(07-27-2026, 02:22 AM)Uncle wrote:(07-27-2026, 01:10 AM)Potato wrote: Cross posting because I couldn't decide between dumb news and culture wars.
Publication which encourages its readers to behave in a way which sucks the joy out of life unironically posts an article asking why life is so joyless...
Can't make this shit up!
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2026/jul/26/age-of-decadence-pleasure-ai
Quote:Why does everything feel so joyless? Welcome to the age of decadence without pleasure
Do you want to have a good time? You know, really enjoy yourself? Click here, and tell us your desires. Maybe it’s a new outfit, or some exotic cuisine delivered anonymously and steaming hot to your door. Maybe it’s porn or gambling. Perhaps you prefer the infinite scroll, the endlessly unfurling ribbon of glossy images and videos starring people you’ll never meet doing things you’ll never do. Or maybe you favor talking to a chatbot who will assure you that you are the most special of all its users.
(07-27-2026, 06:38 AM)Potato wrote: One again for those in the back, "In all of human history, we have never lived in more prosperous, peaceful, free and fruitful times and Millennials still aren't happy. Maybe the problem isn't the times we live in, but the people who live in it unhappily."
Time will tell, but there's always the possibility that 2011 (the year the CK video is from) was the year we reached "peak joy" and it's all downhill from there. Let's just take his example about flying. The experience has become quite a bit more miserable since then.
Add to that some of the worst wars in decades, heatwaves upon heatwaves, enshitification of tech, tech stagnating and becoming more expensive, algorithmic social media becoming the main source of entertainment, the sorry state of Hollywood, the end of "prestige television", the woke era and then the chud era, low Covid interest rates fucking up housing for a generation, the opioid epidemic, the gambling epidemic, broken political landscape, careers on the path of extinction, etc.
Things are still alright in the grand scheme of things, but I can't really blame pampered westerners for being depressed about the future.
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