Feels like the end of the world

[Guest]

Maybe I'm just having a midlife crisis, or maybe I read too much news... But have things ever been this bad? Immigration, Islamic attacks, child grooming, north Korea, attacks on freedom of speech, riots in USA, grenfell & associated fallout.

I've deleted Twitter from my phone because I can't take it any more!

[dougless]

It does feel like the wheels are coming off everything at present but I expect it felt worse in the late 30's.

[Switch625]

Grab.

To quote the great late Terry Pratchett "There is a curse. They say: May you live in interesting times".

We do indeed live in interesting times, but just how interesting? Well that's a bit tricky to answer unless you look at everything that has gone before, or will ever be, so before I get very existential, lets face it we can't do that. Besides even if we could do it, we are such small and insignificant creature that we simply couldn't understand what we were looking at.

My opinion for what it's worth, is that the modern age is cursed with a lot of white noise, Rolling Media, Adverts, TV, Radio, Twitter, Facebook.... the list is endless. In small doses each has a place and value, taken all at once it's just too much.

So the best advice I have is take a step back ... Realise that watching things unfold and worrying about them doesn't alter the event, or any other potential train of events one iota. 

You can't shut out the modern world entirely, you risk becoming a hermit, instead why not turn off your TV, phone, laptop etc at a set time before you go to bed and only turn it on when you are ready to head out the door. Make time to do something else in the evenings, read, have a bath, go for a walk, hell you could even talk to real people face to face, remember that?

I have reduced my media consumption enormously over the last few years and I can tell you, I sleep better, I am less worried about what some idiot may do in a nuclear pissing contest and my life is so very much better

PS; Deleting Twitter is a great start

[wasbuckers]

39 minutes ago, Switch625 said:

 

PS; Deleting Twitter is a great start

I've never used Faecebook but two friends have dropped it in recent months and are definitely happier for it. 

[Mikhail Liebenstein]

6 hours ago, Grab_Some_Popcorn said:

Maybe I'm just having a midlife crisis, or maybe I read too much news... But have things ever been this bad? Immigration, Islamic attacks, child grooming, north Korea, attacks on freedom of speech, riots in USA, grenfell & associated fallout.

I've deleted Twitter from my phone because I can't take it any more!

I'm pretty chilled, but then I grew up under the Politics of the late stages of the Cold War. Interestingly on the train back from the Althletics last night I overheard some young Millennials (probably GCSE aged) with their parents discussing these current issues relative to the Cuban Missile Crisis. 

I think the kids were still quite worried though. 

To be fair the current generation of young adults have got to the point where they are so far in time from some of the really nasty historical events that they don't have the same sense of proportion. Obviously I am not old enough to have experienced WW2, but when I was a kid there were plenty of middle aged people and pensioners who had. All the more recent conflicts have been in remote far away lands or indeed have fallen into the category of turkey shoots in military terms.

 

[Bossybabe]

In the seventies, we had the Vietnam war, Cambodia, El Salvador, Idi Amin in Uganda, Grenada, military coups in more than one African country, the USSR war in Afghanistan, Yemen/Yemen, Tanzania/Uganda, Somalia, Pakistan, Egypt, Libya, Lebanon, Belize, Laos, Turkey invading Cyprus, military coup in Greece, Rwanda, Syria, Yom Kippur, Burundi, Colombi9a, El Salvador, Phillippines, Baader-Meinhof in Germany/Europe and our own war against the IRA.  Bombs exploding in N.I. and big cities in the UK, starving people in most of the third world, Watergate, Iran...and so it goes on.  All of this against a background of imminent nuclear annihilation.

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.

[with apologies to purists, I can't do accents on my work computer]

[Guest]

I suffer from insomnia... Middle of the night panics at the moment ... But yes media overload does not help.

[Bruce Banner]

28 minutes ago, Bossybabe said:

In the seventies, we had the Vietnam war, Cambodia, El Salvador, Idi Amin in Uganda, Grenada, military coups in more than one African country, the USSR war in Afghanistan, Yemen/Yemen, Tanzania/Uganda, Somalia, Pakistan, Egypt, Libya, Lebanon, Belize, Laos, Turkey invading Cyprus, military coup in Greece, Rwanda, Syria, Yom Kippur, Burundi, Colombi9a, El Salvador, Phillippines, Baader-Meinhof in Germany/Europe and our own war against the IRA.  Bombs exploding in N.I. and big cities in the UK, starving people in most of the third world, Watergate, Iran...and so it goes on.  All of this against a background of imminent nuclear annihilation.

