Another great perspective, Irina! You folks in the EU are a decade or two ahead of us here in the US with that climate curriculum, but we lead you in the insertion of what is mainly an American malady, and that is the Transgenderism push.
My son is a Senior in High School this year, and while fairly well-grounded at 16, (17 tomorrow!), he's told us of the existence of both, and how he and many of his peers simply ignore it all and go on about their business of being normal, goofy teenagers.
He does tell us of exceptions to his cohorts, though, who can be either LGBTQ+*%^ and/or climate activists, who rail on about those creeds almost constantly. While they are the exception rather than the rule for now, their numbers appear to be growing.
We here in the states have also seen a sharp rise in "Parent's Rights" movements, which have sprouted up in response to what we as parents saw over the shoulders of our kids while being home-schooled during the ridiculous COVID lockdowns. School bureaucrats are beside themselves that we who actually pay their salaries want to have a say in what out kids are taught, and are fighting us tooth and nail. The topic has grown to such a point that it's starting to steer elections away from the left and back to the right, with the left now demanding that school libraries include sexually explicit content that cannot be read aloud here or at school board meetings.
There is indeed something gangrenous in public education both here and in the EU, and it takes parents saying "ENOUGH!" to academia in large enough numbers to make it stop.
Oh, the transgenderism push is strong in places like the UK, Germany, and northern Europe as a whole. Here, not so much. We're backward, it would take time for the gangrene to start working.
The attempts to take away parents' rights in the States, however, is really chilling.
Be thankful for your "backwardness", because here, it's not just a demand to accept transgenderism, it's being used as a tool to put the state between parents and their children.
And, as usual, California is leading the charge:
"California Passes Bill Requiring Parents to Affirm Kids’ Gender ‘Transitions’
Tony Kinnett September 08, 2023
The California State Assembly passed a bill Friday that would require judges in child custody cases to consider whether a parent has affirmed a child’s “gender transition” by making “gender affirmation” an equal part of a child’s “health, safety, and welfare” under state law."
Here is Virginia, we recently elected a parent's rights-supporting governor, after his leftist opponent had this to say:
“I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”, and "And I’m not going to let parents come into schools and actually take books out and make their own decisions.”
They don't want to just indoctrinate our kids, they want to own them outright.
I have never been more thankful I live here, believe me. What just happened in California is truly mind-boggling and very concerning. I suppose people will start leaving the state in even greater droves now. I would, if I lived there. The problem with trans and related ideology is that there are many well-fed organisations happy to export it to every corner of the world including ours. The good news is that such radical ideas take a while to take root in a conservative society, and then only in small parts of it. Unless, those organisations are really very well fed, that is. We already had the government subsidise a drag show, so who knows.
Yep, the exodus out of CA is sure to increase now, but I fear that those who flee won't shed their "progressive" ways at the border.
And yes, here in VA we're making strides against it, but those behind it are well-funded and currently hold the megaphone of the heckler's veto, but I hope that there are still fair-minded people in numbers large enough to beat them at the ballot box.
It's like we live in a world created by a mixture of minds of Orwell, Huxley and Rand, without the safety of it being a work of fiction....
I very much hope so! I've always thought more people are decent because they can't be bothered about stuff like gender identity and climate anxiety. But the minority that is bothered is really, really loud and this is a problem.
There is an amazing lady, Yoenmi Park, who grew up in North Korea, escaped to China as a young teen and suffered horribly before then escaping again, with the help of missionaries, to South Korea and then the USA. Her analysis of her education experience in the USA, in the true "Woke" climate of a leading NYC university led her to the conclusion that we in the west are fast adopting the educational traits of the Hermit Kingdom. Your inclusion of propaganda in the education system is right on and in North America is being accompanied by disenfranchisement of parents in education. If you read Ms Park's vivid description of school in North Korea it comes remarkably close to the erosion of education Irina has described today. We no longer teach thought, we no longer teach excellence. We teach obedience and conformity. All are to be educated to exactly the same level and capability. I was very happy to hear about your daughter and her friends exploring their intellect and how to interact with the environment. They represent what Ms Park was looking for but found wanting in America.
I have seen bits and pieces from interviews with that message, yes. This move to teach conformity and compliance instead of thought is what makes a lot of Eastern European immigrants to the West mad these days, and with very good reason. I mean, really? They tried to escape from that precise thing and what happened? 20 years later here it goes again. It's really unfair.
