Category Archives: First World Problems

There’s something screwy going on in the K-pop community.

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The Hindustan Times reported a story which alleged that a few K-pop idols are receiving backlash for enjoying a “dark anime” with “pedophilic content”. The anime in question is Made In Abyss, an adventure anime wherein a girl and a robotic boy explore a gigantic chasm, navigating its dangerous ecosystems in a quest to reach its bottom.

The Hindustan Times can be blamed for burying the lede, as the real story that led to the controversy would be the cancel culture of the K-pop community, and it turns out that much of its community is pretty toxic.

One might imagine that a collective appreciation for K-pop would bring the K-pop community together, but what we instead see is a toxicity among fans who divide themselves into factions based on their preferences for K-pop artists.

Personally, I’m glad that it’s the K-pop brand of tribalist bullshit that’s keeping these clowns occupied, because if they got into either sports or religion, they’d probably cause some riots.

The K-pop tribalism is so toxic that some fans will actually dig into the social media activity of the other tribe’s K-pop artist of choice to find anything that can be held against them. Pretty much cancel culture per se.

It so happens that this time, the K-pop artists under scrutiny are Soobin, Woozi, and Taeyong for liking Made In Abyss, an exquisite anime with developed characters, excellent worldbuilding, a heavily-favored soundtrack, and a tone that indicates that it takes its viewers seriously. The problem is, the anime is sometimes accused of promoting pedophilia by people who aren’t mature enough for the anime.

It’s disturbing enough that the toxicity of the K-pop community has reached the point that fans are willing to drag K-pop idols enjoyed by another K-pop faction down by making them out to be pariahs, it’s even worse when they are willing to drag down anime communities that weren’t even involved to begin with, and don’t deserve the negative attention that they might end up getting.

Being one who enjoys Pokémon, I can point out that, while there has been some amount of toxicity in the community, much of it came from bad actors who were quickly recognized, and the Pokémon community has mostly resisted dividing up into factions. If you can avoid certain bad influencers, you’ll generally have no problem avoiding drama in the Pokémon community.

That being my point of reference, from my perspective, the state of the K-pop community is surprising and horrifying. I didn’t have much interest in K-pop to begin with, but with the pervasiveness of toxicity and cancel culture within its community, I have no problem keeping my distance.

I suppose some might expect that I’d defend Made In Abyss from accusations that it somehow promotes pedophilia. The fact is, I really don’t have to. For one thing, I’ll refer to this flowchart that I like sharing:

One of the things I like about the Made In Abyss community is that when someone attempts to describe it to someone who hasn’t seen it, they might bring up some of its more extreme elements in an effort to warn someone that they’re there. But in doing so, they might make it sound like some hyper-edgelord anime that it’s actually not. While it’s true that there are some disturbing scenes, they don’t make up the majority of the anime’s runtime, but instead serves to make the point that there is a connotation of danger for the protagonists.

While it’s true that there are brief instances of nudity, no sex acts were committed, and the scenes played out naturally. Anyone who holds these brief scenes against the whole of the anime are failing to evaluate it from a position of honest criticism. One may even get the idea that they haven’t actually watched it.

But in any case, Made In Abyss was made for grownups, and it’s obvious that much of the K-pop community is way too young to watch anime like Made In Abyss.

And what’s more, when someone can be rightly described as smug and closed-minded, I don’t really mind that they don’t enjoy the same things that I do. As I’d have it, I’d prefer that such people were not in my own community.

Finally, it can be pointed out that we live in a world where trafficking of actual, living human children is a real problem. When someone throws themselves into a tizzy because a fictional character, a literal piece of merchandise, may be doing something sexual, they are expressing some misplaced priorities.

This McDonald’s Commercial From Japan Just Made Everyone Cry

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I’ll say first that I don’t recommend eating McDonald’s, seeing as it’s one of the worst things that you can put in you which is still legally classified as food.

That aside, what’s the cruelest thing that you can show a people who are suffering from a declining birth rate? Feast your eyes:

That’s right, you show them just what they’re being fucked out of. And to make it even worse, you show one of the most idyllic moments, in warm colors.

Now you’ve got something to think about as you go to pick up some McDonald’s on the way home. Take your time, because there’s probably nobody waiting for you there, anyway.

Is Starbucks Ditching Pride Decor?

