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Lessig: We Are Squandering Away The Future
Illissius writes "Lawrence Lessig has a new article up on Wired, with the title Our Kids Are in Big Trouble. I suck at summarizing, so here's a choice quote: 'Gone is the sense of duty that made so compelling Kennedy's demand "ask what you can do for your country." We don't even ask what we, as a nation, can do for our kids. The rhetoric of self-interest so deeply pervades politics that an ideal as fundamental as building a better future has been lost.'"
"Ask not what your country can do for you..."
A fine is a tax you pay for doing wrong and a tax is a fine you pay for doing all right.
Obviously, this is an op-ed piece. Not really news. Then again, this is the politics section of /., so I suppose it fits.
The more politically-aware of us have ideologies which we believe are larger than ourselves. They dictate things like taxes, spending, abortion, stem-cell research, etc. So I won't even pretend to agree with TFA on all points.
To me, the only universal point was to ensure that we think about the consequences if we do something, but, unlike the article, we need to think also about the consequences if we don't. We endanger ourselves to years of extremists terrorising us if we stay in Iraq. Something tells me that if we didn't go in to begin with, we'd be in a worse position after a generation or two of no consequences to committing terrorist acts.
Oh, and I always cringe when a political statement involves "think of the children" mentality. Of course we all care about our children. Too often, this cry is followed by an appeal to do things that otherwise really don't make sense, and are very, very shortsighted.
I believe that there are larger and ultimately more beneficial (personally and socially) virtues than some dogmatic worship of greed and belief that the market, left to its own devices, is perfect and holy, not to be touched by the Satanic hands of government bureaucrats. We *are* sacrificing the ability of future generations to succeed, to live on a planet that is substanaible for human life, and are moving towards a nation where our elders live our their final years in poverty.
Mr. Lessig is a noted voice in the FOSS movement, but his hysterical, sky-is-falling political rhetoric is truly breathtaking.
It almost made me run out and protest Nixon and his damned Viet Nam war.
sigs, as if you care.
Congratulations. You fail the non-partison global test.
GMHowell's JE had a topic on this today- how our forefathers paid a larger top rate income tax and built the middle class. My generation, Generation X, however, saw this tax rate cut first just as we were being born, and again when we were in our teens, and again when we were in our twenties, and again now that we're in our thirties. Can anybody truthfully say that the middle class is better off for all of these tax cuts? The article asks, sort of, the following question: Was it always like this?
It may always have been like this. I don't believe in "golden age" histories; the past was not always better than the present. But somehow it seems that we have lost an ethic. When your grandfather spoke of building a better world for you than he knew himself, you believed him. And when you look into the eyes of any 1-year-old child, you may understand what he meant.
The reason we believed our grandfathers is because our parents had a better world than they did- but our parents did not return the favor, as the 7 generations of Americans before them did- and thus we've got the mess we have today.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
Kennedy was talking about sacrifice in that speech. Sacrifice, it seems, few Americans can stomach. more than 8k per kid is not enough for school? what people might have to save for retirement? what unemployemnt only lasted a year? bulderdash! we need free health care, double the spending on education, unlimited terms on welfare, and G*d help us if we dont start giving money away on $cause, after all its for the children.
Government data shows Democrat and Republican spending patterns.
What's happening to the US is the same that has happened to every other empire before, except that technology has accelerated the rise and is accelerating the fall. No society, no empire, and no superpower lasts forever.
Self-centeredness IS America (at least now).
** Except for Ancient Crimes of Your Ancestors Against Pretty Scenery, Femino-Shamanic Peoples or Fuzzy Animals, (Fascist!).
The choice is clear:
"Realistic", barbaric, near-xenophobic selfishness and police state or a shapeless and self-hypocritical never-ending expensive journey through a Hemp-based GDP of zero.
What a country!
Nietzsche is dead - God
While not everyone is motivated by faith to work on these issues, most people share the common values that drive it. This past weekend, we got 4,000 people together to talk to our state and federal legislators about what matters to us.
Underneath all of this is an effort to change the current dominant worldview. We are constantly told to be afraid, that no one is there to help us -- we have to be self-reliant and go it alone and that there just isn't enough to go around.
We've been told this in many ways. Terrorists are going to attack us; we all need to take personal responsibility; individualism is supreme; taxes are an evil to be avoided at all costs; we can't afford to pay for schools.
4,000 people came together on Oct. 10 to reject this outlook. We put forth an alternate view: one of hope, community and shared abundance. We know there is enough to go around -- taxes are how we fund our society and we all have a responsibility to contribute. We know we are surrounded by community and by acting in community we have more power than acting alone. We have hope because we have put this vision into action with real results.
Some of our elected officials were "visibly shaken" according to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. They did not expect ordinary citizens to declare such a radical vision and did not expect so many to support it.
I believe this new worldview is what Lessig is talking about. When we live and work in community, hope and abundance, we will provide for the future as well as the present.
It's time to define our own society and stop letting others define it for us.
We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future. - Franklin D. Roosevelt
I may twist orthodoxy to partly justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a German philosophy to justify him entirely.
