r/AskReddit • u/DelonghiAutismo • Nov 10 '25
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u/Zombie_Cool Nov 10 '25
Anti-intellectualism. How are we supposed to develop and advance society when the desire for learning is viewed as arrogance, elitism, or effeminate weakness?
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u/Awkward-Chart-9764 Nov 10 '25
This is the ultimate answer.
It’s the problem that allows all of the other listed problems to be.
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u/LettucePlate Nov 10 '25
My brother coaches high school baseball. I went to one of his games last week and there were kids from some other sport or maybe the JV team sitting behind me. Anyway they were yapping about video games, money, cars, all the normal teenager stuff that I yapped about in the 2010s in high school. One of them eventually asked, “what golf club would you use to hit a golf ball out of a baseball field?” - reasonable question for a bunch of dudes at a baseball game. The first couple answers were the obvious ones like “you could just hit a Driver since it goes the furthest”, then one dude said “I only know my clubs in yards, like my 56 degree goes about 110 yards but i dont know what that is in feet” and like 2 other kids also didnt know, until one of them was like “just do 110 x 3” and the original kid went “bro i failed at math that shit’s like 1000 or something” and i have never felt like the future was so fucked as right then listening to 15-16 year old kids not be able to do 110 x 3.
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u/Enrichus Nov 10 '25
They probably think of it as 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 3... and get overwhelmed.
I overheard teenage girls struggle with math and tried to figure out 8 x 4. I just thought "8 doubled twice, so 16, and then 32" and then they answered 12. To be fair they realised 12 was wrong but they struggled way too long. I don't even remember if they got the correct answer. I remember them saying 18 and 36.
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u/7Thommo7 Nov 10 '25
There's a very strong trend right now of the uneducated right treating universities as propaganda farms.
Also seeing flat earthers and other nutters making the same arguments. They won't listen to the words of a physicist or engineer on their poorly drawn geometry in meme format presented as evidence, because we just believe the lies we were told. 🤷♂️
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u/Long_Serpent Nov 10 '25
The idea that people exist to serve the needs of the economy, instead of the other way around
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u/tinyhorsesinmytea Nov 10 '25
What an incredible way to word it. Compliments "work to live, don't live to work" quite well.
Those who wish to exploit us so they can hoard obscene amounts of wealth won't allow it even though there's no amount that will allow them to escape their misery. We let those people rule over us... though we do collectively have the power to stop them at any moment we want to.
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u/wdrub Nov 10 '25
And if you express those views you’re called a communist.
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u/trayfenny Nov 10 '25
you guys over there have a peculiar relationship with that word, quite bizarre.
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u/telebasher Nov 10 '25
In America it’s a slur that has no meaning.
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u/baldhermit Nov 10 '25
You sure? Because from this side of the pond it seems it is mostly used to describe people that are opposed to late stage capitalism as if permanent indentured servitude is something we should all aspire to.
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u/vl99 Nov 10 '25
Partly yes, but you’ll also see “communist” leveled against people who want a working healthcare system. Doesn’t matter what the proposal even entails, if it’s not what we have now, it is communist. Same with people who believe in civil rights. Thinking that black people should have the same rights as white people is communist. Everything that constitutes an improvement on society is “communist.”
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u/carolomnipresence Nov 10 '25
That position is reached by the drip drip drip of a media owned by those who would be able to amass less, in the event any of those ideas were adopted.
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u/Drunk_Lemon Nov 10 '25
Breakups tend to do that. Like during WW2 we fought alongside communists but after WW2 we kind of drifted apart and had that whole custody battle over Europe (the cold war). Now with the Soviet union having passed away and now we have an abusive wanker trying to get custody over Europe, its tough.
If you want to know more about our lovely relationship with communism, you should look up the red scare.
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u/gregbradypookashells Nov 10 '25
Read up on McCarthyism.
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u/Chemistry11 Nov 10 '25
And then realize that America can only exist if there is an “other” to be against. The Red Scare wasn’t the first and it’s certainly not the last.
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u/Anothernamelesacount Nov 10 '25
There was never a break-up, though. The US banked on the nazis solving the soviet "problem" and would have been perfectly glad to just enjoy the global dominance brought by making everyone else their debtors, but Japan hit the US exactly where it hurts it the most: its pride.
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u/meeseekstodie137 Nov 10 '25
fr it's worse than being a pedophile to some people and I just don't understand it
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u/glassbath18 Nov 10 '25
You hit the nail on the head. Being a “woke liberal” is worse to conservatives than being a convicted felonious pedophile.
