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I hear you, but have you considered that the world's actually on fire? Perhaps you wouldn't notice because you don't live in the Amazon. I don't mean that seri

I hear you, but have you considered that the world's actually on fire? Perhaps you wouldn't notice because you don't live in the Amazon. I don't mean that seriously, but it does serve a point. How can you tell if people are just ranting "because of the internet" and not because they are suffering and think your political inaction is contributing to their pains? Because of your comment I will try to be more cautious about people complaining as they might just be attention grabbers but it's also dangerous to fully ignore them because it makes us uncomfortable. We should be grateful people rant to one another, because it means we still believe we can help ourselves. If this was a dictatorship we were living in there would be no point in complaining to the neighbours.

simonsarris 7y ago
You're proving his point. The Amazon is experiencing a more or less average amount of fire during its dry season as farmers clear/maintain cropland like they do every year. However, the internet media has turned this into sensationalism that captures people like you and turns them into doomsayers. From nasa.gov: > As of August 16, 2019, an analysis of NASA satellite data indicated that total fire activity across the Amazon basin this year has been close to the average in comparison to the past 15 years. https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/145464/fires-in-brazil https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/145464/fires-in-bra... Things are not as bad as you think they are, or as bad as crappy internet news sites want you to think they are.
- munk-a 7y ago
  Who is to say that the status quo isn't alarming, "things aren't worse than last year" isn't a valid argument that things are fine in any logical setting. And the internet has helped spread information, some of these issues may have been captured by Nat Geo in the 40s but others will have been missed. A status quo progression may be championed as an issue not because everyone previously accepted it but because no one was previously aware of it.
  - deadmetheny 7y ago
    Per the linked article: "As of August 16, 2019, an analysis of NASA satellite data indicated that total fire activity across the Amazon basin this year has been close to the average in comparison to the past 15 years. (The Amazon spreads across Brazil, Peru, Colombia, and parts of other countries.) Though activity appears to be above average in the states of Amazonas and Rondônia, it has so far appeared below average in Mato Grosso and Pará, according to estimates" A status quo isn't inherently bad, and this one looks like it's been consistent for many years.
    - munk-a 7y ago
      I wanted to clarify that my statement above isn't specific to this article. I was trying to make a general reply, with consideration to the rest of the thread, to that original point and general statement. I'm not in a position to evaluate how dire this specific instance is with any sort of confidence in my findings.
- rollinDyno 7y ago
  I wasn't being serious about that. I was trying to say is that just as they can't tell if the Amazon is on fire because they don't live there, they can't tell if someone is being opressed by the system because they simply aren't this certain someone.
  - tenaciousDaniel 7y ago
    But this is true of everything, everywhere, all the time. The world is a complex place, and we have to make do with the knowledge we have at hand. It doesn't mean that we should be brash and unwavering in whatever our current judgement is, but we also can't endlessly refuse to form own judgements simply because we don't know everything there is to know in the universe.
skybrian 7y ago
I think even in wartime, people don't want to talk about the war all the time? Also, there is a difference between specific calls to action and gripes that someone ought to do something. Some complaints are more useful than others. It seems possible to tell the difference? Political discussions are an important component of Internet addiction and we shouldn't be naive about the bad effects of large amounts of low quality conversation in distracting us from more important stuff.
weberc2 7y ago
> How can you tell if people are just ranting "because of the internet" and not because they are suffering and think your political inaction is contributing to their pains? In many cases, it's not the group which is allegedly suffering that is doing the alledging, but rather elites who are far removed from that group, and the "alledging" takes the form of straw men, motte/bailey fallacies, and definitions that are ultimately circular. Often, we _are_ in the groups that are allegedly suffering or surrounded by those group, and there are no clear signs that we/they are suffering as described (and indeed, the descriptions are often incoherent). So yeah, bonafide suffering is pretty easy to spot, as is opportunistic "compassion".
fauigerzigerk 7y ago
There's a difference between ranting on a subject and creating this "You're either Wonkru or you are the enemy of Wonkru. Choose!" kind of atmosphere on a permanent basis. The former can be eye opening and it can provide the necessary emotional push to get something rolling. The latter is meant to shut others down and suppress opinions - it's a playground for sociopaths thriving on ad hominem aggression.

