Outrage fatigue? Add me to the list. But you have to get past the outrage and put things in perspective. The current state of affairs is nothing new for humanity. Is this sad? Yes, but still you have to put it in perspective. There have been multiple extinctions on Earth, separated by millions of years. We’re just on the cusp of the next one. And even if we’re not, eventually the sun is going to grow and swallow up the solar system and Earth and all the other planets will be destroyed anyway, regardless of what we do or don’t do.
I don’t find this depressing. It just puts things in perspective. I still care, I still try to help (in my limited way), I still want people to be good to each other and to flourish. But it’s all going to end someday.
@Spice_Weasel recently recommended a bookWhy Buddhism is True by Robert Wright, which I recently finished reading, and I also highly recommend it for its insights into how natural selection has affected our perceptions, feelings and thinking in ways that aren’t always helpful or realistic.
So that’s basically it. Have some perspective but don’t give up. THC gummies also help.
I think the problem started when multiple people here claimed 2010 was literally “The worst year in history”, and if you can’t remember why 2010 was the worst year in history then that explains why we’ve had outrage fatigue for so long.
So glad you found it interesting. It’s funny, I’ve considered myself a Buddhist for a couple decades but I focused predominantly on Zen. I never really got the chance to do a deep dive into Theravadan Buddhist philosophy, nor have I ever had a chance to learn about evolutionary psychology in a context that wasn’t trying to convince me gender inequality is cool because it’s natural. I thought the part about mind modules was really interesting. I’ve even used it to manage my political outrage. “Well, the tribal mind module is really kicking in here. Look at that, it’s trying to protect me. Silly mind module.” I don’t always know what module is in play but I can at least recognize thoughts arising… Meditation helps with this.
And it’s a very particular flavor of fatigue, the same kind of fatigue I feel when I know someone who is in an abusive relationship and keeps refusing to do anything about it other than walking on eggshells trying to avoid offending their abuser, whose abuse keeps getting more and more egregious everyday. Then something really bad will happen, and I get into that cycle of hope thinking that they’ve really gone too far this time and the force of society and the law will come down hard of them.
Then after a couple of days, they go back into concentrating their efforts on appeasing their abuser, trying to be fair and justifying their inaction.
