To think that we already live in a dystopian world?

[wheresmymojo]

I've seen a lot of talk about dystopian TV series and possible outcomes of the climate crisis.

But AIBU to say we actually already live in a dystopian world but we're lucky to be in the 'ruling class'?

While we mainly live in our reasonably comfortable bubbles if you actually took things that were happening in the world today and strung them together it would be a perfect dystopian novel....

• BJ in the media offering tax cuts to those earning about £50k while we have 4 million children in poverty

• People being told they are fit to work who then die

• The popularity of cheap clothing which is reliant on large sections of society being in absolute dire poverty to provide the cheap labour (but we don't care and carry on buying)

• The growth of tech companies that have bigger turnovers than many countries GDP and have a global reach beyond any other institution that exists

• The factory farming of animals and genetic modification of them beyond anything nature intended so we can get bigger chicken breasts even if it means the chickens are too large to support their own body weight

• The amount of money pumped into the food industry and levels of obesity while other parts of the world starve

• Wars over oil killing thousands and thousands, even when science says using that oil will contribute to the destruction of the planet

• Rolling back of women's rights in the US so women will have to get across state borders for an abortion if they've been raped

• Arguing about cutting foreign aid while children live by scavenging rubbish dumps in so many countries.

Sorry depressing but it occurred to me that if you put all of this together in a novel it would be pretty clear that we already live in a dystopian world and are just in denial about it...?

@Gth1234, you’ve been picked up before on your ignorance of anything outside your hermetically sealed bubble of privilege. I don’t know if that ignorance is genuine or wilful.

I’m old and the world’s in a worse state than I can ever remember. It terrifies me and I’m pleased I’m closer to the end of my life than the beginning.

Things are mostly fine, and globally they are better than they have been at any previous point in human history. The rise of the far left is a problem, but hopefully one we can all overcome.

Dear God.

Typed on your iPhone that not only uses slave labour but has suicide nets in factories.

I don't for one second think I'm not part of the whole thing, I am

There are a lot of sociopaths about.

fullfact.org/economy/poverty-uk-guide-facts-and-figures/

but humans have made incredible progress in most arenas

That really rather depends on how you measure progress...

We're not happier or more content

The inequality of wealth is jaw dropping

Many humans are barely benefiting from this 'progress' - those of us in the West are basically being supported in our cushy lifestyles by the poverty of millions of others

@Gth1234 I think you have extremely low standards for what's acceptable if you think things are okay because we don't have barefoot parentless urchins.

Is that really how bad things have to be for you to give a shit?

I quite like all the things the OP mentioned in her opening post.....they help take my mind off my problems!

I agree op. Also, amazing how many people on here don't understand the concept of relative poverty. Children don't have to be "barefoot urchins" to be living in poverty. Sorry but that's just really ignorant.

Many people in Britain are busy supporting the cushy lifestyles of others here by working to pay rent. Poverty is not something that happens only in other countries. I seem to remember that international inequality is actually reducing, even as inequality within Britain rises.

This is just madness, I believe irrational anti-Tory madness.

It's the Conservative Government's own figures

But weren't there loads of 'barefoot urchins' in centuries past? The type sent to workhouses and who inspired books like Oliver Twist?

There were and just because we don’t still have them doesn’t mean there’s no poverty. The poor are always with us.

I think society may have seemed more 'wholesome' to many in decades past but I reckon it would've been much worse for the non privileged or those deemed outsiders.

Being gay, black, or suffering from mental health issues would've undoubtedly been much harder 100 years ago.

@Gth1234

I'm interested to know what personal experience you have that makes you so sure that poverty figures from the Govt are made up?

Are you a social worker?
Do you volunteer in a food bank?
Do you work in public sector housing?
What kind of area do you live in?

Obviously you have very strong views and I'm interested in what these are based on.

I mean, we're almost at the stage where it's a criminal offence to hurt people's feelings nowadays!

'Relative poverty' is a nonsense term created so that political activists will always have a cause to campaign for - by its very nature, it can never be eradicated, no matter how high the absolute standard of living rises. It actually fell during the global financial crisis, because the gap between top and bottom decreased!

The average worker of the 20th century would kill for the 'relative poverty' of the 21st.

Meanwhile the embrace of capitalism has raised China from absolute poverty and famine to being a challenger for global hegemony within little more than a generation. But no, I'm sure it was so much better under Mao, right? Much less 'inequality' then!

Only if you are a celeb @Bjornagain.

Are you aware of the racism and threats against Mr Kabede who lived in Flat 16 Grenfell Tower.

He is under protection because of it. No one has been arrested though.

I agree that you could pick any time in history and make a dystopian novel about it.

But I feel like people knew it was shit then - there wasn't much of a middle class before WW1 so unless you were in the upper classes you knew how things were

Now most of us in the UK are massively removed from the shit side. We're living in 'good times' and can get our shopping fix and new shiny things without actually seeing the impact. Most of those that know about it still go into denial day to day (me included).

I don't have to look the Bangladeshi woman who made my top and who lives in absolute poverty in the eyes.

I feel like a lot of people in the West rely on the ' life has never been so good for humans' to cover the fact that actually it's still incredibly shite for the vast majority....but 'we're okay'.

Yup. True story

The average worker of the 20th century would kill for the 'relative poverty' of the 21st.

The 20th century covers a wide timezone. My parents working in the 70s-90s did relatively well out of unskilled work. My generation wonders what the hell they had to be so angry about and what they did all day as we work harder and harder for less. Resources and assets are the real wealth, and the housing crisis leaves private renters asset-poor.

@Gth1234 Wow! you are truly a blinkered 'I'm alright Jack' person aren't you?
Have a good look around your local town. A really long look.
Once you see the real poverty, you won't be able stop seeing it.
Or do you live in a nice posh suburb?
Travel somewhere not so nice and you will see it.

HelenaDove

I'm sure that walking a mile in the shoes of many different groups would truly open my eyes, no doubt.

That said, I'm really sceptical that it's as hard as it was in 1920 to be gay. You couldn't go to gay clubs to meet people, there weren't dating apps, etc, no gay celebrities. You'd be disowned from your family in many cases.

I know quite a few openly gay people who seem to live perfectly 'normal' lives which I don't think could've happened 100 years ago.

But no, I'm sure it was so much better under Mao, right? Much less 'inequality' then!

This is quite a defensive way of looking at it though (and quite a Western way).

Go to the third world where they're still living on less than a dollar a day and tell them not to worry, because it used to be worse.

Plus the argument is - I don't want to acknowledge that things are shit for anyone today because things were more shit a hundred years ago. How is progress ever made if that's the approach?