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.

[with apologies to purists, I can't do accents on my work computer]

Our parents had WWII and Korea, our grandparents had WWI.

[Errol]

Civil wars and much more strife are coming.

If the left and others of their ilk persist in ignoring the valid concerns of the quiet majority (call them those on the right for the sake of simplicity), or trying to portray them as misguided/wrong/nazis etc etc, then things will only get worse.

The true fascists currently, are those on the left - movements such as antifa - and in a less strong sense the general trend of the left to try to shut down any view that does not accord with what they have decided is the 'established truth' or boundary for discussion.

We are at an impasse. The time for backing down is over. If the left thinks the right is just going to go away, or that white people/males/anyone else the left doesn't approve of are going to stop organising themselves into entirely legimitate movements and voting blocks then, then they need to think again. It can't just be ignored. Brexit and Trump were the beginning. There is a very long road still to be travelled.

For people interested, there is a name for this time - The Fourth Turning.

[reddog]

It is true that there were much worse times in WW1, WW2 and other conflicts.

 

But in those times British society was mostly united, now British society is completely broken, and I think that is where your anxiety is coming from.

 

Maybe people say this in every generation, but I think a number of different financial and societal things will come together to create a massive change (not necessarily for the better!).

[Bossybabe]

This sounds like crystal ball gazing - and about as scientific. Predictors of the future are rarely right, however scientific their predictions seem to be.

[Switch625]

2 hours ago, Bossybabe said:

In the seventies, we had the Vietnam war, Cambodia, El Salvador, Idi Amin in Uganda, Grenada, military coups in more than one African country, the USSR war in Afghanistan, Yemen/Yemen, Tanzania/Uganda, Somalia, Pakistan, Egypt, Libya, Lebanon, Belize, Laos, Turkey invading Cyprus, military coup in Greece, Rwanda, Syria, Yom Kippur, Burundi, Colombi9a, El Salvador, Phillippines, Baader-Meinhof in Germany/Europe and our own war against the IRA.  Bombs exploding in N.I. and big cities in the UK, starving people in most of the third world, Watergate, Iran...and so it goes on.  All of this against a background of imminent nuclear annihilation.

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.

[with apologies to purists, I can't do accents on my work computer]

There you go Bossy!

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

[Switch625]

2 hours ago, wasbuckers said:

I've never used Faecebook but two friends have dropped it in recent months and are definitely happier for it. 

So true, looking at others portrayals of their "perfect" life and then measuring yourself against something which actually doesn't really exist is about as constructive as chasing unicorns

[winkie]

2 hours ago, Bossybabe said:

In the seventies, we had the Vietnam war, Cambodia, El Salvador, Idi Amin in Uganda, Grenada, military coups in more than one African country, the USSR war in Afghanistan, Yemen/Yemen, Tanzania/Uganda, Somalia, Pakistan, Egypt, Libya, Lebanon, Belize, Laos, Turkey invading Cyprus, military coup in Greece, Rwanda, Syria, Yom Kippur, Burundi, Colombi9a, El Salvador, Phillippines, Baader-Meinhof in Germany/Europe and our own war against the IRA.  Bombs exploding in N.I. and big cities in the UK, starving people in most of the third world, Watergate, Iran...and so it goes on.  All of this against a background of imminent nuclear annihilation.

Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose.

[with apologies to purists, I can't do accents on my work computer]

Quite, threats and fears have always been and will always be there.....all that plus what is happening at the end of the road close to where living that we have yet to find out about......technology now does mean if we look for it will find it c'est la vie....life, human nature always has been, always will be....power, ego, control and corruption.....an elderly aunt of mine said she was not interested in TV, rarely listened to the radio apart from music and would prefer to live among the fairies, recon she has a long live ahead of her.....broadband she wouldn't know what that means and wouldn't want to......que sera, sera...only here for a short moment in time best to make the most of it whilst you can...

 

[Riedquat]

1 hour ago, reddog said:

It is true that there were much worse times in WW1, WW2 and other conflicts.

