Druidposting

"The reason why States are often so undemocratic is because they were never intended to be governed from the bottom up, and simply cannot be. A centralised set of institutions ruling in a particular space cannot be ruled by everybody, and so the governing class and a ruling elite command it to the benefit of themselves and for the reproduction of their own power. For true democracy, one must necessarily begin by removing the State first. In the State’s role as a governing body, accumulating and protecting resources (and people), it naturally sets apart the governors from what is governed. The State is its own beast. This was summed up well again by Malatesta when he wrote about the role of government: ‘A government, that is a group of people entrusted with making the laws and empowered to use the collective power to oblige each individual to obey them, is already a privileged class and cut off from the people. As any constituted body would do, it will instinctively seek to extend its powers, to be beyond public control, to impose its own policies and to give priority to its special interests.’ Malatesta’s point can be viewed as common sense to some, as we all know and often agree that politicians serve their own interests. This does not change with each politician, governor, or dictator. Rather, the government wields a State for the benefit of its own class at the expense of others. Even when the governors seem to be in conflict, their underlying shared class interest remains intact. Businesspeople may war with politicians, and politicians may war with aristocrats and monarchs, but ultimately each of these groups have a great deal in common: their proximity to the State machinery and their separation from those governed by it. Claims that we all belong to one nation, or that we all have a part in democracy, simply obscure the reality that a social elite is wielding the State for its own ends. The difference in power between you, a modern citizen, and a subject of an ancient kingdom might not be as dramatic as you might imagine. Our voice in this system is minimal — and that is why we must step away from it completely." https://www.thecommoner.org.uk/the-state-our-ancient-enemy/

I need you all just to consider that there are 15 million vacant houses in the US and just under a million homeless people, although since they're not exactly pausing for registry that's likely to be an underestimated number. The global economy is at 115 trillion dollars and just over 3400 people own 43% of that. We could all be doing good, fine, and dandy. There's no reason for people not to be making it. There's no reason for people to be going paycheck to paycheck. You are all being sucked of your imagination and passions because those in economic power feel that in order for them to be successful, the rest must suffer. But the pie is big enough for everyone. It's lonely at the top, it's the bottom that's full.

Yes, I AM post-and-sometimes-anti-civ. Yes, I am also post-scarcity. No, those aren't contradictions. We've been post-scarcity since last century. We could stop all production on everything immediately and have enough for everyone for decades and more. We just don't want to.

Some of the conversations around this post are crazy, I said large-scale LLMs in their current state are bad for the planet and mental health and there are folks around Telegram clinging to them like a bff and hissing at me from a distance because the chatbot gives them automated compliments. Embarrassing.

Perhaps the stance here on "Artificial Intelligence" (which does not exist) should be made a little clearer. I do not have a specific grievance against LLMs that stands unique against my issues with technology as a whole. Rather, it is supplemented into my issue with technology as a whole. The leviathan of Civilization has always concerned itself with matters of efficiency. This, in turn, has always resulted in efficiency for one thing at the cost of another. Order at the cost of freedom. Strong homes at the cost of nature. Cheaper materials through enslavement. And this pattern has proceeded from the creation of the city-state to the Industrial Revolution and finally to the AI Boom. Did it make things more effective? Having a machine that can gather information from across the entire internet and summarize it for you in about ten seconds will do that. Sure. Effective, for what it does. And in turn we are losing water across the globe and people killing themselves and others through A.I. psychosis. Perhaps if we could figure out a way to make it effective without slamming through lakes-worth of water in days, I would have different opinions about it. I consider ChatGPT to be a glorified chatbot hooked up to a data center. I do not have any conspiratorial belief that it will independently take over the world a la Terminator. It's not smart by itself. But even if ChatGPT were to become up to 95% more energy efficient, we are still dealing with mass transit pumping tons of gasoline into the ozone. We are still dealing with oil and plastic dumped into the ocean. And when society at large forgets to be scared by data centers, Civilization will continue its deadly tree-felling tramp across the Earth, until there is nothing left. And if anyone was worried, this post was written without A.I., just like the rest of them.

The older I get the more I'm finding that most problems have very easy solutions that we overthink too much to consider.

#fckcars #alt4me https://jorts.horse/@ecosurrealism/117370123082517954

Next person I see in the subscriber list w/ a Snufkin pfp and nazi symbols in the bio gonna get forcibly unsubscribed. He ain't for you, you little shits.

We are making a grand turning. There is something in the air. The trees know it. The birds sense it. The animals prepare for it. It is the last of the warmth leaving the air before the harvest. The spirits of old ready to wake from their slumber and walk the earth. October is coming.