Saved by Keely Adler
How to Do Escapism in the Trump Era
Political pessimism keeps people trapped in a search for purely personal and individual solutions.
Johann Hari • Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention--and How to Think Deeply Again
This disconnect between culturally mandated politics and the actual demonstrated preferences of most Americans has created an enormous reserve of unmet needs—and a generational opportunity. Build new things! Create great art! Understand and accept that sensory information is the brain’s food, and that Silicon Valley is systematically starving us of... See more
There are many aspects of life that pull us in opposing directions. We need to be pessimistic enough to prepare for bad outcomes but optimistic enough to undertake new projects. We need to see people both as enmeshed in systems that push them around and as free agents shaping their own lives. It’s vital to be skeptical and ask questions, but also t
... See moreJoshua Rothman • Why Are We Tormented by the Future? | The New Yorker
Is this catharsis? Possibly more like indulgence, and creation of a sense of comparative safety. A kind of late-capitalist, advanced-nation schadenfreude about those unfortunate fictional citizens whose lives have been trashed by our own political inaction. If this is right, dystopia is part of our all-encompassing hopelessness.
Kim Stanley Robinson • Dystopias Now | Commune
Americans are good at responding to a crisis and then going home to let another crisis brew both because we imagine that the finality of death can be achieved in life—it’s called happily ever after in personal life, saved in politics and religion—and because we tend to think of political engagement as something for emergencies rather than, as peopl
... See moreRebecca Solnit • Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities
I worry about the withdrawal from public space and public life. Democracy was always a bodily experience, claimed and fought for and celebrated in actual places. You must be present to win.