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Pride month isn’t halfway over yet, and we’re getting news of yet another corporation that’s ending the rainbow-colored festivities early, if Starbucks Workers United is to be believed.

Yes, Starbucks. As in, the company that’s in a race with Dunkin to make the most overpriced sugary coffee that adds something like 300 calories to your to your daily tally.

Apparently, Starbucks locations, particularly unionized stores, are taking down pride decorations in an apparent effort to avoid controversy. As you could probably imagine, the professional victims are not taking it well.

Now, if this turns out to be the case, one might imagine that I’d be up for rewarding them with a few purchases for making the decision to ditch cynical activism and pivoting to profit. But Starbucks still comes off as hella shady.

The fact is, coffee is one of the least expensive beverages that one can make from home. So, why spend a few bucks on a cup from Starbucks?

What’s more, Starbucks is typically in a Target store. And even putting aside Target’s current controversy, shitty public image, and that they overcharge for low-quality merchandise, the fact is, a caffeine high makes a person prone to spending more money. When you know that, you see putting a Starbucks in the front of a Target as shady AF.

For a long while, it seemed like corporate entities were powerless to resist the power brokers of the banking cartels which have been pushing ESG and DEI in an effort to force behaviors. But as the Bud Light effect and the Target effect have proven, the consumers actually do have power. And if the people decide that they’re sick of the bullshit, they’ll just take their money elsewhere, and a higher ESG score won’t be enough to keep mega-corporations afloat.

Before we get too carried away, Starbucks corporate have denied banning pride decorations:

In a statement, a spokesperson for Starbucks told Newsweek that “We unwaveringly support the LGBTQIA2+ community. There has been no change to any policy on this matter and we continue to encourage our store leaders to celebrate with their communities including for U.S. Pride month in June.

“We’re deeply concerned by false information that is being spread especially as it relates to our inclusive store environments, our company culture, and the benefits we offer our partners. Starbucks has a history that includes more than four decades of recognizing and celebrating our diverse partners and customers – including year-round support for the LGBTQIA2+ community,” the statement said.

Wow, that alphabet slop acronym gets longer and more jumbled as a function of time. It’s almost looking like a password that would make the NSA proud!

I suppose we’ll find out with time just how much sway the union has over the Starbucks brand, or whether we’ve been fed misinformation (that falsehoods come from the professionally offended must be taken into account). If true, then we might instead find out just how much sway Starbucks corporate has over unionized stores. The nature of the relationship between Starbucks corporate and unions I profess I don’t understand.

One bit of advice that I can give to Starbucks (as though they’ll listen) is to not pick any unnecessary fights, and play it safe by getting out of culture war battles, and staying out. Especially if joining would mean siding with fringe groups at the expense of the majority.

After all, straight people drink coffee, too.

Target Hiding LGBT+ Outfits Out Of Fear Of Backlash

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Legacy media doesn’t want you to know that the boycott of Bud Light is having a drastic impact on the brand. This is because they don’t want you to know that you have the power to make a difference, and that you can influence culture.

It would seem the ripple effect of the boycott is extending well outside of Anheuser Busch, as Target is now taking measures to hide pride-themed merchandise in fear of backlash. This news comes after conservative commentator Matt Walsh called for a boycott of Target in consideration of their “tuck friendly” swimwear, and other merchandise targeting cross-dressers.

It would appear as though Anheuser Busch has proven to be quite the head-on-a-stick.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t think the threat of a boycott against Target would get much of anywhere. Personally, I seldom set foot inside of Target. There isn’t much to Target besides a pseudo-vaporwave vibe, and the opportunity to pay way too much for low-quality merchandise. Pride-themed merchandise isn’t really much of anything new for Target, but it’s still strange how in-your-face they are with their endorsement of the various flavors of sexual deviancy, considering that such merchandise would only appeal to less than 2% of the population.

I don’t claim to understand the logistics behind appealing to just a few on the fringe for the sake of an ESG score while running the risk of alienating nearly everyone else. But then again, I’m in a business that actually produces value, rather than grifts by manipulating the value produced by other people.

It’s mainly stores in the southern states where Target is hiding its pride-themed merchandise, so if you live in the north and still see pride-merch, that goes to show how little Target thinks of your values. Think that assessment is too harsh? You probably didn’t know that Target hired a Satanist clothing designer to design their pro-LGBT clothing line.

