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Ravi Daithankar's avatar

I have had the feeling that there has been a major disenchantment epidemic permeating across the world over the last 8 or 10 years. Any sense of wonder or optimism has basically fizzled out. It spread pretty rapidly, but surreptitiously at first. And then there was no denying it during COVID. Now, sitting in the middle of 2024, it is pretty amazing just how disenchanted people are about things in general, even when you consider their best case scenarios! If your instinct is to think about why the most optimistic scenario you can come up with isn't optimistic enough, and if that outlook is held by a big enough portion of the population, we're literally saying we're not even interested in inventing a future. We'd rather think about how we're going to deal with whatever that future is inevitably going to be, and get bummed out today.

I read the "other shoe dropping" in that sense. We're about to find out just how we cope with a future we aren't particularly enthused about. I feel like there will be visible signs or reactions first, but those will be distractions and a deviation from the broad, subliminal theme. That broader theme will be apathy and indifference, but of a very nihilistic or absurdist type. A wartime mindset, but without the hope of peacetime.

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Art's avatar

I look at your writing, and go, I wish I could write. So since you can write, I'm happy that you do. Reading your writing makes me wish that I could write someday - have interesting ideas and share them in a coherent way.

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