I felt Dan is still too stuck in this old "Media Gatekeeper" way of thinking as he contextualizes the current atmosphere, which is ironic since he briefly mentioned the "Everyone's a Broadcaster Now" fact. You and I and everyone else can now directly connect our innermost Ids to each other, and refine and amplify them. The Internet has become The Great Mental Catalyst, and all the good, bad, and ugly things that implies.
The President or the Media Execs or whatever
can't reign the fervor in anymore because advances in communications technology have decentralized broadcasting. That's what that whole business we heard about Youtube and Facebook trying to find a way to "filter out" fake news was all about: they're feeling pressure to
find a way make their platforms gatekept and herd the barking dogs in again.
GrumpyCatFace wrote:Halfway through, but I am thoroughly enjoying this episode. Couldn't agree more, so far.
'What is the objective? What's the reaction from our manic government, if people really go nuts?'
Great quotes:
"We are not citizens, we are suspects."
And the thing is, it's not merely we are suspected by The Government or The Conglomerates, it's also that we individual citizens suspect our fellow birth-right citizens (and they suspect us in return). I've had a friend tell me he doesn't feel his family trusts him anymore, and that he can't trust them in turn either. He half-joked about a "society where we all have a tip line on speed dial, ready to literally sell out our own mothers at a moment's notice."
de officiis wrote:Maybe the ultimate solution to the reduction of this division and hatred is shrinking the footprint of the federal government. Americans fighting for control of the federal government has become like the people of Middle Earth fighting for control of Sauron's One Ring.
The problem is there will
always be the pressure, no matter the political, religious, ideological, or ethnic source, to unify and assert control over our fellow man. We are hierarchical animals. We, at some primal level, seek to either dominate or be dominated (or both, if you're into middle management). The enemy we fight against when trying to determine the best system of governance is
basic human nature. Even if we temporally "shrink the fed," inevitably there will be those who seek to enlarge it again to assert control over the greatest number of people, and they will figure out ways to rally a percentage of the populace to that cause.
I've personally come to conclude not only can man not be trusted to govern himself, he can't be trusted to govern anyone else. Bring on the Enlightened Philosopher Emperor AI, I say. To quote Voltaire:
If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.
"Old World Blues.' It refers to those so obsessed with the past they can't see the present, much less the future, for what it is. They stare into the what-was...as the realities of their world continue on around them." -Fallout New Vegas