What Anheuser Busch should have known is what Target may end up learning the hard way: Most people don’t like when their sexuality is questioned. Therefore, if your brand can cause someone’s sexuality to be questioned, then people will be more likely to avoid your brand. Currently, men don’t want to be seen drinking or even purchasing Bud Light. It’s gotten to the point that the mere thought of drinking Bud Light disgusts them. In the same way, if people were to start viewing Target as a “gay store”, that would be a disaster for Target.

Sure, the cheap seats might view such thinking as “bigoted” and “close-minded”. But the fact of the matter is, sexuality plays a significant factor in people’s thinking. And that thinking is going to continue to play a role in the backlash phase of the woke ideology, before the woke ideology takes its rightful place in the dumpster of bad ideologies that have been tested and failed.

Wokeness May Be Destroying the Global Economy, But Economic Hardship May Destroy Wokeness

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The insolvency of Silicon Valley Bank has resulted in a run on the banks, which has resulted in more insolvent banks. The Red Pill community has pointed to SVB’s prioritization of DEI initiatives as being a significant factor in the bank’s collapse, and note with a sense of irony that wokeness may have knocked over the first dominoes that may result in a collapse of the global economy.

Of course, it’s also pointed out that SVB may have been targeted by Uncle Sam for having been friendlier to the crypto market. That sounds kinda conspiracy-theoryish, but if that’s the case, I’d say that that effort backfired, considering that Bitcoin shot way, way up in response to the SVB collapse.

More banks have since collapsed due to bank runs, and I’m seeing the more Red Pill types celebrating the accelerated collapse of the woke movement. While I can get behind that, it’s a little disturbing that there are people who seem to be cheering on the destruction of the global economy. It’s enough for me for the institutions to come to the realization that the woke movement is of no benefit for them to get behind. But considering how much harder it would be for everyone if the global economy were to collapse, I wonder what benefit it would be to anyone if things came to that.

Perhaps there would be some benefit, if only to slap more people awake to the true nature of the woke movement, and if people as a whole were to ditch the crutch of the victim mentality in favor of living on one’s merits. Which they may end up doing out of necessity, if things get difficult.

My foresight is not great. If I had better foresight, I would have understood the true nature of the global economy before majoring in Electronics. Live and learn, and all that.

But still, I can see what would come about if economic difficulty were to necessitate meritocratic living. It would mean that ideas such as wokeness would be viewed in terms of its virtues, which wouldn’t be much outside of its ability to manipulate algorithms. Even now, entertainment companies are slowly coming to the realization that woke messaging negatively impacts the quality of their products, which is part of the reason why viewers are starting to turn against subscription-based streaming services. And now, we’re seeing banks collapse after investing in numerous DEI startups.

While the pendulum is already shifting against wokeness, economic uncertainty would further push the general public into meritocracy as they seek out a way of life that actually, you know, pays the bills. Projecting victimhood seldom does as much, and is becoming increasingly evident as being the sport of the interpersonally manipulative.

When matters are difficult, people turn to merit to get by. It’s when motivated by survival that people look at themselves and other people in terms of what they have to offer. That’s the most practical course in challenging times. Because men tend to have greater upper-body strength than women, and the physiology that lends them more towards physically-involved labor, men tend more towards more dangerous jobs that usually pay better than clerical jobs. This means women would tend towards management of resources and maintaining relationships, in part because their relative lack of physical endurance would mean that this would be the safer option for them, but also because women tend to have minds that are better suited to such things. While feminists wouldn’t like it, more women would return to the trad wife life, even if only out of necessity and in consideration of what they’d have to offer in consideration of their innate attributes.

Considering this, what the woke movement shouldn’t want is challenging times, as woke pet causes tend to thrive more in the prosperous conditions that allow for the luxury of societal experimentation, erroneous philosophies, and the inflexibility of thinking that would result from the rigidness that is characteristic of the woke cult.

Yet, challenging times is just what one can expect, considering that it is the natural consequence of experimenting with ideologies such as wokeness.

Looks Like the Makers of Funko Pops Are Throwing These Things Out, Too.

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Did Nietzsche ever find a way to stop the abyss from staring back?

