I’d say austerity for at least a couple years with massive spending towards the us and military. I dont think we will see fascism again as it was back then. Its probably more a toned down, stupider version like the us.
It’s hard to say. I don’t think anybody expected 1930s style fascism before it got into motion either. These things can take on a life of their own very quickly. What we’ll see is that repression is going to increase in response to public discontent. We already see this happening both in the US and the EU. We’re seeing militarization of police, mass surveillance, bans on political speech, widespread censorship, and so on. All of that will continue to be cranked up, and that’s how you end up with full blown fascism in the end. The US is just at the start of the road, it’s going to keep getting worse with each and every year. Europe is sure to follow.
Thats an interesting yet harrowing perspective. It feels like the US is already becoming kind of unruly as the people start protesting en masse.
Germany didnt protest hitler. They loved him. There are many interviews from before and after where people were frenetically in love with him. The us back then had its own dictator with near totalitarian power and nobody was against that either. They even had concentration camps with japanese people in it.
I think its very different know. We cant say people are terribly resolute but the mere flow of information is manyfold and the reaction albeit being disorganized or misguided is there.
Maybe some history buffs can fill in the blanks here?
I’m skeptical that access to information plays that big of a role in practice. What we see is that people just form online bubbles along with other people who have similar beliefs. Take the whole flat earth movement as an example, clearly the abundance of information to the contrary isn’t preventing people from believing nonsense. And that’s one of the more extremely absurd beliefs, it’s much easier for people to believe things like immigrants stealing jobs, or that entrepreneurs are needed for innovation, and so on. Meanwhile, MAGA is basically a cult around Trump, his support hasn’t really fallen amongst them even despite the economic damage his trade war is doing.
It’d be interesting to see more perspectives on this from people who know history better, but I see a lot of the same mechanics playing out today as at the start of the 20th century.
Flat earthers are very few which not really escape but decide not to believe in science while palestine for example is something that would have and has gone differently just because the information wasnt as abundand. Now we have thousands upon thousands of websites, profiles, people, messages, etc that depict the genocide in 4k.
So our core audience for flat earth is enormously different from the palestine issue.
This means that on average people will definitely and massively benefit from the information abundance but of course some will - same as flat earthers - not be convinced, no matter the evidence.
But we cant discount the rule for the exception. It took me half an hour by the way to find the name of the fallacy that seems to be coming up rn. “Exception fallacy” is discounting a rule “abundance of information makes a huge difference to past situations of this nature” for its exceptions “the flat earthers still dont listen.”
My point is that people tend to pick and choose what they believe. A flat earther is not a unique kind of irrational actor, but simply the most visible example of a cognitive process we all engage in. The reason debates over Palestine, Ukraine, or China’s Xinjiang region persist despite overwhelming evidence isn’t a lack of information, but due to the fact that our minds have a tendency to protect our existing worldviews.
What we’re really talking about here are the fundamental mechanics of belief formation. I’d argue that it ultimately comes down to thermodynamics. Our minds are constantly bombarded with an infinite stream of contradictory information. To avoid cognitive overload, we use our existing belief system as a filter. Accepting a fact that fits neatly into our current model is energetically cheap. It slots right in. But accepting a fact that contradicts our core beliefs is metabolically expensive. It forces a painful restructuring of our entire mental framework which we’d rather not do.
Incidentally, this is precisely why the liberal ideal of “just educate people better” is a such a profound failure. It assumes people are empty vessels waiting to be filled with facts, when in reality, we are architects constantly fortifying the cognitive structures we already inhabit. Presenting contrary evidence often just makes people double down, because rebuilding the house is more costly than throwing out a single brick that doesn’t fit.
I’d say austerity for at least a couple years with massive spending towards the us and military. I dont think we will see fascism again as it was back then. Its probably more a toned down, stupider version like the us.
It’s hard to say. I don’t think anybody expected 1930s style fascism before it got into motion either. These things can take on a life of their own very quickly. What we’ll see is that repression is going to increase in response to public discontent. We already see this happening both in the US and the EU. We’re seeing militarization of police, mass surveillance, bans on political speech, widespread censorship, and so on. All of that will continue to be cranked up, and that’s how you end up with full blown fascism in the end. The US is just at the start of the road, it’s going to keep getting worse with each and every year. Europe is sure to follow.
Thats an interesting yet harrowing perspective. It feels like the US is already becoming kind of unruly as the people start protesting en masse.
Germany didnt protest hitler. They loved him. There are many interviews from before and after where people were frenetically in love with him. The us back then had its own dictator with near totalitarian power and nobody was against that either. They even had concentration camps with japanese people in it.
I think its very different know. We cant say people are terribly resolute but the mere flow of information is manyfold and the reaction albeit being disorganized or misguided is there.
Maybe some history buffs can fill in the blanks here?
I’m skeptical that access to information plays that big of a role in practice. What we see is that people just form online bubbles along with other people who have similar beliefs. Take the whole flat earth movement as an example, clearly the abundance of information to the contrary isn’t preventing people from believing nonsense. And that’s one of the more extremely absurd beliefs, it’s much easier for people to believe things like immigrants stealing jobs, or that entrepreneurs are needed for innovation, and so on. Meanwhile, MAGA is basically a cult around Trump, his support hasn’t really fallen amongst them even despite the economic damage his trade war is doing.
It’d be interesting to see more perspectives on this from people who know history better, but I see a lot of the same mechanics playing out today as at the start of the 20th century.
I think there is a fallacy at play here.
Flat earthers are very few which not really escape but decide not to believe in science while palestine for example is something that would have and has gone differently just because the information wasnt as abundand. Now we have thousands upon thousands of websites, profiles, people, messages, etc that depict the genocide in 4k.
So our core audience for flat earth is enormously different from the palestine issue.
This means that on average people will definitely and massively benefit from the information abundance but of course some will - same as flat earthers - not be convinced, no matter the evidence.
But we cant discount the rule for the exception. It took me half an hour by the way to find the name of the fallacy that seems to be coming up rn. “Exception fallacy” is discounting a rule “abundance of information makes a huge difference to past situations of this nature” for its exceptions “the flat earthers still dont listen.”
My point is that people tend to pick and choose what they believe. A flat earther is not a unique kind of irrational actor, but simply the most visible example of a cognitive process we all engage in. The reason debates over Palestine, Ukraine, or China’s Xinjiang region persist despite overwhelming evidence isn’t a lack of information, but due to the fact that our minds have a tendency to protect our existing worldviews.
What we’re really talking about here are the fundamental mechanics of belief formation. I’d argue that it ultimately comes down to thermodynamics. Our minds are constantly bombarded with an infinite stream of contradictory information. To avoid cognitive overload, we use our existing belief system as a filter. Accepting a fact that fits neatly into our current model is energetically cheap. It slots right in. But accepting a fact that contradicts our core beliefs is metabolically expensive. It forces a painful restructuring of our entire mental framework which we’d rather not do.
Incidentally, this is precisely why the liberal ideal of “just educate people better” is a such a profound failure. It assumes people are empty vessels waiting to be filled with facts, when in reality, we are architects constantly fortifying the cognitive structures we already inhabit. Presenting contrary evidence often just makes people double down, because rebuilding the house is more costly than throwing out a single brick that doesn’t fit.