Several decades ago the USA "decided", possibly with the help of some law suits, that we could no longer have "fast", "medium" and "slow" classes. Apparently this was unfair to the slow kids who didn't get the "stimulation" of being with the fast kids.
I think this may have been the start of our decline to uniform mediocrity.
While in Elementary School, my Son told me math class was way too slow. I told him to tell the teacher that the class was bored and to speed it up. He pointed out that about half the class was struggling to keep up.
So half the class was bored. Half the class was lost. I guess the curriculum was perfectly balanced. It sure didn't sound like it was doing any favors for the "slow" kids though.
"Slow" has a negative connotation, but the reality is that some kids need a little more help and explanation of the material. Some times just in one topic. We don't all "get" everything on the first explanation. I wish I could think of a better word than "slow" but I'm just going to use that one.
In my Elementary school, '69 - '75, we had an "outdated" form of teaching, called Team Teaching.
Teachers were grouped into teams of 3 or 4 -- usually 3. And then given a pool of students, often in a mix of two adjacent grades.
When it's time for English, there's a slow, medium and fast class and the team teachers allocate the kids to their best match. One teacher teaches the slow class, one the medium and one the fast class. The slow teacher for English might be the fast teacher for math depending on how the Team's teachers feel about their relative strengths. Sometimes you need the better teacher on the "slow" class to help kids over the humps.
Similarly for each other subject. One kid might be in a mix of slow/medium/fast classes depending on how he does in each topic. And if a kid starts excelling or needs a little more help, he could be moved from one class to another for that subject. Mixing two grade levels allowed a broader range of teaching speed vs. detailed teaching help.
This was an excellent system that adjusted to give the students what they needed in each subject with very little downside/inconvenience. But somehow it is too "backward" for today's education experts.
Another thought provoking post. It prompted me to reflect on two incidences pertinent to the topic:
1) The infamous, cringeworthy “You have stolen my dreams and my childhood” United Nations tongue lashing from Greta Thunberg. To me it’s still painful to watch.
2) More recently, a New York Times article concerning the judicial ruling in the Held v. Montana climate case noted the following about the youthful plaintiffs - “They also spoke of the toll on their mental health, and the anguish they felt as they considered a future dimmed by environmental collapse.”
As to the second of those, I have a 30 year old son who lives in Montana since venturing there for college 12 years ago. Am I supposed to be concerned or embarrassed that he has no “anguish”, but instead feels blessed to live there? Do these youngsters involved in the case ever walk out the door and exclaim “What a beautiful day? Sadly, the answer might be a resounding “no”.
I love the memes of Greta's "stolen childhood" with the child workers in DRC cobalt mines. They say it all, really.
About the Held c Montana kids, I keep telling my daughter that how you see the world is a question of choice. So, you can either make a three-act tragedy out of every piece of plastic waste you find on your walk in the forest or you can just pick it up, curse the idiot who chucked it and continue on your merry way, enjoying the forest.
If you like complaining, you'll see everything as a problem, even a sunny day. It's sad to see such a perspective from such young people but, well, the search for meaning sometimes leads you into strange directions.
This looks like the path to Idiocracy...good movie
Teenagers tend to rebel so maybe there is hope.
If just stop oil got their wish most of them (and us) would be dead of starvation in three months. I’m a bit of a good old boy so I might make it a year. It would solve the CO2 emissions problem, though.
Without oil and the technology to use it life expectancy was around 30. Subsistence farming is tough on the body.
None of the people making up these crazy ass rules intend to live by them.
A medium size data center uses 900,000 MWH per year. Enough to supply 750,000 homes. There are thousands of them. Rather than eat bugs, why don’t we turn off the internet? People flourished for thousands of years without it, and it just seems to be causing mental illness.
I have for years hoped the internet would break down and give us all a break but so far no luck. I'd also have to switch to subsistence farming if it breaks down because I won't have a job but on some days even this sounds better.
Yeah, if these idiots get their wish and things break down, I plan to shoot the urban deer they seem so happy to have roaming our neighborhoods eating everything in site. I used to grow roses in the front yard for everyone to enjoy. Deer love roses.
I almost hope things break down, just so I can start shooting those da&*^,mn deer.
I'd say you've accurately exposed the root of the rot. Throughout human history, ignorance has always been the stumbling block on the path to affluence, the impeding factor in human flourishing. Today, as you say, we suffer from the misconception that preserving nature is a higher value than human wellbeing. Far too many people have accepted guilt for being well off and let the destroyers of human happiness indoctrinate young minds with nonsense.
