by As a society we have failed. People are killing others just because their ideology doesn’t match, or they do not support the same political party or don’t belong to the same religion. Girls are abused and are getting treated worse than animals. Politicians are getting corrupt and not even the supreme court is able to help (link1, link2). These behaviors have made me believe that society is not going to work in our favor, hence living in status quo is not going to work anymore.
My advice is to re-focus on yourself. I firmly believe you can do it and the tools and resources are readily available. We have access to great technology which was only imagined in comic books just 20 years back. You can develop and master any skill with time and determination. HOWEVER, technology has also brought new challenges and the biggest one of all is distraction. There are more distractions than ever, and we are entangled deep in it.
In this article, I want to convince you that most major systems of the society are not working in your favor. They are working for themselves and the elite. Their goal is to grow themselves with whatever means possible. The way things are now, the odds are not in your favor and you are going to lose the game of life if you do not re-think and re-adjust your life strategy.
Political systems don’t work for you
Most politicians are too busy to make sure they are politically correct, and their image is good. Simple case is even if a different political party is doing something right for the society, politicians in all other political groups would channel all of their efforts to stop it or throw dirt on the good work some way or the other. Actually, it’s even worse today, politicians of the same party would also do their best to bring down the good effort if their name is not part of it. The ideology is making others as bad or ineffective as all politicians so everyone looks good.
No One is responsible
No one is willing to take responsibility. Everyone is finding some else to blame for their issues. This has created such an environment of neglect and in-action that no one wants to fix anything. On the contrary, if the norm was to think that its my problem to solve, we would have been in much better shape. The concept of ownership is lost. People excel when they take responsibility and hold up to a challenge. Sadly, this is not going to change.
Social Media
Perhaps social media is the biggest distraction in human history. Billions of people are daily active on it. People are exposed to obnoxious views and trolls which derails the mind from being productive. It has reduced the happiness of people as we are now measuring happiness in relative terms with reference to others. The general feeling of self-happiness is extinct. We are happy if our social media profile is better than others and vice versa. I use social media as well, all I see is smiling faces, or new clothes or new travel posts. It makes me wonder why we are all so pretentious. We are all connected but farther away due to this relative index of happiness.
Further, social media knows too much about you. They crawl all your pictures, all your shopping history, places you visit (physically and on web), when you visit, how much time you spent at place etc. This is not just a privacy issue but an exploitation case wherein they can easily sell products to you by repetitive display of ads of things you desire or want which they learn from your data.
Digital Money
Spending money is easier than ever. Few years back, people had to carry the physical money to buy something. It was very easy to manage and track money. However, with digital money coupled with EMI options has completely ruined it for you in the face of making it easy. More people are in debt today than ever. Materialism is the definition of happiness now. All companies are overselling stuff by making you believe that it’s going to make your life easy and hence making you happy.
Abundance
Everything is in abundance today. Coupled with ease of buying and abundant supply, we are over-consuming stuff. Groceries are getting delivered online making sure there is no scarcity of products at your home and money in corporations accounts.
People are getting obese, there are more mental issues than ever. There is more anxiety, stress etc etc and all when things are in abundance and they are easy to procure.
Conclusion
I can go on and on but I hope that we are now on the same page wherein you can intuitively know that society is not working for you. It has a face which gives an impression that it’s making things easy for you or improving your life. But now I know that you know, it’s a tragic irony!
Hence, my final request to you: please stop being the average Joe and please stop being getting entangled in the web of society. Please stop comparing your life with someone else. Take that time for your self and look inside…
