Almost finished today's piece, but I don't like it. I've been highlighting the abject failure of our institutions in a few recent articles: one on our uneven history of advocacy for human rights, one on the carelessness of media treating news of Saudi Arabia's oil plans as shocking, one on COP28's initial messes (this is the follow-up), and of course one on the inefficacy of the UN.
But I don't just want to repeat that all our institutions have failed, so I'm working on the proactive part now.
@MLClark It's frustrating to see our institutions fail, but the long game is, that the failure will reach a form of pressure that leads to a reform of the institution.
Entropy is a universal law. There is no perfect in this universe, for nothing remains static. Times change faster than governments and institutions do, and so occasionally, there has to be a fall, and a winter so a new spring can come.
@NiveusLepus @MLClark There are, however, strategies for accommodating the presence of entropy that do not involve doing nothing about it until something collapses, then trying to build from scratch on ashes.
We could, for instance, adopt forms of cooperative governance with shared power, with less corruption.
We could assume a stance of refining and changing methods as new information becomes available, and not thinking of each decision as final.
I could go on.
; )
The devil is in the details. ^_^ You are right that there doesn't have to be a crisis and collapse. Great movements seem to come out of nowhere, zeitgeists seize generations.
But I also consider that the Civil Rights movement of the 60s was born out of the Harlem Renaissance and the experience of Black Soldiers returning from France in WW1, as well as building off of elements of the Abolitionist and Freedmen movements of the 1800s.
It's all connected.
@NiveusLepus @MLClark But to the rest of your point, change is inevitable, and if we embrace that, we can steer towards changes that lift us all up and bring us all forward.
We don't have to do things the way we've always done, and if we pick a new way that doesn't work, we can change that also!
🖤
If one does what they've always done, one will get what they have always gotten.
Change takes the work of recognition of pattern, and the will to change that pattern.
Habit energy is strong, but the heart is stronger no matter what conditions surround it.
@NiveusLepus @MLClark I hope you're correct. I think we're going to have to place our chips on that bet.
@AskTheDevil @MLClark It is the only bet for change.
Proceeding in the same patterns ensures the same results even if it seems different on the surface. Hatred creates hatred, suffering creates suffering
It's not so metaphysical as it sounds. What we practice, we become, if we have a habit of hatred, anger, or greed, then our hearts will angle towards these conditions, and we and those around us reap the ills of all those choices
Institutions are the crystallization of the habits of a people
@MLClark The UN is a great example. It's true they were created with the idea of ensuring world wars wouldn't happen, and to provide a way for nations to redress grievances and work together, but it was also created with the idea of preserving the power of the victors of ww2.
The security council has acted like an anchor around the neck of the GA, and as that power dynamic has changed, it has reduced the efficacy of the entire organization.