I weep for the future

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I have seasonal affective disorder, so no doubt my depression is making me think too negatively. That's a disclaimer before I begin.

I have been contemplating suicide lately and it has to do with sex, not my sex life but the sex life of my generation: the millennials is what they call us. People who have come of age around the year 2000. The norm for people my age seems to be serial monogamy, having kids in your early 20s, not getting married, having kids by somebody else, then moving on and having kids by somebody else. You might be married, you might not. The American family is already dead. What is going to happen when these kids come of age with no intact family? Who is going to teach family skills and relationship skills to these kids? How are these kids going to treat sex and relationships? Culture over the last couple of decades has become increasingly crude and "pornified", where casual sex, exploitation, and drug abuse are seen as okay. I don't want to live to be an old person and entrust my security to these kids. 30 is already the new 18. What about these kids who were raised by their grandparents? I don't know. I just see the U.S. culture going down the tubes, kind of like the movie idiocracy. Bad is good, and good is bad.

Damn, I'm too young to be thinking like this, but I was raised conservative and the older I get, the more I realize that conservative is right as far as social issues are concerned.

The same thing happened to Rome, they got increasingly depraved, and the army was filled with foreigners. Then the army turned on the empire, and toppled it. Then the barbarians came along and finished them off. Eventually, our world's modern barbarians (most likely Muslims) will succeed in toppling the American Empire, which will have become lazy and depraved and incapable of defending civilization. Then the barbarians will impose their version of civilization on America, the way the Christian Church banned any hint of Romanism once it got into power. Festivals became Masses, bathing was prohibited because Rome had used public bath houses as brothels, and so on.

American women will wear burqas and men will have to grow full beards and wear dishdashas (traditional Muslim male robes). Green flags will fly over our cities (what will be left of them), crosses will be replaced by crescents, and Americans will pray facing Mecca. Depressing, yes, but unavoidable. When? That's the million dollar question. Maybe it's time to simply abandon civilization and live in the woods. I plan on buying land and living alone, sustainably, far from the depravity. I saw a blog post from a rabbi who said that it's time for Jews to leave America and move to Israel, that America is no longer a friend of Jews and that Jews need to split before they're kicked out or killed. Sad indeed. America has forgotten why it was founded.

Would you please clarify your statement about the Christian Church banning any hint of Romanism once it got into power, and your statement about festivals becoming Masses? The last I checked, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass did not arise from any sort of festival.

Well, I'm thinking of the Lupercalia, where young men picked names of young women, and the woman would be a companion of the man for a year. Usually, these relationships involved sex. Also, the Romans had sexual initiation rites where sausages were used. When the Christians got into power, the Lupercalia was replaced with a solemn ceremony where teens would pick names of saints whose pious, virtuous lives were to be emulated. Sausage was banned, as was soap, and bathing entirely was eventually banned. Why? Because these things were "Roman", and associated with depravity. Also, the festival of Eostre, which marked the beginning of spring, was turned into a Mass celebrating the risen Christ. The festival of Invictus Solis Mithras, "Birthday of the Invincible Sun God Mithras", became Christ Mass, the celebration of the birth of Christ. Mithraism was the official Roman religion for a while. That's mainly what I'm thinking of, the Christian tendency to replace a holiday celebrated by Romans with a holy day Mass celebrating Christ. Also, the Holy Sacrament likely derives from the Elysium mystery cult.

Oftentimes cultures need to fail, in order for people to realize what's wrong with them. The culture of the U.S., as well as the cultures of most other places in the world, has never been ideal. In some ways the culture of the U.S. has gotten worse, but in other ways it's gotten better. I believe that the culture of the world as a whole has generally gotten better though. The U.S. is still a part of the world. If the U.S. can't fix its own culture, influence from outside cultures will slowly fix it. I believe that as long as nothing greatly damages or destroys the world, it is destined to eventually become a utopia, though it will probably be in the very distant future. By that time, I doubt the U.S. will still exist though.

So am I the only one who is disgusted by this?