There is a bright side as well. When absurdities reach a level where they overwhelm sanity, either a society changes or collapses. The beauty is that nothing is preordained. A coherent argument for reason can stripe the power from many charlatans. Our destiny is what we make it.
If someone feels guilty about being well off, they could simply donate their money to charitable causes or use it for something constructive. Many do just that. But that's not enough, of course, so let's erase the impulse to have a better life altogether. It's quite smart, really.
At least we as kids in the Soviet block knew we’re being brainwashed... today’s children truly believe the woke propaganda, not in a small part because of their woke parents.
Absolutely! We knew it was garbage and it was garbage we couldn't care less about. This now is about things we are all supposed to care about, and indeed many of us genuinely do. That's why it's so dangerous. Agree, parents are a huge part of the problem.
"You used to be dead because of your sins and acts of disobedience. You walked in the ways of the ‘olam hazeh [this world] and obeyed the Ruler of the Powers of the Air, who is still at work among the disobedient. Indeed, we all once lived this way — we followed the passions of our old nature and obeyed the wishes of our old nature and our own thoughts. In our natural condition we were headed for God’s wrath, just like everyone else."
- Sha'ul Paulos of Tarsus in his letter to the believers in Ephesus (Ephesians 2, CJB)
But there is hope:
"But God is so rich in mercy and loves us with such intense love that, even when we were dead because of our acts of disobedience, he brought us to life along with the Messiah — it is by grace [God's favour] that you have been delivered."
- Sha'ul Paulos of Tarsus in his letter to the believers in Ephesus (Ephesians 2, CJB)
"But God is so rich in mercy and loves us with such intense love”
To the woman [the Lord God] said, “I will greatly multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children.” Scripture teaches that as a result of original sin, God would “greatly multiply” the pains of labor not only for Eve, but for all women.
And so I say, what a truly wonderful creator, NOT! 🤔
Here is how it works: it was through one individual [Adam] that sin entered the world, and through sin, death; and in this way death passed through to the whole human race, inasmuch as everyone sinned. Sin was indeed present in the world before Torah was given, but sin is not counted as such when there is no Torah. Nevertheless death ruled from Adam until Moshe, even over those whose sinning was not exactly like Adam’s violation of a direct command. In this, Adam prefigured the one who was to come.
But the free gift is not like the offence. For if, because of one man’s offence, many died, then how much more has God’s grace, that is, the gracious gift of one man, Yeshua the Messiah, overflowed to many!
I don’t believe in the inheriting, handing down, passing on, whatever, of original sin, and your reply doesn’t provide in any way a convincing argument as to why women have to be the ones to suffer pain in childbirth in retribution for Adam’s sin🤔
Well, you may not believe in the inheriting, handing down, passing on, whatever, of original sin, but "original sin" is absolutely apparent in everyone.
Eve's rebellion against God was that she truly believed that SHE could become an arbiter - i.e., a judge - of good & evil.
"You will be like God, knowing good & evil."
- the Serpent to Eve
"When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it had a pleasing appearance and that the tree was desirable for making one wise, she took some of its fruit and ate."
We ALL truly believe of ourselves that way You do. I do. Everyone thinks that way. That's the core of "original sin", i.e., that we can play God.
The consequences?
ADONAI, God, said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, you are cursed more than all livestock and wild animals. You will crawl on your belly and eat dust as long as you live. I will put animosity between you and the woman, and between your descendant and her descendant; he will bruise your head, and you will bruise his heel.”
To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pain in childbirth. You will bring forth children in pain. Your desire will be toward your husband, but he will rule over you.”
To Adam he said, “Because you listened to what your wife said and ate from the tree about which I gave you the order, ‘You are not to eat from it,’ the ground is cursed on your account; you will work hard to eat from it as long as you live. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat field plants. You will eat bread by the sweat of your forehead till you return to the ground — for you were taken out of it: you are dust, and you will return to dust.”
The man called his wife Havah [life], because she was the mother of all living.
So basically there’s no way out for women, they’ve had the pleasure of a man and must suffer the consequences, pain in child birth with all that that entails. Best of look telling women that the pain suffered is for their own good. And what about those women who request and or accept pain killers like an epidural and the baby dies, have they triply sinned, if your answers yes, guess you won’t mind women’s hate mail🤔
Yes, based on various "religious" writings, the behavior of all gods is deplorable. Of course, you have your folks like Gary here who will twist like a pretzel to justify horrifyingly immoral behavior by said god(s).
