2012 or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Buzz

lanugo

von Verfall erzittern
A black hole of debt in the US surpassing global GDP, pools of plastic waste the size of countries polluting the oceans, pop music video clips fetishising riot police gear, Chinese growth resting on the erection of entire ghost cities, Frankenstein GMO's polluting the biosphere while an underground corporate-sponsored seed bank (or ark?) is being built in Greenland, pornography becoming the most profitable entertainment industry by filming human beings having gastrological sex, astrononomers discovering numerous earth-like exoplanets in a matter of months, endless reruns of Mayan Prophecy documentaries alternating on TV with news of actual global catastrophes, the Eurozone break-up reversing 60 years of European integration, researchers engineering an ultra-deadly flu virus in furtherance of scientific knowledge, hundreds of millions of young people transfering the gravity of their existence onto virtual social networking sites, male ejaculate being discovered to contain 50 % less fertile sperm, planet earth finishing a 25.000 year cycle of precession, a cacocracy of psychopathic oligarchs manouevring the global financial system towards collapse, neurobiology advancing to a stage where mind reading is only a matter of ressource allocation, weaponised human rights and fake democracy arranging the pieces on the great chess board for the geopolitical endgame - - -

There's an almost athmospheric sense that big things are coming our way. Will things turn for the better or for the worse? Personally, are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future? Do you even care? What are your predictions for 2012?
 

luka

Well-known member
less democracy for 2012 seems inevitable. its true about china building ghost cities.i read a book that mentioned how they have for example 5 international arioprts in a 100 square k radius.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Bring it on, I say...

The thing about dystopian sci-fi is that no matter how horrible the author/director has tried to make it, the aesthetic is invariably badass. If the future looks like Bladerunner then frankly I'm all for it. Edit: or Metropolis, exactly.
 
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luka

Well-known member
thats true isnt it. metropolis looks pretty cool, the jetsons, minority report looked so good apple stole all their ideas. (is that true?)
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Even a post-apocalyptic society would be OK as long as it was ruled by Tina Turner in a chainmail bikini.
 

yyaldrin

in je ogen waait de wind
I liked the "realistic" approach of Michael T. Winterbottom in his Code 46 movie. Really refreshing after seeing all those flying cars in other movies set in the future.

I don't know about 2012, I think I'm rather pessimistic but ask me again on the longest day of the year instead of the shortest. The sun makes things brighter.
 

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
Hard to make a strong case for things not getting worse in the future :( , but 2012, in London at least, could be good:

(i) The year starts, hopefully, with all Occupy sites still in place;
(ii) May - that twat Johnson leaves office;
(iii) August - the Olympics is a complete, unmitigated disaster;
(iv) the social landscape becomes even clearer as it becomes increasingly easy to sort out who is a twat and who isn't, as society becomes even more polarised.
 

you

Well-known member
2012 - Or how I forgot about money and learned to love the sprawl

I forgot about money, I'm over a grand worse off per month now and enjoy life more.

I like trains, I like the sprawl.

Politics is an utter distraction, the world changes in mysterious ways, to force something is to endure pain for something unquantifiable. I'll be focusing on learning, finding my own interests and passions in the pages of ovid and plato. Speaking is a skill, the more I indulge myself the better my speech. Speaking is how people communicate and how you make friends - I'll look after my own interests, read my books and work selfishly at keeping my little brain happy and the rest will work itself out.

Every time it rains it's bladerunner.
 

luka

Well-known member
Speaking is a skill, the more I indulge myself the better my speech.

this is true. i speak every day and you wouldnt believe how good at speaking i am. im sort of a genius at it. im much better at speaking than writing and i enjoy it more. its the improvisational aspect of it that maks it so much more satisfying. that and you get to see your audience. (i realise most people dont think of the person theyre talking to as an audience.)
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
I like talking (is that different from speaking?), I love punning off-the-cuff and all that sort of stuff. Reparte (not 'banter'). Dunno whether the people I'm doing it at enjoy it, but who cares.
 
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Leo

Well-known member
this is true. i speak every day and you wouldnt believe how good at speaking i am. im sort of a genius at it. im much better at speaking than writing and i enjoy it more. its the improvisational aspect of it that maks it so much more satisfying. that and you get to see your audience. (i realise most people dont think of the person theyre talking to as an audience.)

cool, but be careful: there's a fine line between this and just talking shit that bores people.
 

Leo

Well-known member
re: lanugo's original post...is 2012 so different, really? in relative terms, you could have the equivalent negativity about most coming years, or at least many of them. the onset of the great depression, the dawn of the industrial revolution, the rise of brutal dictatorships, the start of the nuclear arms race, etc. we don't live in a utopia, bad shit is part of the human condition. i'm not saying we should disregard it, but you also can't let it dominate your life and drag you down.

besides, the beach boys "smile" just finally came out. :)
 
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luka

Well-known member
cool, but be careful: there's a fine line between this and just talking shit that bores people.

thank you for your advice. i will try to apply it in my everyday life.
 

Leo

Well-known member
thank you for your advice. i will try to apply it in my everyday life.

oops...wasn't implying anything personal, apologies if it came off that way. your postings are always interesting and i only assume your talking skills are the same. :)

but i think we've all been trapped at one point or another with someone in love with the sound of their own voice who believes their ramblings are vastly more entertaining to others than they really are.
 
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Sectionfive

bandwagon house
Luka's right about democracy and I think we are heading towards a Chinese standard of living as the only way to compete.





Looking from my neck of the woods at least. Four austerity budgets down. The IMF have kindly provided details of the next two which involve dismantling the state, butchering the public service, more "internal devaluation" and privatising the state's assets. Over 120 Billion debt on just over 4 million people. €571,760,000 of which due Thursday while we cut disability programs and special needs assistants from schools last week....and we got Spain, Italy and Croatia in our Euro's group.




Getting some King Tubby for xmas though which is more then I had this year.
 

Ness Rowlah

Norwegian Wood
Democracy going backwards: Think this might turn out to be correct from a European point of view? Hungary might be the first of the Eastern European countries heading back to the warmth of Mother Russia's way of doing "democracy" (do a Google News search for "Hungary" if you have missed what's going on). And you have to wonder where Greece will be heading?

Rest of the world? It's more positive is it not (ie Burma, Arab Spring)?
Apart from Syria, North Korea, Russia. Sure there's a democracy index somewhere.
Edit - yup it's all going downhill - http://www.sourcewire.com/releases/rel_display.php?relid=69243&hilite=


Saw Michael Portillo claim that there were only a dozen or so democracies 70 years ago, so in historic terms we have no idea how long they are going to last. We might be living at the tail end of the age of democracy. With less resource, more people, more weapons, global warming and bigger social differences the future might not be calling for a set of new sunglasses.
 
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