simonsarris 7y ago

You're proving his point. The Amazon is experiencing a more or less average amount of fire during its dry season as farmers clear/maintain cropland like they do every year. However, the internet media has turned this into sensationalism that captures people like you and turns them into doomsayers. From nasa.gov: > As of August 16, 2019, an analysis of NASA satellite data indicated that total fire activity across the Amazon basin this year has been close to the average in comparison to the past 15 years. https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/145464/fires-in-brazil https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/145464/fires-in-bra... Things are not as bad as you think they are, or as bad as crappy internet news sites want you to think they are.

munk-a 7y ago
Who is to say that the status quo isn't alarming, "things aren't worse than last year" isn't a valid argument that things are fine in any logical setting. And the internet has helped spread information, some of these issues may have been captured by Nat Geo in the 40s but others will have been missed. A status quo progression may be championed as an issue not because everyone previously accepted it but because no one was previously aware of it.
- deadmetheny 7y ago
  Per the linked article: "As of August 16, 2019, an analysis of NASA satellite data indicated that total fire activity across the Amazon basin this year has been close to the average in comparison to the past 15 years. (The Amazon spreads across Brazil, Peru, Colombia, and parts of other countries.) Though activity appears to be above average in the states of Amazonas and Rondônia, it has so far appeared below average in Mato Grosso and Pará, according to estimates" A status quo isn't inherently bad, and this one looks like it's been consistent for many years.
  - munk-a 7y ago
    I wanted to clarify that my statement above isn't specific to this article. I was trying to make a general reply, with consideration to the rest of the thread, to that original point and general statement. I'm not in a position to evaluate how dire this specific instance is with any sort of confidence in my findings.
rollinDyno 7y ago
I wasn't being serious about that. I was trying to say is that just as they can't tell if the Amazon is on fire because they don't live there, they can't tell if someone is being opressed by the system because they simply aren't this certain someone.
- tenaciousDaniel 7y ago
  But this is true of everything, everywhere, all the time. The world is a complex place, and we have to make do with the knowledge we have at hand. It doesn't mean that we should be brash and unwavering in whatever our current judgement is, but we also can't endlessly refuse to form own judgements simply because we don't know everything there is to know in the universe.

skybrian 7y ago

I think even in wartime, people don't want to talk about the war all the time? Also, there is a difference between specific calls to action and gripes that someone ought to do something. Some complaints are more useful than others. It seems possible to tell the difference? Political discussions are an important component of Internet addiction and we shouldn't be naive about the bad effects of large amounts of low quality conversation in distracting us from more important stuff.

weberc2 7y ago

> How can you tell if people are just ranting "because of the internet" and not because they are suffering and think your political inaction is contributing to their pains? In many cases, it's not the group which is allegedly suffering that is doing the alledging, but rather elites who are far removed from that group, and the "alledging" takes the form of straw men, motte/bailey fallacies, and definitions that are ultimately circular. Often, we _are_ in the groups that are allegedly suffering or surrounded by those group, and there are no clear signs that we/they are suffering as described (and indeed, the descriptions are often incoherent). So yeah, bonafide suffering is pretty easy to spot, as is opportunistic "compassion".

fauigerzigerk 7y ago

There's a difference between ranting on a subject and creating this "You're either Wonkru or you are the enemy of Wonkru. Choose!" kind of atmosphere on a permanent basis. The former can be eye opening and it can provide the necessary emotional push to get something rolling. The latter is meant to shut others down and suppress opinions - it's a playground for sociopaths thriving on ad hominem aggression.