If there really were gods, I would think it was my duty to figure out a way to kill said gods.
“ What they do seem to want is to raise a generation — and further generations — that consumes less and is happy with less, of everything. A generation educated in a “climate-friendly” way, according to the activists pushing for the overhaul.”. That of course would not apply to the woke elite left like John Kerry or Al the Gore and all the Europeans of a similar bent. Only the mere peons have to comply with less.
There’s a flaw in your observation Irina: FINITE Flammable Fossils (FFF’s), sunlight buried over thousands of years but extracted 10 million times faster than sequestered.
Daddy when your generation were supposed to be transitioning to rebuildables, sorry daddy renewables, you say it didn’t work because people wouldn’t give up on increasing their lifestyles, and so continued increasing consumption of FFF’s. You’ve told me not to waste energy, switch the lights off, only cook when we need to, rap up to keep warm, and justify why I need driving somewhere because energy is so expensive and hard to get, yet you and mummy daddy consumed energy like there was no tomorrow ignoring that it was FINITE, and so now my future looks bleak. Why daddy did you have me knowing what I’d be facing with “The Great Simplification”. I’m really sorry Pet it all seemed so good at the time, they told us Conventional and Small Modular Reactors using Fission, and Hi tech Fusion would be so cheap with little radio active toxic waste, but it never materialised, except for the waste, along with all the other detritus we believed we needed to live, I’m so, so, sorry Pet😞🤔
I recommend Nietzsche's "Meaning of the Ascetic Ideal" to everyone. It is a clear explanation of how these people think. Of course, that he never considers what could happen when a whole generation is proselytized to become ascetics. Still worth a careful read.
I think the kids will be fine- it is their parents that are the problem. Of course the parents didn’t get climate indoctrinated in primary school, they had to wait until college to learn Malthusianism from truly out of touch professors like Ehrlich, Schumacher, Mann, etc.
I think this generation will find all of the subversive stuff in college, which of course will be the exact opposite of what the propaganda is and this madness will turn around.
“Did you know how good meat tastes? Let’s try some!” “Check out this gasoline car- it sounds so cool, let’s take it for a spin!” “Electricity is so useful- wouldn’t it be cool it we had it 24/7 like they did in the old days?”
Long term, I’m not worried. We just have to get through this lump of crazy first...
Another great piece, thank you for writing it. Before Karl Marx and the Communist Manifesto, there was the 1847 "Communist Confession of Faith" by Marx's co-author, Frederick Engles. Like many religious "confessions of faith", it is a question/answer format stating the core beliefs of the doctrine.
Modern society needs to read this, particularly for the reasons you uncover in this piece.
Let me introduce question 17, and see it lead to the corruption of children in number 18, 19 and concluding with question 22:
Question 17: What will be your first measure once you have established democracy?
Answer: Guaranteeing the subsistence of the proletariat.
Question 18: How will you do this?
Answer. I. By limiting private property in such a way that it gradually prepares the way for its transformation into social property, e. g., by progressive taxation, limitation of the right of inheritance in favour of the state, etc., etc.
II. By employing workers in national workshops and factories and on national estates.
III. By educating all children at the expense of the state.
Question 19: How will you arrange this kind of education during the period of transition?
Answer: All children will be educated in state establishments from the time when they can do without the first maternal care.
Question 22. Do Communists reject existing religions?
Answer: All religions which have existed hitherto were expressions of historical stages of development of individual peoples or groups of peoples. But communism is that stage of historical development which makes all existing religions superfluous and supersedes them.
In the name and on the mandate of the Congress.
Secretary: Heide [Alias of Wilhelm Wolff in the League of the Just]
President: Karl Schill [Alias of Karl Schapper in the League of the Just]
London, June 9, 1847
Unfortunately, few recognize how this hideous strategy is working in our world today.
Train youth to be critical thinkers, & let them decide. I think most of them will eventually look Chicken Little in the eye & say, "The sky isn't falling."
Another great perspective, Irina! You folks in the EU are a decade or two ahead of us here in the US with that climate curriculum, but we lead you in the insertion of what is mainly an American malady, and that is the Transgenderism push.
My son is a Senior in High School this year, and while fairly well-grounded at 16, (17 tomorrow!), he's told us of the existence of both, and how he and many of his peers simply ignore it all and go on about their business of being normal, goofy teenagers.