If you’ve walked into a Gamestop in the last decade, odds are, you’ve seen Funko Pops. They’re not hard to find. Just as you walk into the store, a quick glance to the right, and you might see a wall lined with tiny, expressionless eyes glaring back at you like the tiny abysses that they are. For a brief moment, you wonder whether anyone actually buys the things, before continuing into what has basically morphed from a software store into a toy store for grownups.

As it turns out, not a whole lot of people are buying them. That’s the impression that one gets when one finds out that the company that makes these are throwing out $30 million worth of them, because that would be a better financial move than having them take up space in their inventory.

According to Kotaku, inventory for Funko Pops has totaled up to $246.4 million, up 48% compared to the year before. So it seems like Gamestop isn’t the only place where these things are just piling up.

And now, Funko Pops will make little vinyl heaps in landfills, presumably alongside other toys that nobody wanted to play with.

I’m not really doing much to hide my disdain for these little things. What exactly is the appeal? Is there some kind of ironic, meme appeal behind taking pop culture media icons and shrinking them down, shaping their features to fit a template, sucking every last ounce of personality from them, and leaving them with tiny, expressionless eyes?

Wow.

Or could it be that I’ve discovered Nendoroids first, which actually attempt an illusion of depth in their painted-on eyes?

Far superior.

You see that? Effort! Actual effort!

Or, if you prefer that your weeaboo loot be on the softer side, there’s Fumos:

You might not find stuff like this in Gamestop, but that doesn’t mean that Funko Pops don’t get competition. For one thing, Funko Pops line the walls at Gamestop, which are otherwise packed with things that anyone would rather play with. Also, you can shop online, where you can easily find the likes of Nendoroids and Fumos. Sure, they can get pricey. But they also don’t suck.

Or, if you’d rather have these things staring into your soul…

…just take a roadtrop to whatever landfill these are being piled up in. And bring a shovel. They’ll be free.

Sawyer Hackett Does Not Get the Homelessness Crisis.

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The left seems to have no problem with throwing money at problems, as long as the money is not their own. And they’ll happily do so, with little respect for the underlying causes of those problems.

Here’s yet another precious moment:

There’s a reason why the left tends to swing more for younger voters, and that’s because they don’t think younger voters have the insight needed to recognize the left’s platitudes as being as naive and vacuous as they are.

Oftentimes, you’ll hear one of them say that there are N number of homeless people and M number of houses (where N < M), and therefore solving the homelessness problem is as easy as putting one in the other. This sounds appealing if you don’t understand the nuances of the matter, which might be the ignorance that they are banking on.

The fact is, people who are homeless are usually homeless for some compelling reasons, and unless the underlying reasons for their homelessness are solved, the act of scooping them up from off the streets and dropping them off in a vacant home will probably only solve their problem for about a week.

For one thing, people become homeless because they struggle with drug addiction. That’s being generous, of course, as in many cases, it’s not so much a struggle as it is a full-on embrace, to the point that a person deems them more important than anything else, including having a roof over their head.

And that makes it more interesting that California is actually providing homeless drug addicts with the free drugs that they’d need to continue their addictions.

Another problem has to do with mental health. Some people have a difficult time holding down a home by reason of mental illness. While these people could be institutionalized and therefore treated, mental clinicians in the western world are largely dependent on voluntary committals. This is made unlikely in cases where one’s paranoid delusions result in them distrusting the professionals who could otherwise help them.

How does one go about solving this problem? I don’t know, but it’s one major underlying problem behind the homelessness crisis.

Perhaps it’s the case that Democratic strategist Sawyer Hackett is truly unaware of the nuances behind the homelessness problem. But it’s hard to dismiss the possibility that he’s aware that the problem is more difficult to solve than just dropping homeless people into empty houses, and he’s counting on you not having the insight to question him about it.

In either case, it’s not a good look.

Western Comics Getting Gutted By Manga and Webtoons

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I grew up with the likes of Batman, so it kinda saddens me to see how things are going for the Dark Knight, and his compatriots in western comic books. But at the same time, I don’t want to see Batman succeed for the wrong reasons. And with DC and Marvel comics having become full-on woke rags, it’s pretty much necessary for those comic companies to tumble, if it means that they’ll learn a few things as it happens.

