The reality is setting in that people simply do not care about making the world a better place. It is breaking my heart, and I do not know how to reconcile my thoughts. I’m sorry to be such a downer here but I don’t know where else to share.
Perhaps the climate catastrophe, human suffering, and inequality is so large and so much out of people’s hands that even people who care have come to a state of learned helplessness. However, there are things within people’s control that doesn’t change. At work, I listen to a coworker frustrated about a simple problem. It would be a simple change to make this person’s job much less painful, but he “just works here”. It’s just such a dumb problem to waste hours of someone’s life on. To a certain extent, I can’t blame him, because a lot of people just work to survive.
I want to make the world a better place. A world where people have all there basic needs met, live in balance with nature, and have a right to self determination. A world where humanity strives to be the best version of itself. I can’t help but get sad or frustrated when I see something wrong. I can’t help but feel like I’m a downer to my friends when I point these things out. They don’t disagree with me, but it just seems like a depressing topic. People seem generally content to live their normal lives. In the same way, I can’t blame them. It won’t build a better future, but they deserve to be happy.
Maybe my coworkers are right, and that I’m too naïve. Maybe my friends are right, and that I’m too empathetic for my own good. I am envious that they can turn off the thing in their head that worries, or wants to make things better, and that they can just enjoy life. A more utopian future is generations away, or maybe never. If I can’t effect change, maybe I should find an outlet, or stop caring, or something. idk, sorry for yapping. if you’re reading this i hope you have a good day
This is great advice! It took me a couple of decades and I’m still struggling sometimes, but this is the way. It is a burden and a privilege to recognize a deep-seated social or environmental problem because you can now spend the rest of your life telling people about it and get hit with ignorance, apathy or some sort of bullshit bingo. It will crush you if you don’t find strategies to deal with that. The post I’m replying to lists exactly the strategies I would recommend as well. It’s not easy because it’s (too) slow and not as sexy as calling for a revolution. But I’d say it’s the only way. Lead by example.
Well … and sabotage. You should definitely blow up some pipelines.
You explained the burden part, but forgot to explain why it’s also a privilege.
It’s like everyone is in the fog of lost souls from Legend of Korra, and we’re the ones that can see through it. When you have a working brain, you can make the right choices. You can guarantee your life is meaningful, because you’re not blindly using random dice rolls to determine that - you’re using your brain to make choices based on the meaningful information available to you. This makes every day deeply different for us.
I’m outnumbered by people who can kill me any time, but they can’t make it mean anything, or stop me from doing so, because I’m the one with an actual mental model of the world to make choices from.