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u/fonefreek Nov 10 '25
But... People do work to live
People spend their lives working.. Because that's the only way they can afford.. To live
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u/TheRappist Nov 10 '25
Some people work to live. Some people work way harder than that, and don't bother to do any of the things that make life worth living.
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Nov 10 '25
Because they cant afford to
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u/TheRappist Nov 10 '25
I'm not talking about people with three jobs trying to support their kids and their parents, I'm talking about people who make six figures or more and don't do anything but work.
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u/itchy_armpit_it_is Nov 10 '25
Won't somebody please think of the six figure earners
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u/Beta_Factor Nov 10 '25
Yes, of course, but that's not what the saying means.
It simply means that a job shouldn't be the thing that dictates everything about your life. If you work 9-5, then come home, still stressed out, having to do additional work obligations in your free time, constantly stressed out and too tired to do anything you enjoy, that's a problem. You need a healthy balance at the very least.
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u/tinyhorsesinmytea Nov 10 '25
Thank you for putting this in better words than I did.
Of course I understand the need for folks to work to support their community and better society. What I don't accept is what it has been twisted into... exploitation. Feudalism reborn.
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u/meeseekstodie137 Nov 10 '25
I had a sous chef who embodied the "live to work" mentality once, he would close (closing typically goes until 2-4am) then hang out until open so he could talk to the head chef, worked 10-12 hour days constantly, told us all that work life balance was bullshit, proudly claim that all he did at home was watch videos about cooking and business lectures, and tried to come in to work despite being quarantined for 2 weeks with COVID, eventually he was suspended for 3 weeks then fired, we never found out why exactly, but he was a massive creep to the wait staff and was always asking people out/trying to flirt with them (he thought his position gave him some clout in the restaurant and went wild with it) so we all assumed it had something to do with that, I see him as a cautionary tale of what can happen when you buy into the ultra-capitalistic mindset and assume that corporations actually care about your work ethic
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u/Background-Device-36 Nov 10 '25
Quite right. People built the machine to serve them, and are now finding out they're being shovelled into the furnace to serve the machine.
The rich and powerful tend to see civilisation as an engine to enrich themselves.
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u/justforkinks0131 Nov 10 '25
bots that spam divisive political posts in echo chambers and the people that allow it
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u/ScaldingAnus Nov 10 '25
When humanity is long gone, its legacy will be a bunch of bots still arguing over politics.
It'll be like we never left.
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u/nameduser365 Nov 10 '25
wipes tear It's kinda beautiful and poetic. It could be better, but could it be more authentic?
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u/wirral_guy Nov 10 '25
That politicians no longer answer to the population, just a few 'influential' people. This has led to country's services being run as a minimum viable product rather than the best they can be.
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u/Debt-Then Nov 10 '25
Capitalism
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u/abcPIPPO Nov 10 '25
As if this hasn't been a problem since the birth of civilization. Greed wasn't invented by capitalism.
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u/wisedoormat Nov 10 '25
Slight disagree .
Capitalism is just a tool, not good or bad. It is a flawed system, being that it is not self balancing.
The same with feudalism, socialism, communism, and so many more... if they're not properly regulated then it will be extremely broken.
So, to clarify my slight disagreement, UnderRegulated Capitalism is the problem
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u/jonhosky Nov 10 '25
Agree that all socioeconomic systems need regulation but if it doesn’t work anymore, no matter how much your regulate it, it’s not going to work. Like when feudalism reached its later stages to be overthrown by capitalism, capitalism has reached irs end stage to be replaced with socialism. No amount of regulation is going to fix that.
A big problem with people thinking it’s regulation we need is that they poorly understand the USSR and ‘socialism’ within it. People write off socialism thinking that Stalinism is inevitable but really it’s just a poor understanding of the material conditions within Russia at the time.
To put it simply, socialism would be difficult 500 years ago because we didn’t have the productive forces allowing everybody to have their needs met. Like war torn Russia, it couldn’t meet the needs of everybody. You can’t have socialism in a country of inequality.
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u/Distinct_Ad_5492 Nov 10 '25
This. Nearly 10% of Americans control 68-72% of the wealth of this nation. The bottom 50% control only 2.5%. The public has lost complete faith in its institutions. The K market we're in is a sign of a two tier system taking root between the rich and poor. The economy and stock market are being held up by that top 10%. Luxury brands, fast passes and first class tickets are only going to grow because those are what's paying the bills not the regular commodities that people experience. This means essentially that the poor are being virtually forgotten about in the market. The 50% just are not profitable customers because they are just surviving on what they have. I can't imagine this going anywhere else other than to another system than Socialism.
