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Post by sorcerer on Sept 15, 2019 18:41:28 GMT -5
It's definitely good to be able to express these ideas and be taken seriously! I will add, though, that the strange ideological turns of the modern left may be symptomatic of decline without causing it. Leftism has always had an aspect of fashion to it, a set of new ideas one must learn and keep up with to be taken seriously by the cultural jet set. Prison reform, eugenics, prohibition, nudism, these are all ideas that the left took up and then later abandoned; perhaps identity politics will go the same way. But what does seem to matter about the left's current position it is that it reflects a deeper erosion of morale. On the surface we see various groups shamefully scrambling for a piece of the economic pie - and economic conservatives have always encouraged this as well, with their habit of equating worth with earning potential - but more deeply the rejection of whites, and particularly the while males who built Western civilization, represents a rejection of Western civilization itself. We see monuments torn down, not only from the Civil War but WWI, in a way that indicates a deep discomfort with the country and its history. I am no friend to traditional religion, but I hardly see how the burning of Notre Dame is something to be celebrated. People take this civilization for granted now, or else positively loathe it, and that loss of morale seems to be a critical social piece of the fall of civilizations.
(I've always loved Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The first piece I ever wrote, as a child, was essentially a Body Snatchers fan fic. Though I haven't thought of it in years, there is something vaguely body-snatcher-esque about the way the left, both under Communism, or in Revolutionary France, or its current form today, behaves. I doubt civilization usually encourages that sort of thing on its upswing, but it definitely would have been grist for Howard's mill. It seems strange that a civilization seemingly built upon freedom of speech and expression could build the last ten seconds of that bodysnatcher clip into its political fabric.)
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Post by kemp on Sept 16, 2019 9:38:13 GMT -5
It's definitely good to be able to express these ideas and be taken seriously! I will add, though, that the strange ideological turns of the modern left may be symptomatic of decline without causing it. Leftism has always had an aspect of fashion to it, a set of new ideas one must learn and keep up with to be taken seriously by the cultural jet set. Prison reform, eugenics, prohibition, nudism, these are all ideas that the left took up and then later abandoned; perhaps identity politics will go the same way. But what does seem to matter about the left's current position it is that it reflects a deeper erosion of morale. On the surface we see various groups shamefully scrambling for a piece of the economic pie - and economic conservatives have always encouraged this as well, with their habit of equating worth with earning potential - but more deeply the rejection of whites, and particularly the while males who built Western civilization, represents a rejection of Western civilization itself. We see monuments torn down, not only from the Civil War but WWI, in a way that indicates a deep discomfort with the country and its history. I am no friend to traditional religion, but I hardly see how the burning of Notre Dame is something to be celebrated. People take this civilization for granted now, or else positively loathe it, and that loss of morale seems to be a critical social piece of the fall of civilizations.
(I've always loved Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The first piece I ever wrote, as a child, was essentially a Body Snatchers fan fic. Though I haven't thought of it in years, there is something vaguely body-snatcher-esque about the way the left, both under Communism, or in Revolutionary France, or its current form today, behaves. I doubt civilization usually encourages that sort of thing on its upswing, but it definitely would have been grist for Howard's mill. It seems strange that a civilization seemingly built upon freedom of speech and expression could build the last ten seconds of that bodysnatcher clip into its political fabric.)
It is probably the division created from said identity politics that is of greatest concern, and there are various splinter groups amongst the radicalised elements. Of course, I am also concerned about the inevitable backlash from such politically recklessness movements. Mark Twain ( someone who is very funny and very wise at the same time ) You are right though, western civilisation is being attacked from within by certain radicals at this junction in time, but from what I can see of world politics it is not limited to the west, for instance the Hong Kong protests against the ‘Middle Kingdom’ ( China ). I like keeping things in balance, and hate for the pendulum to swing too much one way or the other. Hate to be clichéd, but I think people have taken for granted certain freedoms, and my personal opinion is that the far left and the far right are the enemies of freedom of expression. I think on some level, and it is my opinion, ’ The Invasion of the Body Snatchers may be allegory on how things may go politically if we are not vigilant, for instance, people becoming pods and allowing certain freedoms to be taken from us. We lose emotion, and even fear humour and comedy because we fear that it may ‘offend’ someone. This reminds me, maybe I should add something about the movies that dealt with political dystopias of the future. There are a few that come to mind, and I will probably list them on this thread in my next instalments.
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Post by kemp on Sept 24, 2019 8:28:58 GMT -5
I’ve watched quite a few movies set in possible futures with dystopian settings. Sometimes they draw on certain real world trends taken to dark extremes. One that always comes to mind was the 1971 film THX 1138, directed by George Lucas , it is a about a society dwelling in a vast underground metropolitan complex and controlled by android police and the mandatory use of drugs to control emotions and ensure that the populace is performing their assigned tasks. Conformity is encouraged with everyone wearing identical white uniforms and with shaven heads. The movie stars Robert Duvall as THX 1138 who eventually stops taking the prescribed drugs and attempts to escape to the surface world. In some ways it predicted our time, our society where so many individuals are heavily depended on prescribed ( and non prescribed ) pharmaceuticals for a range of health needs and mental health issues. We are a civilisation that has become too dependent on prescribed medication.