If you’ve been following along, you already know that manga has been killing the hell out of western comics. As I’ve already covered, manga sales in the year 2020 were three times that of DC and Marvel sales combined. As pointed out by Deb Aoki on Twitter, EuropeComics has posted a graph which visualizes just how much hell is being killed out of western comics:

To further highlight the mayhem:

The first four publishers on that list are manga publishers, and each one of them outsells both Marvel and DC combined, with Marvel and DC placing numbers 7 and 8 behind Korean webtoon publishers.

It looks like no one is buying western comic books anymore, and I wonder why?

Oh yeah, that’s right. It’s because Marvel and DC have gone full-on woke, with DC having started a yearly publication starring characters whose sexual preferences are the most front-facing aspects of their personalities.

Did DC really publish this with the expectation that anyone reading it would feel like they’re being taken seriously?

Now, I get it. Your boomer parents and grandparents grew up with Hanna Barbara bullshit like Hong Kong Phooey, and would therefore feel threatened by anything from across the ocean that might challenge them, which has a lot to do with why they’re among the few left who are currently providing Marvel and DC as much support as they have. I also get that they grew up in an age where it was rare for cartoons to be made for anyone besides children. Even so, the idea that children don’t deserve better products just because they’re children is just an excuse to produce inferior products, which in turn conditions children into becoming adults willing to settle for mediocrity.

Seriously.

I read manga because manga takes me seriously enough to present me with entertainment without beating me over the head with the blunt end of whatever misguided moral that the publisher wanted to push, as though they couldn’t trust me to think for myself.

If the story is about a golden-haired dude battling it out with a galactic tyrant on an exploding planet, the comic doesn’t need to do anything to further justify itself. If some cook is facing off against his dad because of some deep-seated grudge, we don’t need a PSA telling us not to pick on people who like buttsecks. If some deranged scientist performs horrific vivisections just to enhance his capacity to explore come caverns, he’s plainly the bad guy, it’s not necessary to make him a Nazi, as well.

If western comic book heroes are to succeed again at some point in the future, they’re going to have to go back to being, you know, heroes. It’s going to take a whole lot of swallowing to down all the pride needed for Batman and the Avengers to come back up from where they currently are.

But in the time it takes for them to do it, I’ve got plenty of other things to read.

Feminist Turns Tables on Men, and Men Loved It

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The following cartoon was brought to us by Twitter user Fight the Patriarchy. The feminist apparently got the idea that she could take the language that men direct towards women, which feminists find annoying, and turn matters around by showing a cartoon with women directing similar compliments towards men:

  • Heard it,
  • Heard it, except just towards me,
  • Heard a variant thereof,
  • Heartwarming, but still makes me glad I’m no longer a cashier.

Sorry, I got distracted with some fond memories.

The above comic was posted to social media with the idea that it would pwn teh pAtRiArChY, but something different happened. The idea of being complimented like that was something that men loved.

And really, who wouldn’t?

It would seem as though the answer to that question would be feminists, whose distrust of other people is so extreme that they assume a subtle sexual proposition in mere small talk.

Even if such a proposition were present, where’s the controversy? Just like men, women have the capacity to express disinterest at any point in any interaction, and to do so is a trivial social inconvenience.

When one person complains about an experience as a person of one gender, it seems to be the tendency of people to assume that there must always be an equivalent experience for the other gender.

But that’s not always the case, because men and women are different. Many of those differences are obvious, such as the fact that women can get pregnant, and when that happens, they spend nine months giving of their energy and nutrients to help develop the life that’s growing inside them. This being the case, women have a tendency to proceed with more caution in the courtship process, considering that the outcome would be a significant investment of their time and energy.

Though, from what I’ve seen, women have a tendency to take initiative. But I understand that not everyone has had the same experiences as me.

Men and women are different. And those differences should be understood and embraced as beneficial for society, rather than a reason to complain about oppression and play the victim, as the tendency of certain people is.

But even with those differences, I think society would be better still if a certain subculture, feminists specifically, were to learn a few things about taking compliments without assuming ulterior motives. But considering that the typical feminist is characterized by a distrust of those they perceive to be in the outgroup, they’re well set up to surpass expectations.

An Image To Describe 2022

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Fine then, I’ll do what I’ve been doing, year after year, near the end of the year. I’ll post an image that I feel describes the year pretty well.