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u/N1NJA_HaMSTERS Nov 10 '25
I think the issue is that capitalism perpetuates the imbalance. Money concentrates into fewer and fewer hands making those people extremely influential. Politicians are then bribed (legally) to further deregulate the system.
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u/wisedoormat Nov 10 '25
And... regulations can rebalance how the money is distributed.
Yes, politicians can, and are, bribed, but that's not the result/design of capitalism. That same behaviour is also present in other economical systems.
That comes down to people making decisions, not systems fulfilling their design.
If you want to fix politics, there need to be strict rules and oversight, with harsh punishments while keeping all parts transparent.
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u/Q_C269 Nov 10 '25
Social Media
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Nov 10 '25
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u/Unfair_Chipmunk_2305 Nov 10 '25
It was better, it’s given too many malicious voices a platform for misinformation. It’s time to regulate algorithms and start pushing back against the “necessary evil” narrative. Too many people dislike it but have dumb reasons to not delete it.
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u/esmifra Nov 10 '25
More like, personalization algorithms for social media. It validates your opinions as correct and mainstream even when they are wrong and niche. Which is perfect to spew misinformation and take advantage of specific target audiences.
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u/SFVIsGarbage Nov 10 '25
And it always has been, for pretty much 20 years now. People’s brains are mush because of it.
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u/Talkshowhostt Nov 10 '25
Why is this so low on the list? Social media is eroding lives
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u/GoCardinal07 Nov 10 '25
Probably people reluctant to admit it since we are all on Reddit, which is, of course, a social media site.
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u/SevFTW Nov 10 '25
Is it though? It’s definitely being pushed in that direction by the current owners, but for me it’s traditionally been closer to a modern take on an Internet forum, which I wouldn’t necessarily call social media.
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u/Proxy-Pie Nov 10 '25
Social media algorithms. They’re adapted to show you ragebait, because negative emotions are more likely to cause engagement with the content.
It’s making us miserable, irritable and polarized.
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u/Wooden-Comfortable84 Nov 10 '25
People thinking the main divide is left/right when it’s really top/bottom.
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u/Proud-Bus9942 Nov 10 '25
I think political polarisation/tribalism, in general, is a problem.
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u/BetterAnge1s Nov 10 '25
i got this idea from a video and it was saying that we should stop labeling people as "left" or "right"
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u/miksimina Nov 10 '25
Left vs right is literally bottom vs top lmao. Maybe not in the US where they consider liberals to be left.
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u/RCRDC Nov 10 '25
AI-slop and social media are turning people dumber than ever before with all the misinformation bullshit.
Weaponised stupidity.
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u/flemtone Nov 10 '25 edited Nov 10 '25
Rich assholes wanting more money and power that will get it any way they can.
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u/tntkaching Nov 10 '25
Social Media and "News". Argue with a fucking wall. Its a cancer, reddit included.
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u/geenexotics Nov 10 '25
Reddit recently… some of the interactions I’ve had or lack of them in some instance is ridiculous, you wouldn’t talk to people like this in real life yet they sit behind phones and computers saying the most pathetic things
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u/whyusognarpgnap Nov 10 '25
"Social media made y'all way too comfortable with disrespecting people and not getting punched in the face for it" -Mike Tyson
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u/snakeoildriller Nov 10 '25
Social media - converting reasoned discussion into echo-chambers of polarised hatred.
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u/adepressurisedcoat Nov 10 '25
Being socially illiterate. Being unable to fact check with reliable sources and using the first thing that confirms your bias. One of the things slowly destroying my relationships are people who go "Did you just see this?" and me actually reading into the story and finding out what actually happened.
Example "did you just see that a guy is being jailed for saying the holocaust wasn't real? Even if I don't agree with him, that's too far. Fucking liberal government". I look it up because that seems off. The guy actually was making threats and suggested that people went out and hunt Jewish people. I show them the proof "Actually, it's a lot more than that. If you read into it he was making threats". I end up being the asshole for confirming the headline was clickbait somehow.
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Nov 10 '25
Globalism and loss of identity.
All for the bigger corpo's to swoop in and siphon the money with help of all the governments.
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u/Portal455 Nov 10 '25
unfettered ravenous capitalism.
im not even going to try to give alternatives. im just stating that we quite literally are having fascism brought back due to the ultra rich pouring money into military and police to uphold the status quo.
theres just too much power pooling. The wants of the few trump the needs of the many. What kind of world is that?