 

But in those times British society was mostly united, now British society is completely broken, and I think that is where your anxiety is coming from.

 

Maybe people say this in every generation, but I think a number of different financial and societal things will come together to create a massive change (not necessarily for the better!).

Such events tend to bring people together against a common foe, and will only last when there is that common foe. That doesn't mean you're wrong about British society, and the direction it's very deliberately pushing itself towards.

Yeah, it's said about every generation, sooner or later it'll be right (and it's not as if every single change in society has been negative). The question is whether or not enough people will eventually realise that the things they're after aren't worth having, because what they're trying to get isn't something nice but simply more, and with less effort. The former means you'll never be satisfied and the latter, which starts off as great not having to slave your guts out every waking minute for half a mouldy turnip eventually turns in to an inability to appreciate having anything.

[SillyBilly]

Perhaps it is just the evolution of my own thinking but society is fast losing any sense of homogeneity, increasingly consumed by special interests groups and identity politics. I have never been so aware of being a man, white, middle-earner etc. as bizarre as that sounds. I am profiling myself now. This awareness is only really a result of being put off by the militancy of other special interests groups rather than wholly embracing those groups who would claim to represent me. I think it is a real shame but the direction of travel seems unwavering and relentless to me and something I am worried about for the future.

 

[juvenal]

On the upside, we've got the Morrisons foot-long sausage roll...

[longgone]

16 hours ago, Grab_Some_Popcorn said:

Maybe I'm just having a midlife crisis, or maybe I read too much news... But have things ever been this bad? Immigration, Islamic attacks, child grooming, north Korea, attacks on freedom of speech, riots in USA, grenfell & associated fallout.

I've deleted Twitter from my phone because I can't take it any more!

Those things have always existed and always will in one way or another. 

It`s just we have access to  24/7 media and news posts confirming the fact how Sh8T life is.   

all a greed and power trip when you boil it all down, i have noticed people are far more selfish now than at any time i remember, i am alright jack fyou seems to be the way of the world now.

[chronyx]

5 hours ago, SillyBilly said:

I have never been so aware of being a man, white, middle-earner

 

Cis scum fash

[Mrs Bear]

19 hours ago, Grab_Some_Popcorn said:

Maybe I'm just having a midlife crisis, or maybe I read too much news... But have things ever been this bad? Immigration, Islamic attacks, child grooming, north Korea, attacks on freedom of speech, riots in USA, grenfell & associated fallout.

I've deleted Twitter from my phone because I can't take it any more!

Stop watching/reading the news.  Lose yourself in a good book or a box set instead. But nothing with Apocalypse or similar doom in the title. 

[chronyx]

9 hours ago, Mrs Bear said:

Stop watching/reading the news.  Lose yourself in a good book or a box set instead. But nothing with Apocalypse or similar doom in the title. 

Honestly thought that said sex bot for a second or two

[VeryMeanReversion]

On 13/08/2017 at 2:24 AM, Grab_Some_Popcorn said:

Maybe I'm just having a midlife crisis, or maybe I read too much news...

Don't ignore the possibility that both of those things are true

I mostly get my news from the IplayerRadio World Service business-oriented programs.... and HPC-off-topic of course

 

 

[Bossybabe]

22 hours ago, Switch625 said:

There you go Bossy!

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

Yes, thank you, Switch625. I can do it on my Apple devices, but I was at work with a steam Microsoft computer and no phone system.

i know how to do it on Microsoft but life's just too short to be inserting symbols every few letters, which is why, halfway through my OU languages degree, I re-equipped with all Apple and retained my gaming laptop just in case!

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose!!!

[Bossybabe]

21 hours ago, winkie said:

Quite, threats and fears have always been and will always be there.....all that plus what is happening at the end of the road close to where living that we have yet to find out about......technology now does mean if we look for it will find it c'est la vie....life, human nature always has been, always will be....power, ego, control and corruption.....an elderly aunt of mine said she was not interested in TV, rarely listened to the radio apart from music and would prefer to live among the fairies, recon she has a long live ahead of her.....broadband she wouldn't know what that means and wouldn't want to......que sera, sera...only here for a short moment in time best to make the most of it whilst you can...

 

Your great aunt sounds like my sort of person!  Good on her. 

[Errol]