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it is continually revealed that modern industry is poisoning us all, over and over again, for little to no reason. in the rare instance the political will is ge
by ruined 6y ago
it is continually revealed that modern industry is poisoning us all, over and over again, for little to no reason. in the rare instance the political will is generated to act against one thing or another, the regulation is sidestepped with analogs, and buried a hundredfold with other new profitable inventions.
unfortunately there is no reason to believe this destructive process is slowing or stopping.
we and our children are all debilitated in both subtle and drastic ways that we absolutely do not understand. the past century of industrial/biological experimentation will be looked back upon as one of the greatest and most senseless crimes ever committed.
i fear the consequences we must face.
- alexfromapex 6y agoIn a lot of cases, it seems the root cause is disregard for others and greed. People wouldn’t knowingly poison babies if they didn’t stand to make money or they felt sympathy. Unfortunately it seems Hollywood for the past decade or so has glorified nihilism and Machiavellianism because they sell, which has trickled into all facets of American life to the extreme detriment of our society. That’s just my take.
- macromagnon 6y agoIt seems rather disproportionate to blame such ills on the movie industry.
- alexfromapex 6y agoWhy because it’s an uncomfortable truth? It’s certainly not a novel concept https://as.nyu.edu/content/dam/nyu-as/politics/documents/AriasCommonKnowledge.pdf https://as.nyu.edu/content/dam/nyu-as/politics/documents/Ari... https://gap.hks.harvard.edu/how-does-media-influence-social-norms-field-experiment-role-common-knowledge https://gap.hks.harvard.edu/how-does-media-influence-social-... https://live.worldbank.org/should-we-use-entertainment-media-shape-norms-and-behaviors-scale https://live.worldbank.org/should-we-use-entertainment-media...
- krustyburger 6y agoThe notion that human malevolence is a recent enough development to have somehow been caused by this entity “Hollywood” is laughable on its face. Are you under the impression that humans led some kind of Edenic existence before we started watching movies?
- alexfromapex 6y agoI’m not claiming it as an origin of malevolence but definitely an amplifier by distributing and eliciting fascination with dark triad ideas to much larger swaths of the population
- krustyburger 6y agoIt seems to me that maybe you should try switching to watching better films before you condemn an entire industry full of creative people. I happened to come across this quote from the late Roger Ebert just now: “If it’s a great movie, it lets you understand a little bit more about what it’s like to be a different gender, a different race, a different age, a different economic class, a different nationality, a different profession, different hopes, aspirations, dreams and fears. It helps us to identify with the people who are sharing this journey with us.” There is no monolithic “Hollywood.” Suggesting not only that there is but that it has a nefarious agenda of some kind is an all-too common element of popular conspiracy theories and, frankly, an example of lazy thinking.
- alexfromapex 6y agoIt seems to me this is a straw man argument. Hollywood is merely metonymy.
- krustyburger 6y agoI am not suggesting that you are under the impression that the film industry is only located in California. I’m sure you’re well aware that isn’t the case. My point is that in reality all sorts of people make all sorts of films, many of which are valuable sources of inspiration and comfort for their audiences. And yet despite this you are quite obviously engaging in a definist fallacy by suggesting that only those films and shows that bother you personally are representative and thus the entire film industry can be rightfully condemned.
- natmaka 6y agoMost people wouldn’t knowingly poison babies they know, or babies of people they know. The root of cause of disregard for a group of people is anonymity, which in turn is a consequence of large and dense groups of humans. Unknown "others" just aren't real. We feel attracted to huge and dense cities/provinces/nations, and the result becomes more and more ugly. Aren't pandemics another consequence of those? Hollywood glorifies what sells (attracts many). Many feel, more or less consciously, surrounded by the masses, threatened by it, and react thru nihilism/Machiavellianism/...
- m463 6y agoI seemed to have trouble with sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS). Sleeping on freshly washed sheets would irritate my skin. I switched to a detergent without SLS and they were soft and comfortable again. I also did the same with shampoo and toothpaste, to my benefit. Thing is, it's a cheap ingredient that has been signed-off by regulators. But manufacturers are onto the controversy and just use "alternate" names for it on the ingredients list.
- hangonhn 6y agoSame here. I used to get terrible rashes on the back of my neck that needed increasingly stronger steroid creams to deal with. Then I found out about SLS from a BBC clip about it. It’s an incredibly drying chemical and it’s only purpose is to increase foaminess in shampoos. Because shampoo would go down the back of my neck when I rinsed it off, the SLS was causing my skin to dry and crack leading to rashes. I’ve stopped using any cleaning products with SLS and the issue has never returned. The part that annoys me is that SLS doesn’t really aid in cleaning. They just add it to soaps and shampoos because foam plays to the notion of cleaning. It’s a marketing thing.
- rowanG077 6y agoHow do you expect the industry to manage this? We can't even scientifically test whether the different foods we eat are harmful or good for us. I think humanity will have to face consequences and start paying people to possibly sacrifice their health for the greater good. It's just not possible to in any other way I think.
- sep_field 6y agoUnfortunately, while human trials might in some perfect world be a workable idea, under capitalism we have a perpetual underclass of people who are kept at wages low enough that they would be willing to do almost anything to get a bit more money. So paying people to sacrifice their health turns into another form of abuse that poor people will endure.
- rowanG077 6y agoThis is true. There are no clean solutions.
- nine_k 6y agoOK, let's require a proof of income above the national average from the applicants. Any better now? "It sucks to be poor; you can't even sell a piece of your health for a greater good of humankind and some good money. Only the rich folks are entitled to that."
- YouthfulMarxism 6y agoAmount of feeble slogan salad in HN comment section approaches Twitter poisoning levels.
- tweetle_beetle 6y agoYour second ever comment in this community is decrying the quality of comments in said community with an attack containing no substance?