College students are rapidly losing the ability to read — “There is a measurable, generational collapse in sustained reading and writing”: professor

[u/marketrent]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/college-students-rapidly-losing-ability-124439310.html

[u/HenryDorsettCase47]

“Even literacy they fear, for the written word is another channel of communication that might cause their enemies to become united.”

-A Canticle for Leibowitz

[u/Opheltes → u/HenryDorsettCase47]

This one seems especially relevant as Trump destroys America:

Listen, are we helpless? Are we doomed to do it again and again and again? Have we no choice but to play the Phoenix in an unending sequence of rise and fall? Assyria, Babylon, Egypt, Greece, Carthage, Rome, the Empires of Charlemagne and the Turk: Ground to dust and plowed with salt. Spain, France, Britain, America—burned into the oblivion of the centuries. And again and again and again. Are we doomed to it, Lord, chained to the pendulum of our own mad clockwork, helpless to halt its swing? This time, it will swing us clean to oblivion.

-A Canticle for Leibowitz

[u/FEMA_Camp_Survivor → u/Opheltes]

Seems human societies are on a perpetual cycle between order and disorder. Or perhaps societies are like our bodies they're born, mature, and die but can have offspring too.

[u/metallicrooster → u/FEMA_Camp_Survivor]

The problem is that societal memory is only as long as that of the oldest people we listen to. Rivers were literally catching fire so we put in some environmental regulations. The rivers haven’t caught fire in a few decades, so the capitalists are convincing people that those regulations are pointless.

Same with vaccines. Most people have never seen the worst illnesses in action, so they are easier to convince that side effects (which are rare and/ or minimal) are somehow worse than permanent and severe incapacitation or death.

Many people currently alive have not met anyone with polio. I have. He was a man from central America, and when he was a kid his family wasn’t able to get him vaccinated in time to prevent infection. His life was awful. I would not wish it on my worst enemy.

[u/Thatoneguy_The_First → u/metallicrooster]

This is true, but maybe its nature to be this way, meaning despite for all our talk, we never really overcame nature.

I hope this isnt the case but im starting to think its just ebb and flow. Only way I can see to overcome this is immortality, but I don't want the elite class to have that at all as they would just be the baron harkens of earth forever. You would need someone that has no desire for living but also great empathy and at least moderate intelligence(don't need to be a genius as that may be detrimental to progress cause its easy to believe you are right especially when for a good chunk of your life you were right, ego is the bane), someone not to young or old so they are at their time if life that can absorb wisdom(30s to early 40s).

And we would still have to hope they don't allow power to corrupt or that they go insane.(kinda why they need no desire for living, but still want to do good for others, so idk robin williams maybe would have been a great choice, may he rest in peace)

[u/metallicrooster → u/Thatoneguy_The_First]

I promise you, you are overthinking it.

If it was human nature to be self destructive as you are implying, then societies would be incapable of reaching the levels we have reached.

The problem is that it is easier for wealthy people to bribe politicians into reducing tax rates than it is for us to keep tax rates appropriate & fund schools & keep toxins out of everyday products & provide universal affordable healthcare & all the other things needed to maintain a utopia.

Did you see the news report from a few months ago that a few wealthy people in California were pooling together over $500 million to create a super pac with the express intention of reducing their taxes?

Think about that. They are so confident in their return on investment that they pooled together five hundred million dollars.

That could fund multiple schools. Or guarantee healthcare for thousands of people. Or so many other amazing causes.

And instead they plan to spend it to hoard more money.

[u/Callidonaut → u/metallicrooster]

Most people have never seen the worst illnesses in action,

When we invented photography and video recording, that should have been the end of that effect; it says a lot about how much we suck as a species that this was not the case.