He does tell us of exceptions to his cohorts, though, who can be either LGBTQ+*%^ and/or climate activists, who rail on about those creeds almost constantly. While they are the exception rather than the rule for now, their numbers appear to be growing.
We here in the states have also seen a sharp rise in "Parent's Rights" movements, which have sprouted up in response to what we as parents saw over the shoulders of our kids while being home-schooled during the ridiculous COVID lockdowns. School bureaucrats are beside themselves that we who actually pay their salaries want to have a say in what out kids are taught, and are fighting us tooth and nail. The topic has grown to such a point that it's starting to steer elections away from the left and back to the right, with the left now demanding that school libraries include sexually explicit content that cannot be read aloud here or at school board meetings.
There is indeed something gangrenous in public education both here and in the EU, and it takes parents saying "ENOUGH!" to academia in large enough numbers to make it stop.
Oh, the transgenderism push is strong in places like the UK, Germany, and northern Europe as a whole. Here, not so much. We're backward, it would take time for the gangrene to start working.
The attempts to take away parents' rights in the States, however, is really chilling.
Be thankful for your "backwardness", because here, it's not just a demand to accept transgenderism, it's being used as a tool to put the state between parents and their children.
And, as usual, California is leading the charge:
"California Passes Bill Requiring Parents to Affirm Kids’ Gender ‘Transitions’
Tony Kinnett September 08, 2023
The California State Assembly passed a bill Friday that would require judges in child custody cases to consider whether a parent has affirmed a child’s “gender transition” by making “gender affirmation” an equal part of a child’s “health, safety, and welfare” under state law."
Here is Virginia, we recently elected a parent's rights-supporting governor, after his leftist opponent had this to say:
“I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”, and "And I’m not going to let parents come into schools and actually take books out and make their own decisions.”
They don't want to just indoctrinate our kids, they want to own them outright.
I have never been more thankful I live here, believe me. What just happened in California is truly mind-boggling and very concerning. I suppose people will start leaving the state in even greater droves now. I would, if I lived there. The problem with trans and related ideology is that there are many well-fed organisations happy to export it to every corner of the world including ours. The good news is that such radical ideas take a while to take root in a conservative society, and then only in small parts of it. Unless, those organisations are really very well fed, that is. We already had the government subsidise a drag show, so who knows.
Yep, the exodus out of CA is sure to increase now, but I fear that those who flee won't shed their "progressive" ways at the border.
And yes, here in VA we're making strides against it, but those behind it are well-funded and currently hold the megaphone of the heckler's veto, but I hope that there are still fair-minded people in numbers large enough to beat them at the ballot box.
It's like we live in a world created by a mixture of minds of Orwell, Huxley and Rand, without the safety of it being a work of fiction....
I very much hope so! I've always thought more people are decent because they can't be bothered about stuff like gender identity and climate anxiety. But the minority that is bothered is really, really loud and this is a problem.
Yet another excellent post. Thank you. Could I recommend a couple of good books on similar lines?
"The Parasitic Mind" by Gad Saad
"Bad News" by Batya Ungar-Sargon
Thanks, I always love a recommendation. I'll check these out.
There is an amazing lady, Yoenmi Park, who grew up in North Korea, escaped to China as a young teen and suffered horribly before then escaping again, with the help of missionaries, to South Korea and then the USA. Her analysis of her education experience in the USA, in the true "Woke" climate of a leading NYC university led her to the conclusion that we in the west are fast adopting the educational traits of the Hermit Kingdom. Your inclusion of propaganda in the education system is right on and in North America is being accompanied by disenfranchisement of parents in education. If you read Ms Park's vivid description of school in North Korea it comes remarkably close to the erosion of education Irina has described today. We no longer teach thought, we no longer teach excellence. We teach obedience and conformity. All are to be educated to exactly the same level and capability. I was very happy to hear about your daughter and her friends exploring their intellect and how to interact with the environment. They represent what Ms Park was looking for but found wanting in America.
Loved her book
I have seen bits and pieces from interviews with that message, yes. This move to teach conformity and compliance instead of thought is what makes a lot of Eastern European immigrants to the West mad these days, and with very good reason. I mean, really? They tried to escape from that precise thing and what happened? 20 years later here it goes again. It's really unfair.
Several decades ago the USA "decided", possibly with the help of some law suits, that we could no longer have "fast", "medium" and "slow" classes. Apparently this was unfair to the slow kids who didn't get the "stimulation" of being with the fast kids.
I think this may have been the start of our decline to uniform mediocrity.
