First World Problems

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First World Problems
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thank past governments for that

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Deleted by moderator

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No, since I keep a bottle of water next to my bed. Who doesn't do the same?!

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You manipulate an actual bottle? Last week there was a guy who hung a 3L water bag above his bed with a tube he could just bite on. You're workin' way too hard!

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Then you grab your phone and post an angry meme, salivate with the taste of sweet justice in your mouth, and drift back off.

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Living too comfortably is not the main problem. There problem is when you are struggling. When you are struggling you don't care about anything else but your immediate circumstances. You are in constant triage.
And now and more people are forced into that .

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Happy cake day, but comfortable and satisfied are two very different things, and most people in the West are still very comfortable. What you're saying might apply to Gaza. Here, 90% of people honestly haven't considered that they're part of history and bad things could happen.

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Have you tried vacillating between comfortable indifference and acute outrage on an hour-by-hour basis?

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Damn didn't have to come for me like that

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And that is why they succeed.

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That and all of us just scraping by each day with no capacity left to spare.

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Also the voter suppression, gerrymandering, court shopping, SCOTUS stacking, propaganda channels...

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yeah, I really want to do something. I want to fight back. but my job has taken everything out of me and it's barely enough to skirt above the line of a depressive state nowadays. I hate how I can't will myself to fight

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Circuses and bread.

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100%. As long as we have 2 day shipping and streaming services, we'll just let it all burn.

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Voting doesn't change anything.

*doesn't vote*

Things get worse.

*surprised pikachu*

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When local elections only have a 20% turnout we actually don't know if voting works or not

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Yup. Thats why i say to people, vote locally or run locally. If you actually want change.

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When I was a young man, I wanted to change the world.
I found it was difficult to change the world, so I tried to change my nation.
When I found I couldn't change the nation, I began to focus on my town.
I couldn't change the town and as an older man, I tried to change my family.

Now, as an old man, I realize the only thing I can change is myself, and suddenly I realize that if long ago I had changed myself, I could have made an impact on my family.
My family and I could have made an impact on our town.
Their impact could have changed the nation and I could indeed have changed the world.

Rabbi Yisrael Salanter

There are two lessons here:
1. Start local. This will have a greater impact on your life anyway. The desire to have a large, world-affecting impact is more likely motivated by a desire for attention and recognition than it is by a desire to help other people.
2. You cannot force other people to change, and in fact you have no moral ground on which to expect that other people will or should behave the way that you personally think they ought to.

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I wouldn't recommend running unless you're really invested in municipal issues. Most people cannot be arsed about road maintenance schedules and budgeting.

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That's antiquated.

You think they'll let you vote next time?

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They could try and stop me. Difference is I wouldn't let them.

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You wouldn't let them... What? Stop you from voting?

There are plenty of USAmericans that aren't allowed to vote. Do you think they're just letting the government stop them ?

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tbf the lower the turnout, the more powerful your vote is, so that should be a good reason to vote on its own

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Yeah unfortunately that's how minority views (racist bullshit) gets pushed through easily

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Whether or not people care enough to do something is the first and most important factor in determining whether it works or not.

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*voted*

Things get worse anyway.

*cat shrug*

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Unfortunately, lots of people who don't vote need to for this to work.

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*votes once in a presidential election*

Thinks they did everything there is to do in democracy.

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Well I try to do my part by telling the protestors that they're doing it wrong.

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I hate my government but I'm too disabled to do anything about it

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I was just thinking the same thing. :( I'm right there with ya and I know how miserable and sucky it is. I'm sorry. 🫂

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This isnt unique to the first world. In fact, I'd argue it's even more prevalent in many developing countries where government incompetence and corruption is more appearant.1 In places where things like war and famine are in living memory, a shit government can seem like an acceptable tradeoff.

  1. A relative rule of course, the current US executive branch would give any tinpot dictator a run for their money.
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Keep the peasant happy and they will not revolt.

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New rule: Let 'em be unhappy - as long as they can feel like badass justice warriors by venting online, they will not revolt.

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Comments in Political Memes@lemmy.world

Don't worry, the coming financial collapse will fix that.

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Governments understand that a bad economy actually is a problem, because it's one that that will unite the left and right sides of the populace. That is the red line.

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You’re supposed to be voting in all the elections and writing your representatives and showing up at local meetings and stuff.

And then hate your government even more because it’s not just evil, it’s also stupid.

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I've said it before elsewhere but it needs to be heard...

It's just wild to me continually seeing posts not understanding how this all works, and how it would play out. It's like the people who thought China paid the tariffs...

The house is almost tied. That's who passes bills, handles impeachments, some of the most powerful committees are, and who impeaches Presidents...

218 Republicans, 213 Democrats.

Let's see, take New York for example.

26 representatives total, 19 Democrat and 7 Republican.

5 of those were within 2 points last time their seat was up.

People who think that New York is blue, their vote doesn't matter, skips the votes for the House and Senate and end up losing a Blue house seat but later complain that nothing changes are literally the fucking problem.

Every. Fucking. State. Is. Like. This.

Apathetic morons who don't realize that the president is only held accountable by the other branch of government then wave their hands around when they did jack shit to help put people in place to, are the fucking problem.

District 3 of California was lost by 24,000 votes.
District 22 was lost by 3,000.

Those two seats in the house, along with the close ones in New York, Jersey, Michigan, Illinois, Washington, hell every state... Are what makes the House of Representatives or breaks it.

So, if you think that your vote for president doesn't matter, so you skip voting and let these other seats slip, yes, you're a fucking moron who can't grasp basic concepts of government that are taught in 4th grade.

And don't get me started on the State House/Senates, how they define voting laws and voting zones and engage in gerrymandering.

Every fucking vote counts.

And until the country realizes it, and starts acting on it, we'll keep getting the shit we deserve.

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I'd add... votes for Representatives are EVERY 2 YEARS. The next election to decide the House is in 17 months.

That same election will decide 1/3rd of the Senate.

Entirely too many people refuse to vote in off cycle elections. Sure, they show up for President. Rest of the time? Eh, meh.

If you don't like what Trump is doing, the answer is "Flip the House and Senate". Take back control, put the grown ups back in charge.

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I vote every single year. Primaries for local offices were held a few weeks ago in my state.

I have been doing this for decades. And because it’s a stupid group project things go to shit and I hate everyone.

Like, if it were one of those projects where I could just do most of the work myself and keep the idiots away it would be great.

But here not only are the idiots encouraged to participate, they are required to in order for us to succeed.

So we just continue to fail.

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11M of us were motivated enough to do something about it today.

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This is actually the dark side of the social contract. When enough of the plebians have access to bread and circuses, they're content not to stand against empire.

What happened was too many people stopped getting theirs, and voted for King Heron (the fascist autocrats) instead of King Log (the neoliberals).

If the status quo is a crisis for you, and your options are only to vote for more of the same or put everyone in crisis, it makes sense to vote Heron over Log.

That's how we got here in the US. And many industrialized nations are facing similar paradgms. In fact, the current push towards liberal representatives outside the US is because Trump and MAGA serve a stark reminder how bad it is.

Which isn't how bad it's going to get unless we can, by a sociological miracle, get organized enough to general strike.

Then we'll see regime change and reform...provided we demand it.

There will be blood, just hopefully in the tens of thousands rather than tens of millions.

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The delusion that discomfort leads to political revolution is not backed up by reality.

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