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Post by kemp on Sept 24, 2019 8:48:57 GMT -5
Prescription drug expenditure US 1960 - 2019
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Post by sorcerer on Sept 24, 2019 18:15:54 GMT -5
To be fair, the drug craze has been caused by genuine successes in the field - many drugs really do work for a variety of conditions. As pharmaceuticals cease to seem novel and cutting edge, I think it's reasonable to at least hope the overprescription seen today will taper off.
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Post by charleshelm on Sept 24, 2019 21:15:52 GMT -5
THX1138 is underappreciated today.
Prescriptions and indeed all medical care is more expensive because almost no one pays themselves. Insurance pays a lot and often there is a contracted discount. If everyone paid out of pocket a lot of things would be less expensive. Some people still pay cash and negotiate a better discount than the insurance companies.
However, the ability to make big bucks drives research and innovation and as a consequence a lot of things can be treated or cured that in the past could not. So it's a bit of a mixed bag.
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Post by kemp on Sept 25, 2019 4:24:19 GMT -5
THX1138 is underappreciated today. Prescriptions and indeed all medical care is more expensive because almost no one pays themselves. Insurance pays a lot and often there is a contracted discount. If everyone paid out of pocket a lot of things would be less expensive. Some people still pay cash and negotiate a better discount than the insurance companies. However, the ability to make big bucks drives research and innovation and as a consequence a lot of things can be treated or cured that in the past could not. So it's a bit of a mixed bag.It's what I remind myself when I get a head splitter and reach for the headache tablets.
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Post by kemp on Sept 25, 2019 4:28:29 GMT -5
To be fair, the drug craze has been caused by genuine successes in the field - many drugs really do work for a variety of conditions. As pharmaceuticals cease to seem novel and cutting edge, I think it's reasonable to at least hope the overprescription seen today will taper off. As charleshelm put it, it's a bit of a mixed bag, there is probably an over dependence on prescription medication by society in general.
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Post by kemp on Sept 26, 2019 9:06:43 GMT -5
I think Logan’s Run touches upon some of the issues concerning population growth and resources, and the need for balance. The ‘solution’ in this case is to eliminate people when they reach the age of 30. Logan 5 ( Michael York ) is a ‘sandman’, a type of enforcer who hunts down and terminates others who attempt to escape their predetermined deaths at a ceremony called the carousel. The setting is 2274 in a sealed city, eventually Logan escapes the domed city with a woman called Jessica ( Jenny Agutter ), exploring the remains of human civilisation and finding the abandoned city of Washington DC where they meet someone over the age of thirty, an elderly Peter Ustinov. After a showdown with another sandman they persuade the ‘old man’ to come back to the domed city so that they could prove to the other citizens that they could live beyond 30.
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Post by zarono on Sept 26, 2019 22:01:17 GMT -5
Soylent Green is a classic, slow collapse of civilization, everyone wanting and very little left to go around.
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Post by kemp on Sept 27, 2019 7:09:28 GMT -5
Charlton Heston always had a knack for getting those memorable lines in movies.
Spoiler alert
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Post by kemp on Sept 27, 2019 7:45:10 GMT -5
George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel’ ( published in 1949 ) is kinda like some template for many of the dystopian future societies depicted in movies and books. The 1984 film starring John Hurt, Richard Burton and Suzanna Hamilton, produced in the same year, was based on Orwell’s work, a totalitarian state known as Oceania controlled by thought police who are always one step away from arresting people, big brother watching all the time, the Ministry of Love torturing you into their ideology,
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Post by zarono on Sept 27, 2019 9:31:28 GMT -5
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Post by kemp on Sept 27, 2019 18:38:24 GMT -5
Interesting article. There are some sections, certain scientists such as the Swedish behavioural scientist Magnus Soderland ( from the link that you provided ) who are open to the idea. ‘As global temperatures continue to rise, Söderlund said in a talk at the Gastro Summit in Stockholm, the consequences for agriculture could cause food to become more scarce, which might force humans to consider alternative forms of nourishment. Those sources might include insects like grasshoppers or worms, but they could also include corpses, Söderlund said. By gradually getting accustomed to the taste of our own flesh, he added, humans might come to view cannibalism as less taboo.’ Richard Dawkins also threw around the idea of growing meat from harvested human cells. Some hold that Neanderthals were driven to cannibalism in western Europe after a dramatic spike in global temperatures wiped out large numbers of mammoths, bison and reindeer. ‘But of course, the suggestion of cannibalism is rife with problems. Genevieve Guenther, director of End Climate Silence, a nonprofit that advocates for more representation of climate change in the media, told Business Insider that “to suggest that cannibalism is a solution to climate change is about as bad as climate denial itself.” She added: “I don’t think that it should be even entertained in any seriousness, but exposed as a kind of propaganda that only makes it harder for us to transform the world in the ways that we need to.”’ Myself, I have to concur with Guenther on that one, finding the idea of cannibalism repugnant on a few levels.
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Post by kemp on Sept 27, 2019 18:40:52 GMT -5
SSOC issue 105 has Conan trying to deal with mutinous starving soldiers from turning to cannibalism.
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