We need to stop obsessing about the perceived shortcomings or virtues of individuals. The relevant changes in human society are systemic. Individuals rise or fall in that system. If it's not one of them, it'll be another.
The real stories aren't Trump or Thunberg or Musk, the real story is the system that made those people rise to popularity and power.
This is why AI is such an important development -- it's a systemic change, and a huge one at that.
Trump too should be seen as a symptom of a disease and not a cause. It's partly a problem specific to the US American financial and political system, but partly he is symptomatic of a general problem with democracies that they're too slow and unresponsive for modern times.
Thunberg was a condensation seed at the right place at the right time for a community that was looking for a focus. If it hadn't been her, it'd have been someone else.
It makes no sense to psychoanalyse and complain about people in those positions, it'll not make any difference in the grand scheme of things.
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I agree. Although I think the obsession may in part relate to power = popularity = performance. The degree to which power is performative and the desire to bust that bubble as a political strategy (not that it's working on the left).
ReplyDeleteGreat leader a public history of greatness v a secret history of what the butler saw.
The right seems to use it to great effect, shedding sunlight on the deep state etc. Exposing this secret history and role of Hilary, Obama etc. Devil had all the best tunes and immunity from attack as it owns the narrative.
I remember when the fall of the Soviet Union happened, a citizen there stated shortly thereafter how the hope for what the west could deliver turned out to be "sewage".
ReplyDeleteThat's US foreign policy for you, a bunch of sludge monkeys.
DeleteI disagree with her conclusion that it makes no sense to "psychoanalyse and complain" because it will not make any difference in the "grand scheme of things". Vigorous discussion is necessary for other people/other ideas/other things to establish awareness of their existence, of possibilities that differentiate change, of groundwork for other shared views to be shaped and directed by different means to different ends.
ReplyDelete