For example, two pop singers:

Miley Cyrus thinks she's Wendy Williams. Why is she trying so hard to look like a slut? The Plasmatics were a performance art group. Miley Cyrus is just a poseur, but how many kids listen to her and think it is okay? I can't even watch BET anymore. It is the new minstrel show with gangster rap. It isn't even black-owned anymore. Then there is Lady Gaga, the song she did with R. Kelly. He's a freakin' pedophile! He only likes 12-14 year old girls and he's like in his 40's? You do not want to see the porn video he did. "You can do what you want with my body?" That's a horrible message to send to young girls! Isn't she bulimic and a marijuana addict? Then there's Rihanna. She's a self-mutilator and let Chris Brown beat up on her. Nicky Minaj. All the pop stars are sick in some way. Anybody see Britney Spears' new video? Isn't she a mom? and she is singing that? I don't care what anybody says. This is not feminism. It is not in a young woman's best interest to approach sex the way guys traditionally approach sex. They end up raising baby's alone. The loser sperm donor is long gone and he refuses to get a job because he doesn't want to pay child support. Women are more susceptible to STD's than guys.

Even country music isn't country anymore. They are trying to be like rappers with their videos or rock stars.

The pop culture is just a reflection of how narcissistic, exploitative, and self-indulgent American culture has become. I know regular adults can probably see through that crap but kids can't. Who looks out for the kids? In the past, there seemed to be some kind of family values, something family friendly on TV. Nothing seems to be family friendly or kid friendly anymore unless it is on Nickelodean.

Sorry. I am not suicidal anymore. I am just ranting. It seems like every U.S. generation born after World War II gets worse. It is scary! Is life in the UK, Canada, or New Zealand better? I'm thinking about emigrating. New Zealand sounds like a great place to live.

Maybe this will hearten you a little.

Miley Cyrus: What women her age think of her

Long story short, they are not that impressed. I think the whole Miley thing is just a marketing gimick. Same with the blurred lines video. You Tube views count toward the official pop charts now and if you can make a controversial video that alot of people will watch it doesn't matter if you make good songs or not you will chart highly.

I read the news alot and social injustices make me feel depressed. I read the news on my phone before I go to sleep and think, "why did I do that? Why depress myself before bed?" People are really struggling to make ends meet, but those with money don't seem to understand and they think that people who need food hand outs are just lazy even if they are spending every day looking for work.

I remember reading about farm labourers looking for work in Vicotrian times in history lessons at school and being shocked by the harsh attititude the wealthy had towards them, but I feel like society has come full circle and people who are struggling are just not being heard.

Life is difficult. Try and find some positive things to focus on. That's why I like cat memes.

Look at the bright side. A lot of things have gotten better.

1. The Cold War is over. Cooperation between many countries has improved a lot.

2. Despite that the U.S. still has conflicts with other countries, it isn't really at war with any of them, just terrorist organizations. If it does go to war with another country, it will probably be relatively minor and short-lived.

3. Racism in the U.S. is declining. We even have an interracial president.

4. Work conditions in a lot of American industries have improved. There isn't as much of a risk of losing a limb on the job anymore.

5. In many countries, the standard of living has greatly improved and poverty isn't as much of a problem.

6. The internet has brought the world much closer together. It provides access to most of the world's knowledge and perspective.

7. Technology has greatly improved and continues to improve. It is more capable of solving the world's problems and the problems of individuals, as well as providing greater entertainment and making life easier.

8. Autistics aren't being misdiagnosed with Schizophrenia and other disorders as often. Accommodations for autistics have improved.

The age people are expected to have kids is determined by their culture and social class. In the social class I come from, teen pregnancy and single motherhood are fairly common. If it's not teen pregnancy, it's often the case that they have kids in their early 20s, as all my school friends I have on Facebook are now mothers. I have school friends who come from the same social class but a different culture and they've all got married but still they nearly all have kids because it's expected of them in their early 20s to do that (that's a conservative way of doing things, early marriage and early motherhood, and the culture they come from is a conservative one.)

In the social class I'm moving into (fairly poor but educated) having kids outside of your 30s is uncommon. That's because we don't have the money for kids, but we have enough sense to realise that we don't have the money for kids. The social class I am now in is an expanding one and the birthrate for my generation is lower than for previous generations.

