america's over but I still liked the idea
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@sun mass media let us speed run the final 200 years of empire in about 50
@sun @pwm It turns out that if you stop watching the news and you discard everything ever said by some rich kid on Youtube, your opinion on this completely reverses.
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@pwm @sun You think that's what happened or that boomers elected people that killed industry? I don't remember strip-mining small towns but I do remember the erosion of any economic opportunity outside the cities while welfare propped up dying towns that would have evaporated instead of remaining in the slow-death trap.
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@p @sun I was using "strip mining of worthy humanity" to refer by metaphor to the force that took my mom and every intelligent person she grew up with out of rural Alabama and into the relatively big city for an education and work. We are referring to the same thing there
I'm afraid I wasn't here to diagnose the exactly How, but the desert I come from, consisting of only those not worthy enough or not opportunistically minded enough to get out is there. I only grew up in the What that was left.
It's reasonable to assume that my forbears failed me somehow by breaking the great chain of existence in some nebulous way but, while I can draw upon experience to ponder the wasteland, I can't do this for what led up to it. Neither can you, I don't think.
I'm afraid I wasn't here to diagnose the exactly How, but the desert I come from, consisting of only those not worthy enough or not opportunistically minded enough to get out is there. I only grew up in the What that was left.
It's reasonable to assume that my forbears failed me somehow by breaking the great chain of existence in some nebulous way but, while I can draw upon experience to ponder the wasteland, I can't do this for what led up to it. Neither can you, I don't think.
@pwm @sun
> the force that took my mom and every intelligent person she grew up with out of rural Alabama and into the relatively big city for an education and work
Well, fair enough. What caused the rush to the cities?
> I'm afraid I wasn't here to diagnose the exactly How, but the desert I come from, consisting of only those not worthy enough or not opportunistically minded enough to get out is there.
I did spend a lot of my childhood in these places. I saw the small towns erode. I lived in a town that had been a swamp, the swamp was drained for logging, the trees left, there were still people. I saw the push when the banks elected the first banker-American as president in 1992 and we got NAFTA and China was formally awarded most-favored trade partner status and Glass-Steagall was revoked and the technocrats finally got their service-based economy.
"A bad thing has occurred" is not the same thing as "our people are dead and everything shall suck forever". I don't think "service-based economy" fits our national character and I don't think anyone was bought into that system but the goddamn boomers and I'm certain that the damage done will survive them but I do not expect the trajectory to survive much longer than the boomers.
> while I can draw upon experience to ponder the wasteland, I can't do this for what led up to it.
I was not alive in the 1930s but we both can read.
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> the force that took my mom and every intelligent person she grew up with out of rural Alabama and into the relatively big city for an education and work
Well, fair enough. What caused the rush to the cities?
> I'm afraid I wasn't here to diagnose the exactly How, but the desert I come from, consisting of only those not worthy enough or not opportunistically minded enough to get out is there.
I did spend a lot of my childhood in these places. I saw the small towns erode. I lived in a town that had been a swamp, the swamp was drained for logging, the trees left, there were still people. I saw the push when the banks elected the first banker-American as president in 1992 and we got NAFTA and China was formally awarded most-favored trade partner status and Glass-Steagall was revoked and the technocrats finally got their service-based economy.
"A bad thing has occurred" is not the same thing as "our people are dead and everything shall suck forever". I don't think "service-based economy" fits our national character and I don't think anyone was bought into that system but the goddamn boomers and I'm certain that the damage done will survive them but I do not expect the trajectory to survive much longer than the boomers.
> while I can draw upon experience to ponder the wasteland, I can't do this for what led up to it.
I was not alive in the 1930s but we both can read.
Robert_McNamara_official_portrait.jpg
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Replies
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@sun @pwm I don't know where you get the idea that culture has ended and people have stopped making things. You are on a network that is full of people that are obsessed with making shit. There are not too many people where I am now, but LA is goddamn full of people that run off a thousand stickers with their Soundcloud URL and slaptag all the lightposts. I don't even know what you think culture is but you're replying to a post about the dismantling of the economy, which is not culture.
@p @pwm cool there's still culture in giant cities with tons of momentum and money, that definitely is valuable and replaces what used to be an entire diverse and varied city cultures across the entire continent. I connected them because they're a signifier. this is like a libertarian economist arguing that americans are healthier even though theres more cancer because cancer medicine got better
@sun @pwm
> cool there's still culture in giant cities with tons of momentum and money
You said the country's culture is dead; I don't think so. I pointed out two counterexamples and you picked on one of them. I'm out here now and there definitely is culture out here. I don't think the Great Depression destroyed culture. I don't even know what you think is a great indicator of culture or what you mean when you say it because every time I say "I don't think that's correct" you start telling me about something else that sucks. I'm fundamentally optimistic and I suspect you're fundamentally pessimistic and if we don't nail it down a little more carefully than how either of us feels then we're not going to get anywhere.
> this is like a libertarian economist arguing that americans are healthier even though theres more cancer because cancer medicine got better
I'm not the one claiming culture is pegged to the DOW, man. I am saying you gotta get out more instead of closing your windows and insisting that the world outside is completely empty.
I look at a neighborhood I grew up in and it's hollowed out, that's a real thing, sure. That's the boomers and the boomers are going away and I'm optimistic about what this means and where we're going.
> cool there's still culture in giant cities with tons of momentum and money
You said the country's culture is dead; I don't think so. I pointed out two counterexamples and you picked on one of them. I'm out here now and there definitely is culture out here. I don't think the Great Depression destroyed culture. I don't even know what you think is a great indicator of culture or what you mean when you say it because every time I say "I don't think that's correct" you start telling me about something else that sucks. I'm fundamentally optimistic and I suspect you're fundamentally pessimistic and if we don't nail it down a little more carefully than how either of us feels then we're not going to get anywhere.
> this is like a libertarian economist arguing that americans are healthier even though theres more cancer because cancer medicine got better
I'm not the one claiming culture is pegged to the DOW, man. I am saying you gotta get out more instead of closing your windows and insisting that the world outside is completely empty.
I look at a neighborhood I grew up in and it's hollowed out, that's a real thing, sure. That's the boomers and the boomers are going away and I'm optimistic about what this means and where we're going.