What's the first pic?
Why do we —indirectly— proceed perpetuating morality unjust establishments?
How easy humans can flip from something being socially acceptable to something of great malignant pursuits. Take for example slaves, the modern man recognizes such actions as wrong because he was taught that in school, vice versa the colonizer was taught that it was morally correct because Africans were lesser. Same thing with sacrifice with the Aztecs, if feeding the sun ment killing people and if there ancestors were doing the same, than why question anything, the sun will fall from the sky if they stop so continue, they do mindlessly without giving it second thought.
The arguments of being taught something and therefore we can’t judge them on modern standards is an intriguing argument, after all it was the world of old. But looking through my own life I realized that’s not entirely the case. Forgive me as perhaps, I am simply a product of the Information Age, but I am a strong atheist. I was not originally as my mother, father, grandparents and sisters were all christians and strong christians at that, my father and grandmother especially. I went to church every Sunday as my family had one and I became quite popular, anytime I go back I am still loved as I went to that church for all my life. I loved Christ, I couldn’t even understand why anyone would think differently from the bible. But than I began reading it and experiencing the world for myself and I realized that the bible is a work of fiction, with such a powerful message not everything is fake, some parts are very true, but many christians seems to see it as very literal and had warped the story to mean many different things. I like Jesus but I can’t understand why anyone would like the almost egotistical force we call “god”, why must I worship something that cannot be proven? There are way too many reasons why I became atheist, but just trying to list some examples of why one may question such teachings I bring this as another example. Even though I was taught and raise to trust the bible as fact, I’m still able to realize and see through this masterpiece of a literary text imposing as a history book . But why couldn’t the ancient people at the time see through the morally unjust acts such as slavery.
Humans do not need a moral book or Commandments to understand basic human emotion. “If I don’t want to be killed and you don’t want to be killed, let’s agree to not kill each other” such things are basic truths and yet the Aztecs still killed people despite there screams. We actually do know why they continue and why slaves were used for so long, if things are not taboo than why question it, such is why many Americans get so confused of other cultures and vice versa.
EXAMPLES
To finally give examples the thread images reference diamonds and how they are still manufactured and sold at high value despite being just carbon and the working conditions are poor. They have been poor for hundreds of years yet we continue to push a culture where expensive diamond rings are customary to give to loved ones. The other image is factory farming, this is much more understandable in why we continue but still. Humans need food, we are the most intelligent creatures on the planet, we had truly and forever changed the game of food. While cave man had to hunt for food and was very likely to starve or die fighting for the pursuit of it the modern man suffers from the opposite. 12% of America has diabetes, 40% are obese, 40% of food, 120 billion pounds yearly, is wasted, thrown in the garbage because it got bad. Why are billions of animals being killed for them to be wasted, surely we do not need such death but factory farming could be it’s own thread, I recommend this video for more YouTube: DA9nVP479pw
More examples include chocolate, why do we still have borderline slavery to produce our Halloween candy? Toys for Christmas were made in a Chinese sweat shop and everything on Etsy at the same place. If such things are the case then why do people still buy from Etsy? Why is our culture reliant on materialistic goods from poor nations? Most people especially the grown adult who are buying such products know about Offshoring and Outsourcing and yet do not care how there product was made only the final product. How could someone still support such commodities even after knowing where they came from? Why do onlyfans girls continue to drive the pockets of the depressed man for money? Why had the world rewarded the digital slut with million dollar houses? While the working man is poor struggling to afford his apartment.
At this point I’m sure you can think of some examples yourself, I am guilty of some of these actions too, I eat meat, I buy things off Amazon notwithstanding the carbon footprint, I eat chocolate occasionally. the civilian is not to blame entirely but we can still make a difference, we cut back at least a little and to think beyond ourselves towards the people of the future so we make our own world better.
Bernd media:
https://m.youtube.com/shorts/1rvwfbtrQM4?ra=m
>How easy humans can flip from something being socially acceptable to something of great malignant pursuits.
I think I asked myself a somewhat similar question a earlier this year. I learned of a local Russian case about a coach named Kukushkin who injured a National Guard soldier in self defense who (along with 8 other people) frankly was trying to sexually assault Kukushkin and his friend's wives.
Seems comically evil, right? And you'd think Kukushkin would get acquitted easily. But he didn't. The prosecution spent like 5 years to get him jailed. The jury didn't let them, then they tried making a jury with the prosecutor's son who was supposed to bribe them or something. That guy even confessed on camera "I pity the guy, but it's what I'm going to do".
Doesn't it seem so bizzare? Why do they do it and who benefits? This is obviously something that persists across many institutions, and I think this is where the answer lies. The system is trying to preserve itself, and so do the people inside - they need the system to preserve themselves also. It's not super rational but they do think "if this guy in the system doesn't get protections, neither will I - there's other people expecting me to step up - and if I don't act like everyone else, my access to the resources is at stake" - this is like in a very simplified manner.
Why would a slaver value some abstract idea over not being ostracized over other slavers AND free labor? Like with the planted jury member in the story, he valued his relationship with his prosecutor parent more than upholding "justice" (no one will reward him for it and he'll just be relationally punished instead)
With luxury buying a feeling of being richer/better than someone is more immediately emergent than whatever working conditions problems there exist. Like a person with a grown diamond ring will universally feel like a knockoff to everyone compared to a person with a natural one. It's stupid but it's a very hardwired social thing.
And I think this is really at the core why SHIT behavior propagates. Incentives, especially social ones. It's even a bit admirable westoids leftoids veganoids are attempting to stick some sort of values to me. I think some of them are sincere believers. But unfortunately virtues only exist as far as we can afford them, as long as our perceived existence and resources aren't at stake.
Also you can think this way if we are going to talk about diamonds and other resources specifically.
Most people would definitely not be amused if the diamonds were suddenly gone in your country unless they're one of those turbo virtuous lefties. Diamonds are one of those luxuries that signal the status of the civilization. Even if you don't have them they will be used rhetorically like
"KEEEK countryname can't even afford diamonds"
Apply that to banana slavery in Latin America, Nestle, shitty temu toys or whatever other bullshit that get extracted from third world countries. NOBODY wants access to stuff taken away even if it's fucking stupid, unnecessary, or cancerous. Human attachment to resources is so strong that's like asking someone to get rid of their survival instinct.
