Ask Lemmy

because armmaggeton

• The rich take a larger and larger slice of the wealth pie
• Use the money to propagandize to the now more precarious and vulnerable public to bolster their position
• Rinse and repeat

It feels that way, because it kind of is winning a bunch of battles. Whether it's "winning the war" is much more up for interpretation - the past was seriously shit going just a few generations back, and it will take a lot of backwards progress until we get anywhere comparable.

Okay, so why is it happening? When it comes to democratic backsliding specifically, the first reflex everyone had was to blame social media bubbles for causing runaway political polarisation, but it turns out breaking those bubbles actually increases radicalisation, so that's not it. Another theory I've heard is that in a democracy, the weakening of a political party inevitably creates space for extremists to take control. There definitely was some building dissatisfaction with the status-quo right before the trouble began, I could feel it, and in the case of the US specifically winning a party is nearly as good as winning the country.

It's also worth considering this has happened before. Since the French revolution itself the path to liberalism has been two steps forward, one step back. I don't know what causes it exactly, but the dip we're in is big - comparable to the one before WWII.

Even evil people are winning. Why?

That's yet another separate question, which I struggle with too. One notable bad person isn't even smart-evil.

It's been shown in studies that narcissists achieve more conventional success and social status, despite the fact they pretty much ruin everything and everyone they touch. It's a real thing. Bad actors are given far more leeway than would be game-theoretically rational for us to give.

Simple material effect.

People are shaped by the interrest of the social and material class they are part of. And the evil people are always the one in power and have the money, so they act in the interest of their class and do things that help themselves.

Fucking Marx wrote about this quite a while ago, now his predictions just manifest more visibly, but the cultural and material forces have always been at play. Now we just reached a breaking point as a planet and population, so the underlying systems start to break too and the people on top do everything to stay in power, including ditching reality altogether.

People have it tough and I think they have gotten full of hate and greed. Evil people feed on hate and greed.

The information age of the internet grew too fast before humans could get an actual sense of the repercussions, and it was just a matter of time for the greedy people in power all over the world to use it to their advantage.

Extinction Burst.

Trust. In order for good people to achieve something they need to work together and trust each other. Bad people lie and deceive with no remorse which basically gives them the advantage in securing higher seats. Being able to lie with a straight face gives you many advantages if what you seek is personal gain, hence a lot of people keep doing it and that seems to be the goal.

This is a people/societal issue. People's lack of willingness in investing in other people doing well.

Surprised to read so many answers talking about capitalism, social media and wealth concentration. But no one mentioned that we're at an unprecedented point in history of mankind. Ecological collapse, the lightening fast rise of AI. No example of past historical processes can be very useful in this very unique context.

And don't forget that with AI and, coming fast, robots, humans will not be needed for labor anymore. Most of you might feel this is rubbish about something you think is science fiction. I suggest you think again.

Think again and you will quickly realize that the future is not rosy for 99.5% of us.

A ruling class of ultra wealthy lording over the vast majority of people being left with crumbs is a common sign that an empire is in decline. With the US having more global influence than any previous empire the whole world will be feeling the effects in one way or another.