this post was submitted on 03 May 2025
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me_irl
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In effect the relative lack of news back in the day was how people could feel optimistic, at least in the US and Western Europe. We could be pretty oblivious and happy about USSR going away and all seemed just fine because the news barely covered the bad stuff and the Internet was barely a thing and we didn't get a whole lot of global exposure.
Things can get better and we have to work at it, but we don't need to be hopeless. If we can't believe good things can happen, then what would be the point anyway...
Exactly, in times of doom, you have to believe and hope, much more than ever before.
Two things:
I don't expect things to get better within my lifetime and I'm not yet 40. All that I've witnessed in my lifetime is an accelerating decline in financial stability for people who work for a living and continual degradation of the quality of basic goods that people are able to afford.
I managed to not get totally fucked during the pandemic after having been set back probably about a decade and a half by The Recession. Now, my field is getting hit by regular layoffs that don't actually benefit anyone but make the line go up. Shit is not looking good in the near future.