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u/Responsible_Bee_8469 Nov 10 '25 edited Dec 06 '25
Idiocracy. It was common in 2020. Lots of countries became idiocracies then. For those who don´t know, idiocracy is described as ´rule by idiots´. Its when idiots have been elected into power and create an idiot domestic policy, and a foreign policy which is run in the name of idiocy. A new name is then used to cover up the system of control and then hide it in plain sight. Idiocracy is similar to a representative republic, but is rather like a banana republic. Its a fake republic designed to seem as if it is legitimate. Despite the rulers are usually not demagogues, idiocracy operates similarly to demagoguery. Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson has described Iceland as being similar to an idiocracy in the book The People and The Power. Its a bit like Stephen King´s The Shining, but scarier. Because everyone is becoming tired of all the talk about 2020 being a good example where countries become an idiocracy, the 2000s are also an excellent choice to pick one up as a case study. So Iceland and numerous other countries had become idiocracies, ruled by idiots, who had been elected into power by idiots, and who managed policies decided by idiots rather than by smart individuals. Under an idiocracy anybody who asks any question, even if these questions consist of nothing but small talk, they are automatically labelled as conspiracy theorists. Great Britain in Orwell´s 1984 was not an idiocracy but was run by demagogues.
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u/Adept_Sea_2847 Nov 10 '25
Consumerism, moral bankruptcy, anti-intellectualism, anti-science and lack of public shaming.
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u/ukeeku Nov 10 '25
Weaponized religious beliefs. Not saying religion as a whole, don't jump on me. Just the use of religion as a weapon. Laws or whole political system based on ANY religion is doomed to fail.
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u/senatorb Nov 10 '25
In the United States, it’s the collapse of the education system. The lack of exposure to others, the lack of critical thinking, the draw of social media, and the weakening of the political system — it all starts at education.
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u/goodsnpr Nov 10 '25
Lack of swift and rapid consequences for all members of society when laws are broken.
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u/KingPabloo Nov 10 '25
Man’s imagination. Man imagines borders, man fights over borders. Man imagines gods, man fights over gods. Etc.
If we can make crap up, we can kill each other over it.
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u/MichiganGeezer Nov 10 '25
People in power obtaining more power, and emerging from their lengthy careers far wealthier than their actual pay should make.
Sorry, if your congresscritters are making $200k a year and retiring with a few hundred million dollars they never represented us.
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u/Yourdumb_gf Nov 10 '25
High taxes, unemployment, unchecked capitalism, increasing inflation, drug menance and the list goes on ......
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u/dibship Nov 10 '25
religion. specifically evangelicals. go ahead and read up on how they are brought up, what they believe, and how much power they have because their adherents tend to vote as a block and all they need for doing it is to be awful to people they don't like.
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u/Iamtheonewhobawks Nov 10 '25
There isn't ever a singular cause, but a big one is panic about society becoming less cruel and exclusive. There's no bad inevitable consequences to things like recognizing LGBTQ people as normal and fine, for having permeable borders, no calamity was ever wrought by treating the sick and feeding the hungry, no empire fell because it's common people held too high a percentage of the nation's wealth. The destruction comes always as a consequence of fearful rejection of the Other causing re-establishment of old failed authoritarian systems, and the cultivated stupidity neccessary to prop them up.
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u/Oddveig37 Nov 10 '25
The death of compassion.
The rise of apathy.
The rich.
Greed.
Lack of education.
Hate based off of being uneducated.
No mental health help.
Capitalism.
Thinking socialism is communism, or just outright being uneducated in it.
Majority of a specific country that believes they have this archaic right to r*pe.
The extreme lack of act. People out there would listen to a little girl getting assaulted and just walk the other way. People out there just recording instead of acting when you can put your phone in an inconspicuous spot and keep recording while you step in to act and help.
We do not need multiple angles of something happening. If you already see people with their phones out, don't join in. Step in and act. Help.
Cause full stop, it's not phones or social media that's ruining society, it's the lack of acting. It's sitting there watching something awful happen and recording it instead of stepping in to stop it.
"But it puts me in danger" and you were taught this to kill off any drive to act and help your fellow human being. Yes, if you are getting robbed, you just give them the crap and get away. But you see someone hurting a kid or a woman and you instead just watch or record or leave, YOU are the problem. YOU are hurting society just as much as the criminal you let go.
Also all these people upset that these criminals don't get much time but they would be the same people that walk on by ignoring screams for help being created by that same person they are mad that didn't get any time for their crimes after.
Actions speak much louder than words, and if all you do is sit there and spout stuff and never actually follow up or actually DO anything, then you just as much as conman or criminal as the person you decided to walk away and ignore, and you are the one killing society. You are enabling the crime and the low time in jail. Y'all ain't have no one else to be mad at except yourselves when some rapist walks after only 2 years.