While in Elementary School, my Son told me math class was way too slow. I told him to tell the teacher that the class was bored and to speed it up. He pointed out that about half the class was struggling to keep up.
So half the class was bored. Half the class was lost. I guess the curriculum was perfectly balanced. It sure didn't sound like it was doing any favors for the "slow" kids though.
"Slow" has a negative connotation, but the reality is that some kids need a little more help and explanation of the material. Some times just in one topic. We don't all "get" everything on the first explanation. I wish I could think of a better word than "slow" but I'm just going to use that one.
In my Elementary school, '69 - '75, we had an "outdated" form of teaching, called Team Teaching.
Teachers were grouped into teams of 3 or 4 -- usually 3. And then given a pool of students, often in a mix of two adjacent grades.
When it's time for English, there's a slow, medium and fast class and the team teachers allocate the kids to their best match. One teacher teaches the slow class, one the medium and one the fast class. The slow teacher for English might be the fast teacher for math depending on how the Team's teachers feel about their relative strengths. Sometimes you need the better teacher on the "slow" class to help kids over the humps.
Similarly for each other subject. One kid might be in a mix of slow/medium/fast classes depending on how he does in each topic. And if a kid starts excelling or needs a little more help, he could be moved from one class to another for that subject. Mixing two grade levels allowed a broader range of teaching speed vs. detailed teaching help.
This was an excellent system that adjusted to give the students what they needed in each subject with very little downside/inconvenience. But somehow it is too "backward" for today's education experts.
Another thought provoking post. It prompted me to reflect on two incidences pertinent to the topic:
1) The infamous, cringeworthy “You have stolen my dreams and my childhood” United Nations tongue lashing from Greta Thunberg. To me it’s still painful to watch.
2) More recently, a New York Times article concerning the judicial ruling in the Held v. Montana climate case noted the following about the youthful plaintiffs - “They also spoke of the toll on their mental health, and the anguish they felt as they considered a future dimmed by environmental collapse.”
As to the second of those, I have a 30 year old son who lives in Montana since venturing there for college 12 years ago. Am I supposed to be concerned or embarrassed that he has no “anguish”, but instead feels blessed to live there? Do these youngsters involved in the case ever walk out the door and exclaim “What a beautiful day? Sadly, the answer might be a resounding “no”.
I wish my childhood had included a trans Atlantic sailing trip in a carbon fiber boat with a professional racing crew.
Well done!
I love the memes of Greta's "stolen childhood" with the child workers in DRC cobalt mines. They say it all, really.
About the Held c Montana kids, I keep telling my daughter that how you see the world is a question of choice. So, you can either make a three-act tragedy out of every piece of plastic waste you find on your walk in the forest or you can just pick it up, curse the idiot who chucked it and continue on your merry way, enjoying the forest.
If you like complaining, you'll see everything as a problem, even a sunny day. It's sad to see such a perspective from such young people but, well, the search for meaning sometimes leads you into strange directions.
Wonderful framing of the issue
Good one, Irina.
A couple of observations
This looks like the path to Idiocracy...good movie
Teenagers tend to rebel so maybe there is hope.
If just stop oil got their wish most of them (and us) would be dead of starvation in three months. I’m a bit of a good old boy so I might make it a year. It would solve the CO2 emissions problem, though.
Without oil and the technology to use it life expectancy was around 30. Subsistence farming is tough on the body.
None of the people making up these crazy ass rules intend to live by them.
A medium size data center uses 900,000 MWH per year. Enough to supply 750,000 homes. There are thousands of them. Rather than eat bugs, why don’t we turn off the internet? People flourished for thousands of years without it, and it just seems to be causing mental illness.
I have for years hoped the internet would break down and give us all a break but so far no luck. I'd also have to switch to subsistence farming if it breaks down because I won't have a job but on some days even this sounds better.
Yeah, if these idiots get their wish and things break down, I plan to shoot the urban deer they seem so happy to have roaming our neighborhoods eating everything in site. I used to grow roses in the front yard for everyone to enjoy. Deer love roses.
I almost hope things break down, just so I can start shooting those da&*^,mn deer.
Elk and salmon for me...
I'd say you've accurately exposed the root of the rot. Throughout human history, ignorance has always been the stumbling block on the path to affluence, the impeding factor in human flourishing. Today, as you say, we suffer from the misconception that preserving nature is a higher value than human wellbeing. Far too many people have accepted guilt for being well off and let the destroyers of human happiness indoctrinate young minds with nonsense.
