Do your best to resist #cynicism, because cynicism destroys nuance, and almost everything valuable in life exists inside nuance.
Resist saying #cynical things like “who cares about privacy; your data is already out there”, “who cares about stopping climate change; it’s already too late”, “who cares about voting; we don’t have a democracy any more”, and any number of similarly simplistic, thought-destroying nonsense.
Cynicism is faux-intellectualism. It’s attempting to impress people with rational-sounding generalizations that lead to absurd, defeatist behavior. It’s a claim of “being real” while being too lazy to think through the problem. It’s feeling superior by kicking a table on which someone else is doing their homework.
Nuance exists even during a crisis—it’s arguably even more important then. Things can ALWAYS get worse, and things can ALWAYS get better. Working to make things better is worth doing. Feeling smug and telling people to give up is not; it’s the asshole’s easy way out.
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Dave Rahardja
Unknown parent • • •KielKontrovers Blog
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Dave Rahardja
in reply to KielKontrovers Blog • • •You’re right; the definition of “nihilism” is complex and ambiguous, and the term has been applied to mean different things at different times.
I’m using it here to describe the particular case where one perceives the conditions of life as fundamentally meaningless *therefore one might as well go all the way down the slippery slope*. It‘s a low-effort reductio ad absurdum, accelerated by a perception that there is no point in exerting energy in any particular direction.
Qob
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Johannes Hentschel
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Yes and another attitude you see quite a lot in disillusioned middle-aged Germans is #Cynicism which has a similar effect.
#cynicisminpolitics #cynicismandhopelessness #cynicismandmistrust
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Dave Rahardja
in reply to Johannes Hentschel • • •Dave Rahardja
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Johannes Hentschel
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Dave Rahardja
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Thank you to @johentsch for bringing up the word #cynicism instead of #nihilism—that is a _much_ more accurate descriptor of the symptom I’m describing! I’ve edited the post to use that term.
hostux.social/@johentsch/11387…
Johannes Hentschel
2025-01-22 07:54:30
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Jose
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Johannes Hentschel
in reply to Jose • • •This is a very, very old question and the best answer (to everything, life, and the universe) seems to be #stoicism
@drahardja
Jose
in reply to Johannes Hentschel • • •Dave Rahardja
in reply to Jose • • •JimmyB (he/him)
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Dave Rahardja
in reply to JimmyB (he/him) • • •@JimmyB The smugness comes from the presumption that they are entitled to belittle someone else’s effort to improve the situation.
From my experience, people who have decided that things are fucked—and proudly tell others about it—offer no help to improve anything, even when there is room for improvement. The best they can do is stay out of the way and stop discouraging those who are actually working to better the world.
I often say: “Things could always be worse; we could be standing in shit.” The corollary to that is that things could always be BETTER, in ways small and large. People who extinguish the flame in others that work to improve the situation are nihilistic assholes.
JimmyB (he/him)
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Ok - well we have very different experiences of nihilism. I've not seen that at all.
Anyway,
Dave Rahardja
in reply to JimmyB (he/him) • • •JimmyB (he/him)
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Sensitive content
Yeah - fair enough. I think there are so many desperate folks out there, who have looked hard, are willing, but see the future in deeply fatalistic terms.
I stood by the bed of a loved one after they'd taken a big overdose a few years back. I suggested to the psychiatrist that if only they could get some perspective, they'd be OK. She was quick to correct me: she said that most of us wear blinkers to survive. This person had removed there's and couldn't face what they saw.
Dave Rahardja
in reply to JimmyB (he/him) • • •Sensitive content
JimmyB (he/him)
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Sensitive content
Well thank god they flushed him for a week and he was OK, no permanent damage, back to school next week, and is now fine. But a profound shock.
Personally I stay sane with local engagement, helping those I can around me at a level I can manage and cope with. I understand those for whom it all feels too hopeless. I think localism is one answer for those feeling fatalistic.
Dave Rahardja
in reply to JimmyB (he/him) • • •Sensitive content
Al
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •thank you; I'm guilty of falling into the #nihilism / #cynicism trap and will do better.
I also like the #tipJar idea I saw earlier. Have a jar of ideas to improve things and post one of those instead of a cleaver snarky thing.
Andy Wootton
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Long ago I heard an orchestra leader and motivational speaker say on BBC Radio 4 that he has found cynics are idealists who don't ever want to be disappointed again.
They haven't really given up. They're simply 'keeping their intellectual powder dry' and waiting for a good opportunity to fight back. Under fascism, you don't want to look like a threat to The Leader until you strike.
"Bishop to Trump's blind-side". She used her one chance well.
Dave Rahardja
in reply to Andy Wootton • • •@woo There’s picking one’s battles, and there’s discouraging others. Keeping your powder dry until you find a fight you can win is perfectly fine, and admirable even; telling others not to even bother is not.
You know the type: the reply guy who gives you a one-line quip about why you shouldn’t do anything because we’re all fucked in the end, or why your plan won’t be enough to solve the systemic problem so why bother, “there’s always another one ready to take their place” and blah blah blah any number of a hundred wisecracks that discourage others who try to make things better.
Andy Wootton
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Dave Rahardja
in reply to Andy Wootton • • •Andy Wootton
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Maier Amsden
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Daniel Marks
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Urban Hermit
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •The three modern sins are Ignorance, Arrogance, and APATHY. Any 1 can be forgiven and worked through, but any two lock together, and protect the EGO from change. Change is necessary for growth and problem solving.
Ignorance and apathy is bad.
Arrogance and apathy is malignant.
When they can't turn you evil, they want you apathetic. Apathy let's it happen, and if they can add a little ignorance, eventually a little arrogance, you'll never change.
Jos
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Drew Crecente (they/them)
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Thank you for this.
We live in a world of nuance; I despair that is lost on too many.
"It's hard to be grey in a black and white world."
John A. Wojtowicz
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Thank you for your post.
We all need the encouragement.
Peace
Dave Rahardja
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •A great post on #Cynicism!
“Zynismus ist nicht smart. So gewöhnst du ihn dir ab” (Cynicism is not smart. That's how you get used to it)
perspective-daily.de/article/3…
Zynismus ist nicht smart. So gewöhnst du ihn dir ab
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Sordid Amok!
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •I use "cynicism" to mean "making the effort to see society as it is, and talking about it" - the original meaning.
I would use another word, if there was one. The concept is good. It has been discredited by people who don't want to hear what cynics say - that everyone in a society is responsible for the worst abuses of that society, for example.
Diogenes meant to wake people up, to initiate change. I can't hope to do more.
Clara
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Annette Peter 🧜🏻♂️🦂🦁🇪🇺
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •Odradek
in reply to Dave Rahardja • • •