Author Archives: John Lusk

Humans can’t think systemically

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Saw two articles back-to-back today.

  1. We’re apparently getting ready to roll back vaccinations.
  2. Globalization has given people more jobs than they’ve lost, but the “working class” still hates it. (https://www.vox.com/politics/391059/democrats-working-class-voters-nafta-free-trade)

People’s kids will start to experience more and more outbreaks of measles, mumps, and polio, but it will always be somebody else’s kid until it’s not (at which point, gosh, it’s too late).

People will lose jobs but not connect that to retreating from global markets, and not understand why.

I think the issue is that most humans are simply incapable of thinking systemically (or abstractly) until slapped in the face with some need. Even the need to defeat fascism in Europe 80+ years ago was kind of a close call, until Pearl Harbor.

As long as bad things aren’t happening to our little group, we don’t care.

Always afraid, never a coward

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«Brynn stood back up straight and walked right toward our destination.

“Always afraid, never a coward,” I mumbled to myself. My blood started racing. I stood up, tightened all the straps on my pack, and followed.»

This needs to be my motto.

“The Lamb Will Slaughter the Lion” by Margaret Killjoy.

Republicans complete yet another post-election power grab in a state

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Well, that’s just horseshit.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/11/politics/north-carolina-legislature-overrides-veto/index.html

«Under the bill, the incoming Democratic governor, Josh Stein, would be stripped of appointments to key state boards and control of the State Board of Elections will be transferred to the state auditor, a Republican. The legislation also shifts power away from the incoming lieutenant governor, attorney general and superintendent of public instruction, all Democrats.

The bill was introduced after last month’s elections, when Democrats broke the GOP’s legislative supermajority. Republicans will lose their ability to override gubernatorial vetoes after the new legislature is seated in January.»

Supposedly, for Hurricane Helene relief. 135 pages, of which 12 were devoted to moving money from one account to another, and the rest devoted to transferring power from Democrats to Republicans.

The new Bonhoeffer movie isn’t just bad. It’s dangerous. | The Christian Century

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«Bethge is shocked at the idea of committing murder and tries to talk Bonhoeffer out of it. He reminds Bonhoeffer that he once said Christians must defeat their enemies with the power of love. “That was before Hitler,” Bonhoeffer glowers. Bethge, despondent, asks, “Will God forgive us if we do this?” Bonhoeffer shouts him down: “Will he forgive us if we don’t?!”

The line gets Bonhoeffer’s thinking about the conspiracy exactly backwards. He was tortured by his decision to violate God’s clear and inviolable commandment not to kill. Everyone, without exception, is beloved of God, and killing is, in every situation, wrong. At the same time, it would be wrong to sit idly by as millions were murdered. No matter what he chose, whether he joined the conspiracy or not, he would be guilty. He had to act, he wrote, “in the sphere of relativity, completely shrouded in the twilight that the historical situation casts upon good and evil.” He joined the plot, but he refused to see his decision as morally justifiable. “Here the law is being broken, violated,” he deplored. It might be true that “the commandment is broken out of dire necessity,” but to say he broke the commandment of necessity is still to say he broke the commandment. Rather than pretend this was some positive moral good, Bonhoeffer instead threw himself at God’s feet and begged forgiveness for the sin he could not but commit. The movie has none of this squishy moral agony.»

https://www.christiancentury.org/features/new-bonhoeffer-movie-isn-t-just-bad-it-s-dangerous