As for 'pornification', I sort of agree with you, even though I'm quite sexually liberal myself. I do think the emotional aspects of relationships are ignored by society in favour of focusing on the sex. I think people are being hurt by the way society ignores emotions wrt. sex. I wouldn't tell anyone how to behave sexually and I do think people can have lots of partners whilst still looking after their emotional needs, but I think the way sex and emotions are separated is bad. I think it's done to serve an agenda, tbh. The 'sex sells' consumerist agenda, specifically. The people in power (the ones who make money off us) dehumanise the act of sex in order to make money off it, just like they dehumanise us in order to make money off us.

This affects people's ability to form families as well because they're not emotionally mature enough to do it successfully. It's not due to a decline in morals or a lack of conservatism, but due to the fact that capitalism dehumanises people and keeps them emotionally immature because emotionally immature people buy more useless stuff and make 'better' consumers.

This is just my opinion and feel free to think it's BS.

The difference between Wendy Williams and Miley Cyrus is that Wendy Williams was nearly naked as a way of saying 'f**k you' and of terrifying those in power. Miley Cyrus gets nearly naked in order to please those in power and earn money from it.

This is why I won't do burlesque, because it has a power-pleasing quality to it and it has no aggression. You don't fight the power by saying, 'look at me, I'm sexy, look at my sexy body, look at me!' which is what Miley is doing. It's more challenging to go 'look at my body, does it make you uncomfortable? Good,' which is what Wendy was doing. I thought about doing nude performance art once that was deliberately aggressive and nothing like burlesque because I wanted to show people what genuinely subversive nudity and sexuality looks like. I haven't got round to doing it because I'm lazy.

I mean if people want to do burlesque because they enjoy it, then fair enough - but they're not being remotely subversive or challenging with it like some people claim they are. Same with Miley, she should stop claiming it's subversive for her to do what she does - but not only that, she is much more power-pleasing and in cahoots with power than some woman who likes twirling nipple tassels around on stage for kicks. That's why her claiming to get naked for feminism is much more absurd.

I realise the woman in my avatar got naked a lot, but I'll claim that she's more like Wendy Williams than Miley Cyrus because she scared people when doing it (she made money off it too, though it was subversive at the time what she did.)

The problem with female nudity as art comes down to this: does it support the power structure I mentioned earlier (the one that dehumanises people and makes them emotionally immature) or does it subvert it? Or at least it doesn't support power structures? I'm no saying every time a woman gets naked, it has to be a political statement - lots of women take their clothes off because they enjoy it. Just that when it's framed as a political statement (like Miley does in her own words) then you have to analyse what that statement actually is.

Last edited by puddingmouse on 01 Jan 2014, 1:21 pm, edited 1 time in total.

This is a very intereting point and I think I agree with it.

I can get choked up if I see a small animal dead on the side of the road. They had no choice in the changes that happen to their world... the roads, the cars...

People are more aware and intelligent and can make a difference. If you don't like it, then you must fight it. I'm not saying you will win, but you can stand for what you believe.

It sounds like you too, need to get laid. Preferably by someone better looking ...

I used to be in the same pit, and you're right about our culture, but then I got laid again, and again, and again, again, again ... and then I didn't focus so much on the sex lives of other people.

It's not the answer to everything, but trust me, sex will cure most of those seasonal blues, especially if it's with someone you love and trust.

We're all in need of a little love in the flesh on occasion ... because like it or not, we are hard wired to be very, very bad. Then we can be good to others and not judge them for being so "bad."

What exactly is bad about wanting sex?

I think he was criticising people being too reckless are regards having kids in the OP...and later on he talked about crap in the media. He didn't say it was bad to have a sex drive.

"Contemplating suicide" because others are bad is not about "others." It's all about you.

Oh, he could probably do with having sex.

I guess it might cure depression in guys buy it doesn't in me even if it's enjoyable. I sometimes get more depressed when I'm sexually active.

But he still didn't suggest that he thinks sex per se is bad.