about the target audience part here. It's everyone. Because it APPLIES to everyone, or to no one. What's good for the goose and all that.

No matter who the target audience is, Mein Kampf is an abhorrent text with abhorrent conclusions.

And yeah, I did just compare the shit you're saying in defense of a viewpoint I agree with you on to Mein Kampf because the end result of both of them is a lot of people being fucking miserable and/or dead.

Sit with that and keep reading.

Maybe you read Mein Kampf, but I wrote, idk, See Spot Run, at best. Literally, standard-issue postmodernism. I am not responsible for the conclusions you draw from an overly defensive reading of my text.

Do some soul searching while I call you a moron again, because you're letting the facts that you are not very fucking smart right now and that your supporting arguments for your core point are DETESTABLE become an attack on your moral fiber.

But these things are only truly an attack on your moral fiber if you let them be, in the sense that while any human being could think this horrid shit up and most could rationalize it into sounding like a good idea, only a monster would refuse to engage critically with it when told that they're being an asshole.

Stop being defensive and seriously think why the fuck I would say this. Why a lot of people, practically the whole forum short of the resident peacekeeper Cramulus would say this.

If I am defensive it's because someone decided to cram a bunch of words into my mouth that I never said and then shout a bunch of profanity and insults at me like I'm the one who said the things they invented. :shrug:

It's worth mentioning that everyone here read you wrong, which may imply the cause of the breakdown in communications.   I went back and read it, and I got the same thing I read the first time.

[altered]

Funny how I told him that maybe the whole forum is reacting to something that is actually there and his response was to say I misread him

Again

There's another group of people who get away with loudly and publicly talking heinous shit because they deny all culpability in interpreting it as heinous and say it's your fault for reading too deep into it

I'm not saying Vex is like the GOP though, not at all. Any reading that comes up that way clearly misread me, I was just starting a Funny Fact (copyright Get Fucked LLC, 2020)

[tyrannosaurus vex]

how to know what i meant, with the power of reading comprehension:

One of the most insidious and dangerous assumptions we have is the silly idea that human history has a direction. That in some meaningful way, life in the 21st century is fundamentally different (even "better") than life in, say, the 14th century, or the 21st century BCE for that matter. That human events follow a more or less predictable (at least in hindsight) trajectory from "primitive" to "advanced", and that it does this because of some sort of natural law that governs all kinds of progress.

stating the assumptions I wish to question:

1 - that life as we know it in the 21st century is meaningfully superior to life as some schuck in the 14th century knew his life (note: not how we would think of living in the 14th century, because that's preposterous, but how they thought of it.)

2 - that human history invariably follows the path that we describe as "this history of western civilization". the fact that we have to supply the qualifier "of western civilization" should already tend to cast doubt on this presumption, but here we are.

3 - that the aforementioned progress happens regardless of our personal contribution toward or against it. that it is a natural law.

This idea is pure bunk, and should be stamped out with extreme prejudice wherever you see it. It is the kernel at the center of the centrist's inaction in the face of injustice, the unfounded presupposition behind violent wars of "regime change" and "nation building", and the morally vacant justification for colonialist thinking. It is the reason we are taught that the evils of slavery and genocide are "in the past" while the forces that drive them simmer in communities around the world.

initial refutation:

1 - fairly typical call for the avoidance of the ideas noted above.

2 - a list of cases where the idea of unstoppable and inevitable "social progress" is routinely used to excuse bad behavior (note: this is more or less a standard postmodernist rebuke of modernism and similar lines can be found in literally every single place everywhere you might find words about how we fucked up the 20th century with our big ideas about the inevitable march of progress)

History has no arc. It is not a story about a protagonist species who learn and grow. It has never been guaranteed that tomorrow will be more just for you than today, or that the next century will bring more opportunity for your descendants than the last one had for your ancestors. This should be plain to see as we watch the entire allegedly "free" world slip farther every day into the same patterns of mistakes and collapse that have recurred time and again since anyone bothered to remember anything.

additional words on the subject:

1 - "history has no arc. it is not a story about a protagonist species who learn and grow" > basically indistinguishable from 99.5% of anything Roger has ever said about human beings, and

2 - Repetition for effect: nothing guarantees tomorrow will be better than today or that today is better than yesterday. I mean, I'm pretty sure they teach this in preschool.

Even when disaster is averted, for all our apparent progress we have never actually made a difference in what it means to be human. Sure, we have the power to blow up the planet, the power to fling ourselves uselessly into orbit, the power to talk to each other across insurmountable distances. But so what if we can do all this, but give up the ability to feed our children, or the time to appreciate a sunset once in a while, or the courage to speak to our own neighbors? What have we gained, exactly, and why do we imagine that to be "progress"?

Closing paragraph:

1. please note the phrase "a difference in what it means to be human" and how it differs from, for example, "a difference in what it means to own a refrigerator or drive a car."

2. a list of our fancy-pance accomplishments and claims to fame juxtaposed with common-as-actual-goddamn-dirt complaints about the side effects of modern society.

3. The final question about what we have gained, as might be evident if you remember that it is the last line in a larger piece and not just a singular lonesome question posed all by itself without context, is asking whether our technological progress has made a difference in the fundamental, innate feeling of being a human being or our chances of being fulfilled as a member of society.

Notice how in none of these lines were any of the following suggestions posed:

- "everything sucks! let's move back to the forest!"

- "modern medicine is garbage! let's get typhoid like grandma and grandpa used to get!"

- "Technology has not helped anyone ever in any context!"

If you found yourself imagining these suggestions were in fact there, you can see how this assumption arose from your own brain, and not from the text.

Anyway, thanks for playing.

[altered]

"Technology is useless" was implied by "life is fundamentally the same as it was in the 1300s." Because that's a damnable lie.

The rest isn't in the first post, sure: it came from your responses to being called on that really dumb statement about life being fundamentally the same as it was ~700 years ago.