this post was submitted on 12 Apr 2025
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I find it difficult to respect the way we exist in society. Most of us in the west enjoy what we have because someone elsewhere is being exploited. The general pride and vanity we have is unjustified and we should be using that power for good instead. We are focused on the ~~right~~ wrong things.
You could say that this opinion isn’t unpopular, but just try bringing it up in conversation. Many don’t want to know.
You're absolutely right but where do we as privileged and I guess inherently exploitative westerners go from here. Also the entire neoliberaljst system seems to be set up as a exploitation pyramid, where even us the privileged westerners are being exploited for the gains of those monetarily positioned above us.
Me I'm just trying to to understand all this so I can figure out where to go from there
Good question. The first step with any endeavour is mindset. So when people ask “where do we go from here?” my first thought is that we should stop the glorification of exploitation. Stop wearing brand logos. Stop showing our new devices to people with enthusiasm. Stop celebrating the “winners” of capitalism.
I don’t think we should despair - that doesn’t scale well. But we should (IMO) buy these things with a sense of regret or realism. We should normalise the discourse. I want us to be as up to date on this as people who follow sports.
Otherwise, not only will we never think of ways to fix this, but we won’t even recognise the solution when it’s in front of us.
We need to become conscious and informed of the dilemma of people who look different to us and consider them our brethren. That does wonders for the exploitative appetites we’ve developed.