There is a bright side as well. When absurdities reach a level where they overwhelm sanity, either a society changes or collapses. The beauty is that nothing is preordained. A coherent argument for reason can stripe the power from many charlatans. Our destiny is what we make it.
If someone feels guilty about being well off, they could simply donate their money to charitable causes or use it for something constructive. Many do just that. But that's not enough, of course, so let's erase the impulse to have a better life altogether. It's quite smart, really.
At least we as kids in the Soviet block knew we’re being brainwashed... today’s children truly believe the woke propaganda, not in a small part because of their woke parents.
Absolutely! We knew it was garbage and it was garbage we couldn't care less about. This now is about things we are all supposed to care about, and indeed many of us genuinely do. That's why it's so dangerous. Agree, parents are a huge part of the problem.
Superb!
Speaking of which:
"You used to be dead because of your sins and acts of disobedience. You walked in the ways of the ‘olam hazeh [this world] and obeyed the Ruler of the Powers of the Air, who is still at work among the disobedient. Indeed, we all once lived this way — we followed the passions of our old nature and obeyed the wishes of our old nature and our own thoughts. In our natural condition we were headed for God’s wrath, just like everyone else."
- Sha'ul Paulos of Tarsus in his letter to the believers in Ephesus (Ephesians 2, CJB)
But there is hope:
"But God is so rich in mercy and loves us with such intense love that, even when we were dead because of our acts of disobedience, he brought us to life along with the Messiah — it is by grace [God's favour] that you have been delivered."
- Sha'ul Paulos of Tarsus in his letter to the believers in Ephesus (Ephesians 2, CJB)
"But God is so rich in mercy and loves us with such intense love”
To the woman [the Lord God] said, “I will greatly multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children.” Scripture teaches that as a result of original sin, God would “greatly multiply” the pains of labor not only for Eve, but for all women.
And so I say, what a truly wonderful creator, NOT! 🤔
Here is how it works: it was through one individual [Adam] that sin entered the world, and through sin, death; and in this way death passed through to the whole human race, inasmuch as everyone sinned. Sin was indeed present in the world before Torah was given, but sin is not counted as such when there is no Torah. Nevertheless death ruled from Adam until Moshe, even over those whose sinning was not exactly like Adam’s violation of a direct command. In this, Adam prefigured the one who was to come.
But the free gift is not like the offence. For if, because of one man’s offence, many died, then how much more has God’s grace, that is, the gracious gift of one man, Yeshua the Messiah, overflowed to many!
- Romans 5 (CJB)
I don’t believe in the inheriting, handing down, passing on, whatever, of original sin, and your reply doesn’t provide in any way a convincing argument as to why women have to be the ones to suffer pain in childbirth in retribution for Adam’s sin🤔
Well, you may not believe in the inheriting, handing down, passing on, whatever, of original sin, but "original sin" is absolutely apparent in everyone.
Eve's rebellion against God was that she truly believed that SHE could become an arbiter - i.e., a judge - of good & evil.
"You will be like God, knowing good & evil."
- the Serpent to Eve
"When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it had a pleasing appearance and that the tree was desirable for making one wise, she took some of its fruit and ate."
We ALL truly believe of ourselves that way You do. I do. Everyone thinks that way. That's the core of "original sin", i.e., that we can play God.
The consequences?
ADONAI, God, said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, you are cursed more than all livestock and wild animals. You will crawl on your belly and eat dust as long as you live. I will put animosity between you and the woman, and between your descendant and her descendant; he will bruise your head, and you will bruise his heel.”
To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your pain in childbirth. You will bring forth children in pain. Your desire will be toward your husband, but he will rule over you.”
To Adam he said, “Because you listened to what your wife said and ate from the tree about which I gave you the order, ‘You are not to eat from it,’ the ground is cursed on your account; you will work hard to eat from it as long as you live. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat field plants. You will eat bread by the sweat of your forehead till you return to the ground — for you were taken out of it: you are dust, and you will return to dust.”
The man called his wife Havah [life], because she was the mother of all living.
- Genesis 3 (CJB)
This is all still happening.
So basically there’s no way out for women, they’ve had the pleasure of a man and must suffer the consequences, pain in child birth with all that that entails. Best of look telling women that the pain suffered is for their own good. And what about those women who request and or accept pain killers like an epidural and the baby dies, have they triply sinned, if your answers yes, guess you won’t mind women’s hate mail🤔
But did you read God's consequences for MEN?