Like the last three years, I’m just going to be lazy and share something that I found by using the internet, without bothering to shop it:

A theory that has gained popularity in recent times is the Strauss-Howe generational theory, which suggests that major conflicts occur in cycles of 80 years. When applied to the USA, one can point out that roughly 78 years separates the Revolutionary War from the Civil War, and roughly 76 years separates the Civil War from America’s involvement in World War 2. It’s been roughly 77 years since the conclusion of World War 2, so proponents of the Strauss-Howe generational theory are buzzing with the possibility that we are heading towards another major conflict.

Of course, the idea that major conflicts occur because they abide by a schedule is silly. Therefore, there must be something different to which we can attribute this apparent pattern (of course, the similarity in difference in time between these events could be mere coincidence). One possibility is that the difference in time (about 80 years) is the time it takes for most of the members of a generation old enough to remember a conflict to pass away. And without the benefit of the memory of a major conflict, younger generations won’t appreciate the urgency of preventing a similar conflict from repeating itself.

While the generation that fought in World War 2 is held in high regard, the sad fact is, most of the lessons that the western world learned in its light has been forgotten. It’s generally agreed upon that the Nazi Party was bad, but in a cynically unconstructive manner, many of today’s politically involved try as hard as they can to paint their rivals with Hitler’s virtues. In distorting what the dictator was really about, they play a huge part in unlearning the lessons of the war. There is a certain irony in that, mere decades after the Socialism of Hitler’s National Socialist German Worker’s Party (Nazi Party, for short) was overcome, that countless pseudo-intellectuals tout the benefits of Socialism in coffee shops and college campuses, mainly because they don’t want to work. What’s more, while the same pseudo-intellectuals decry racism, they’re overlooking that Hitler’s racism was the end result of following Darwin’s ideas concerning natural selection to their consequence, an evolutionary theory that the same people accept without question.

One might wonder what would cause a major world conflict, especially in today’s age.

Today’s uninformed like to pretend that most major conflict that has occurred over the course of history has been over ideology, with atheists in particular believing religion to be the prime driver behind conflicts. However, most people who have ever lived that weren’t Muslim wouldn’t care whether someone far off were to bow, kneel, and scrape before some graven image N times a day, so long as they themselves got to live in peace. The fact is, most wars that have ever been fought have been fought over resources.

In light of the ongoing war in Ukraine, this winter could prove to be a tad difficult, particularly for Europe. For one thing, Ukraine and Russia are energy rich (with Ukraine’s energy sector having been of particular interest for the Biden administration). In light of tariffs on Russian oil and disruptions in Ukraine’s energy supply, Europe may find itself on a strict energy allocation for the next few months.

What’s more, Ukraine has been one of the world’s top exporters of wheat, and the top producer of wheat for Europe, aside from France and Russia, the latter being the world’s number 1 wheat exporter.

To illustrate, the following chart from Wikipedia shows countries listed by export of wheat:

Wheat is kind of a big deal, as wheat is used to make foods that are substantial in calories, and calories are one of the major sources of energy that humans use to live. If a substantial source of calories, such as wheat, comes to be in short supply, more people could end up going hungry. And when people go hungry, unrest is an anticipated result.

According to the Strauss-Howe generational theory, when a major conflict does erupt, it usually involves the most powerful weapons that are available at the time. Based on this reasoning, we might think that we might be looking at the prospect of nuclear war. During World War 2, atomic weapons were being developed, and a couple of them were deployed.

But are nuclear weapons really the most powerful weapons available? Or has the communication age changed the nature of warfare, to the point that information has become a more powerful weapon?

In times past, wars could be won by kinetically attacking the civilian population, which would then lose interest in war, and no longer want to support the war effort. Thus, it was of paramount importance that the armed forces defend the civilian population. Today, there’s no need to deploy a nuclear weapon, as to weaken a country is as easy as producing a steady stream of bullshit that is designed to systematically destroy people’s minds.

The fact is, we live in an age of fifth-generation warfare, which revolves around the use of cyberattacks, misinformation, and psyops. While Alex Jones has become the right’s butt-monkey, he did have a point when he pointed out that there is a war for your mind. State actors understand pretty well that a demoralized population is less likely to get behind its government, and would tend more towards subversive movements, which could unsettle standing dominant economic powers.

Considering all this, I think that 2023 might be an interesting year. If you live in a big city, and have the means to get out of it, it might be a good idea to do so.