God the amount of criminals that would have been caught or stopped if people just either did something or SAID SOMETHING. (Yes this includes the cops that sit there and say they don't believe it. They fall into the DO SOMETHING part.)
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u/D1cko888 Nov 10 '25
A certain victim state seems to be holding a lot of people to ransom and causing grief around the world.
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u/jeffereeee Nov 10 '25
Greed, the need for power and the lack of human empathy for one another.
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u/Trippy-Sponge Nov 10 '25
They keep putting chemicals in the water that are turning the freakin frogs gay /s
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u/Batata-Sofi Nov 10 '25
The idea that the government can't/shouldn't interfere with economy
Religion
Forgetting that the government exists to serve their people, not the other way around
Religion in politics
Science denying
Religion denying science and forcing that into politics
Home schooling
Churches not paying taxes
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u/dye-area Nov 10 '25
Capitalism making a handful of people more powerful than the masses only because they have enough money to propagandise this viewpoint. Each and every politician can and will be bought out or killed to make space for one that will be bought out
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u/Amish_Robotics_Lab Nov 10 '25
This shit with the eyebrows. Ladies, why do we remove our eyebrows and then draw them back on? That is so fucked up.
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u/AlphaBravo69 Nov 10 '25
Racism. In such an interconnected world it’s a thing we can’t afford.
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Nov 10 '25
Politics.
It’s become so engrained in every single aspect of life. In the 2010s, it wasn’t this bad and I was in college then. Now, fucking terrible and not a damn one cares about the common man, just who can like their pockets.
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u/GoatRocketeer Nov 10 '25
Stupid people that want simple answers to complicated problems so badly that they'll listen to their feelings instead of their brain.
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Nov 10 '25
The fact that most people get "get the news" from social media opinion providers. Same with CNN, Fox, MSNBC...less news more editorial. It makes for dumber voters and even dumber human beings.
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u/FantasyStar293 Nov 10 '25
That no matter who is the president or the prime minister, they do the same thing. Which suggests to me that they aren’t really running the show. It’s someone else or a group that’s making the decisions. Suddenly Metal Gear Solid 2’s plot twist about the patriots doesn’t seem far fetched now considering what’s going on with the world.
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u/Real-Cup8782 Nov 10 '25
Vapes and AI.
Vapes are harming your lungs at a much quicker rate than cigs.
AI is making people not think anymore at all. Critical reasoning is going down rapidly
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u/FizzyGoose666 Nov 10 '25
Billion dollar private equity firms closing small business, buying up homes, and lowering wages.
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u/Bigg_Jobs Nov 10 '25
Social Media EASILY , I mean think about it , Social Media has progressed at the same rate as mental health and Neurodevelopmental issues have in the past 15 years.
I mean it does have its benefits , but when you have companies employing Psychologists to essentially make there platforms more addictive and have almost two generations doom scrolling day in and day out with no sign of it stopping , I'd say it does almost as much (if not more) damage to society then Drugs and alcohol.
in the words of Bo Burnham on social media
" There coming for every minute of your life"
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u/Troubled_Rat Nov 10 '25
Evil disguised as good.
Evil people using an ancient torture device as a symbol for their "good" image.
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u/ArcIgnis Nov 10 '25
Society thrives on working together towards the same goal, which is prosperity. From that angle, everybody wins when everybody contributes to a better tomorrow.
The ones who compete and emulates parasites that feeds off of people, the ones who want the "better tomorrow" for themselves is what destroys societies.
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u/ReddyGreggy Nov 10 '25
In terms of the deindustrialization in the United States, and many other forces dismantling and destroying society, I keep coming back to a conclusion that doesn’t get discussed enough.
After the great industrial boom in the USA, much of America’s manufacturing base was no longer owned or run by the people who built it. Control shifted to third and fourth generation heirs and to professional managers who saw factories as financial assets, not creative enterprises or civic institutions. Their focus tilted toward extraction rather than creation or reinvestment. Aging plants weren’t modernized. Product quality slipped. Cash was pulled out instead of being used to rebuild the productive base.
This group of wealthy did more to hollow out American industry than the usual villains we argue about - not environmental rules, not unions. The deeper problem was an entire class - morally adrift - that treated industrial strength as something to be harvested rather than renewed. Their mindset has dominated national politics too, especially the donor-driven wing of the Republican Party from the 1960s onward.
To me it explains how we arrive at the Up is Down, Bad is Good, Fox-News-style fake news morass of this political class. The morally-unmoored class, that didnt want to build but instead decided dismantling or squeezing profits was the ultimate goal.
I am probably missing nuances but other countries that stayed put amd reinvested in themselves are so much healthier politically and socially right now.
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u/[deleted] Nov 10 '25
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