LIVING A LIFE
OF CONSEQUENCES
from Murph
Recently, SATS referred back to a
posting he had written back in the day of Cyclon's blog. This was
back in 2007. My goodness, that was 7 years ago. To refresh memory
a bit, Cyclone's blog (the Real Deal) began in 2005 and Troutclan
campfire began in 2007, spun off from the Real Deal. I go back and
skim over the what was being written and discussed from 2005 to 2007
and notice that the disappointment and belligerence over the Bush
administrations actions were now transferred to the present Obama
administration. For all practical purposes, same bitches and
complaints. With all our rants and discussion, sure changed things
didn't it? LOL. Sure points out our collective influence in the
present situation, ie, none. However, venting in print serves a
purpose and perhaps disseminates information to some folks that would
otherwise not ever see it.
The same analysis can be said of other
blog sites that are no longer active. Mike Rupperts and Survival
Acres are two that come immediately to mind. For Freeacre and I,
Rupperts writing was very influential for us. So far, Ruppers
predictions and revelation have show themselves to be pretty much
right on, although the timing of some of the predictions was a bit
off. Freeacre and I took to heart what Ruppert wrote and took
action on that information. I shudder to think what would have been
the consequences to us if we had not done so. It has turned out, in
retrospect, to be the best decisions we could have made. So blogs do
serve a function, at least for some folks.
On a broader perspective, our personal
lives are always a matter of consequences for our decisions moment to
moment. The disturbing aspect for me is that so many people are
loath to recognize that this is how things work. We all have had
the experience of consequences (usually unanticipated) of our actions
and decisions. For most of us, the consequences are most of the
time, not a serious handicap, and a great deal of the time not
recognized until after the fact. It's those instances of negative
consequences on our lives that will stick out and encourage us to
think in terms of; “if only I had made a different decision”. In
a far more primitive living arrangement, that can be fatal. Only
in our advanced social systems are negative consequences often
ameliorated to non lethal events of inconsequential or recoverable
events. It disturbs me that so many folks I observe do not recognize
this relationship, having the expectation that their decisions will
have no serious negative consequences. I think most of us strive
to eliminate the negative consequences to our decisions. Some folks
are more successful than others. I would surmise that reduction of
individual consequences is one purpose of how societies organize
themselves. We might want to take a look at who benefits the most
from these policies.
The big social problems I see today is
that those folks with power and influence have, in the last number of
decades, managed to by-pass most of the consequences for their
actions. This is done by controlling the political and economic
processes that operate in our society. However, the consequences
from the thievery and manipulation will have consequences that appear
to me to be extremely serious. It is showing up in scarcity of
resources and adulteration of the environment, the deterioration of
infrastructure and general deterioration of living conditions for
most of society. In every society with a hierarchy of control, keep
in mind that it is the decision by the public on who to give this
control to that determines outcomes. In this country, we have been
voting into this power structure folks that do not have our well
being in mind and have been doing this from the beginning. The
primary concern is immediate benefit and supposedly advocating some
ideology that never serves our overall benefit. I think I have lost
all hope of most folks recognizing the deficiencies of this decision
making process.
I have written multiple times
concerning the consequences of social decisions and urged a return to
more individual responsibility for our actions. I'm an old duffer
with a serious cynical attitude and realization that what I have
advocated, spoken of and written about has not been taken seriously
by more than a handful of folks. I find that true for all of the
folks that have been warning us for years concerning the consequences
of of our decisions. And, maybe all the warnings put out there are
just more shit to deal with. But, we took seriously one particular
warning and benefited by that.
With all of the serious problems that
we are exposed to in this tired old world, we are continually
distracted by the emergency of the day and the lie of the day. I
suppose that has been true every since people have been organizing
themselves into societies and civilizations. That realization does
not make the present any more palatable to me and I also suppose that
is true for most of the folks that bother to read missives such as
this. I also realize that any suggestions I make as to what to do
about our present situation cannot possibly be taken seriously by
more than a few folks, just too much to lose. It is apparent that
the wealthy and powerful flat out don't care, they have a whole other
agenda in mind. In a practical sense, we are in a giant catch 22
situation. Damned if we do and damned if we don't.
The premier of the doomer sites has
finally signed off stating that we are all doomed anyway and any more
effort to warn folks of impending disaster for all of us is a waste
of effort. That was Survival Acres by the way. Only time will tell
if his assessment turns out to be right. Many other doomer sites
with not so quite an extreme vision just keep on insisting that
things are going to shit or worse. So for the most part, we take it
all in and continual to try and operate, bitching and hollering all
the while. We may very well be seeing the future with some
reasonable accuracy, but it's the timing thing that throws us off.
If it doesn't happen in the time frame laid out, does that mean it
won't happen? I suspect that for most folks, it's a matter of
expectations that we will just keep muddling through until it doesn't
work anymore.
Wherever we are going to, we will keep
on going till it stops.