Yes, based on various "religious" writings, the behavior of all gods is deplorable. Of course, you have your folks like Gary here who will twist like a pretzel to justify horrifyingly immoral behavior by said god(s).
If there really were gods, I would think it was my duty to figure out a way to kill said gods.
“ What they do seem to want is to raise a generation — and further generations — that consumes less and is happy with less, of everything. A generation educated in a “climate-friendly” way, according to the activists pushing for the overhaul.”. That of course would not apply to the woke elite left like John Kerry or Al the Gore and all the Europeans of a similar bent. Only the mere peons have to comply with less.
Of course. The rules are not for those who make them.
There’s a flaw in your observation Irina: FINITE Flammable Fossils (FFF’s), sunlight buried over thousands of years but extracted 10 million times faster than sequestered.
Daddy when your generation were supposed to be transitioning to rebuildables, sorry daddy renewables, you say it didn’t work because people wouldn’t give up on increasing their lifestyles, and so continued increasing consumption of FFF’s. You’ve told me not to waste energy, switch the lights off, only cook when we need to, rap up to keep warm, and justify why I need driving somewhere because energy is so expensive and hard to get, yet you and mummy daddy consumed energy like there was no tomorrow ignoring that it was FINITE, and so now my future looks bleak. Why daddy did you have me knowing what I’d be facing with “The Great Simplification”. I’m really sorry Pet it all seemed so good at the time, they told us Conventional and Small Modular Reactors using Fission, and Hi tech Fusion would be so cheap with little radio active toxic waste, but it never materialised, except for the waste, along with all the other detritus we believed we needed to live, I’m so, so, sorry Pet😞🤔
I recommend Nietzsche's "Meaning of the Ascetic Ideal" to everyone. It is a clear explanation of how these people think. Of course, that he never considers what could happen when a whole generation is proselytized to become ascetics. Still worth a careful read.
Thanks!
I think you are safe. The younger generations would rather eat worms than lose tik tok
I think the kids will be fine- it is their parents that are the problem. Of course the parents didn’t get climate indoctrinated in primary school, they had to wait until college to learn Malthusianism from truly out of touch professors like Ehrlich, Schumacher, Mann, etc.
I think this generation will find all of the subversive stuff in college, which of course will be the exact opposite of what the propaganda is and this madness will turn around.
“Did you know how good meat tastes? Let’s try some!” “Check out this gasoline car- it sounds so cool, let’s take it for a spin!” “Electricity is so useful- wouldn’t it be cool it we had it 24/7 like they did in the old days?”
Long term, I’m not worried. We just have to get through this lump of crazy first...
I like your perspective so much better than mine!
Irina,
Another great piece, thank you for writing it. Before Karl Marx and the Communist Manifesto, there was the 1847 "Communist Confession of Faith" by Marx's co-author, Frederick Engles. Like many religious "confessions of faith", it is a question/answer format stating the core beliefs of the doctrine.
Modern society needs to read this, particularly for the reasons you uncover in this piece.
Let me introduce question 17, and see it lead to the corruption of children in number 18, 19 and concluding with question 22:
Question 17: What will be your first measure once you have established democracy?
Answer: Guaranteeing the subsistence of the proletariat.
Question 18: How will you do this?
Answer. I. By limiting private property in such a way that it gradually prepares the way for its transformation into social property, e. g., by progressive taxation, limitation of the right of inheritance in favour of the state, etc., etc.
II. By employing workers in national workshops and factories and on national estates.
III. By educating all children at the expense of the state.
Question 19: How will you arrange this kind of education during the period of transition?
Answer: All children will be educated in state establishments from the time when they can do without the first maternal care.
Question 22. Do Communists reject existing religions?
Answer: All religions which have existed hitherto were expressions of historical stages of development of individual peoples or groups of peoples. But communism is that stage of historical development which makes all existing religions superfluous and supersedes them.
In the name and on the mandate of the Congress.
Secretary: Heide [Alias of Wilhelm Wolff in the League of the Just]
President: Karl Schill [Alias of Karl Schapper in the League of the Just]
London, June 9, 1847
Unfortunately, few recognize how this hideous strategy is working in our world today.
For the full text of the Confession, see https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/06/09.htm
Train youth to be critical thinkers, & let them decide. I think most of them will eventually look Chicken Little in the eye & say, "The sky isn't falling."
I think so, too. But if you, as parent, have neither been trained this way nor developed critical thinking yourself it would be a tough job.