Comment by Imustaskforhelp
21 days ago
Y'know what's troubling to me, freedom as a struggle is indirectly related to other people/ social-political issue.
Like, the people if they decide, they want freedom, are almost guaranteed to get it. But nobody demands it in the truest sense and it feels like the govt. isn't controlled by the people but rather almost by lobbying and that social media etc. have made people complacent in the sense that either we think that others will fight for us or that social media has become a propaganda machine.
I almost broke last night realizing that nuclear can be completely green energy but it isn't the issue of technology but rather political. To me, it felt like a lot of really quality of life changes (like water access, clean cities, good air quality index, atleast where I live) are all almost political issues at this point.
But I am not hopeful towards people, I am hopeful towards tech though. It feels like people have free will, so they might actually pick a net negative option for everybody (trump?), so I am not an optimist because I feel like I have to trust people in the process and I feel like people can do both good and bad, so I wonder how much better our lives have been compared to our ancestors. Maybe trade-offs?
I genuinely felt so weird realizing this, its hard to explain. Like it felt like I can do nothing but watch. And to me I feel like I am being a pessimistic because a lot of people in power feel stupid/inefficient man.
We just don't have a choice. WE have a choice b/w 2 parties and call it freedom.
Of course, freedom will be a constant struggle. People have made it as such. Its on all of us, we all need to take accountability. I get it, accountability is hard, but its much better than waiting for a hero to save us all. We can do it if we realize this.
> To me, it felt like a lot of really quality of life changes (like water access, clean cities, good air quality index, atleast where I live) are all almost political issues at this point.
This is why I struggle when discussing anything on this website - these were always political issues. Everything that touches the way society functions is a political issue. Tech is just a vehicle of political agenda. Freedom is purely political notion, this is why different traditions have different concepts of it. And to obtain it, as well as other things, you need political action. Yet, most HN users, at least that is my impression, tend to think that it is about creating yet another software project or founding startup.
And this is why corpos and government are winning.
> Yet, most HN users, at least that is my impression, tend to think that it is about creating yet another software project or founding startup.
I don't think that a startup is sufficient, but it can be an important step in the right direction. I came to my bank, showed them my Librem 5 phone and asked where I can download an app for it. It was a much clearer message than "but Android isn't free!" (which is of course true). I do the same with governmental services.
Well, political action is hard to bring and you would need an average citizen to weigh his vote into action and not just use his vote for his own biases and as I also said, its really depressing when we think of this to be as a reality and I myself, would like to hide or somehow "prove" that this isn't the case if that makes sense. So no wonder the majority of us techie/hn users feel this way, you aren't wrong for the impression, I also feel like that's true atleast in my opinion being in this community and there is nothing wrong with that but the reality is kinda bitter.