I think it's pretty arrogant for Libertarians to claim Adam Smith and Voltaire as some kind of intellectual progenitors of Libertarianism. Yes, Adam Smith and Voltaire both expressed strong ideas about "liberty", but I seriously doubt they would have approved of the views and policies espoused by modern US Libertarianisms.
The real problem, of course, is not in the politics of it. If it was, it would be easy. Just elect the right people and the problem is fixed. But no, these are real cultural and social issues that really need to be taken care of, and it's going to take time, effort and a whole lot of work.
The further problem, at least in America, has to do with the whole idea of patriotism, and what it means to be a patriot. Conservative types have had a LOT of success of changing the definition of patriotism to a very childish one, where you love your country for what it is. The problem with that, is that it makes change virtually impossible. Because you want America to change? You must hate it!
That's the big problem.
Fortunately, there's a growing number of patriots who are actually getting active in making change, with a more mature love of their country (We love it, so lets make it even better!). Maybe it's too late. Maybe we've let too much ground slip to the single-issue interest groups..let them do all the work..ignore the larger cultural issues.
The second part of it, is the idea that younger people are stupid and inexperienced, so therefore #1. Shouldn't vote and #2. Older people know what's good for them, so they should just shut up. You're seeing this is the media word war between Penn and Stone/Parker. The thing is...it doesn't really matter WHO young people vote for. But the idea is, by getting younger people out en masse to vote..period..it gets more of their issues out. It no longer becomes a government by the baby boomers and for the baby boomers. It has to become something more...substantive and long-reaching.
The third part, in my mind, is the economic problems of an economy based on fraud. The current investor economy for the overwhelming most part, is based upon a big ponzi scheme, where the actual invested in companies are paying very little back to the investors, and the money that's actually being made is coming from OTHER investors. The problem with that, is that it basically kills the insurance industry as their business model is made up in a large part in investments, forcing them to raise prices to keep with the..well..immature investor expectation of forever rising profits as far as the eye can see....
It's a system that's built for instability. And that needs to be fixed.
Something tells me that if we didn't go in to begin with, we'd be in a worse position after a generation or two of no consequences to committing terrorist acts.
But Iraq wasn't involved in any anti-US terrorist attacks. Wasn't that what the 9/11 commission wrote in their report?
Before you can assess the risks of any action (and taking no action is an action), you have to have the facts. Opinions and fantasies and nightmares don't count as facts.
- loss of biodiversity, especially oceanic
- at least one more large-scale nuclear "meltdown" (my suspicion, given current trends);
- Complications of Global warming
- Shifting from petroleum-based energy to other sources (inevitable) causing (yet) more instability in arab socio-political structures
- U.S. Social Security baby-boom-bubble shifting demographics placing a very, very high tax burden;
- increasing speed and longevity of communications means a silly photo at a high-school or college party or an ill-thought-out possibly-anti-(insert-minority-group-here) comment posted on a newsgroup can last until your first senate candidacy;
- Inability or reduced ability to 'reinvent' oneself after a life change due to increasing availability of personal info;
- possible deflation in U.S./world due to U.S. trade imbalance and rise of EU and China as global powers;
- economic and geographic dislocation if a bioweapon or other epidemic causes mass evacuations near population centers;
- Rising pro-"American Empire" (neoconservatism) causing wars that kill them;
- Rising religious fundamentalism (Christian, Jewish, Islamic, Hindu, Seikh, etc.) again causing inter-religion and intra-religion wars as there were in the 1600's and 1700's;
Yah, this list is kind of scarey, but I'm sure you can think of others more and less likely.Unitarian Church: Freethinkers Congregate!
Milhouse: Well, remember when the last administration decided to invest in our nation's children? Big mistake.
I'm not the devil.. just his advocate.
we've increasingly seen this in corporations and government. if i can make $20 million screwing people over, and eventually get caught and thrown out on my ass (whether i be a CEO or gov't official) what do i care what they think about me?
in the past there was usually was never enough potential monetary benefit that the corrupt individual could simply dissapear for the rest of their lives.
on another issue i make this prediction: the social security issue in the US will not be solved. politics is such a short-term game, there's no incentive to save money down the road when the money could be used for something with a more dramatic short-term gain. one president might manage to make some progress and then the next president could jump right in and waste that money.
"We are eating our seed corn."
;-)
But then, how many Americans (or Europeans) these days could explain this sentence?
"Huh? Whuddayamean? All corn has seeds."
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
I was watching SpikeTV yesterday & saw that they were having a contest for men: go to the doctor, get a checkup, and try to win a trip to Carnival. Apparently some people haven't seen a doctor in 10 years! I'm not well off by any stretch of the imagination (student, young family), but I also happen to be sick quite a lot and see a doctor once every month or so. I cringe at the thought of paying $100 per visit to the doctor (this is how much my folks in the US pay - middle class, no health coverage).
I know that /. is US-centric, so forgive me for pointing out flaws in the US, but without free health care I don't know what I would do. From the perspective of an outsider, Lessig is absolutely right. I'm glad that my kids, when they're starting out on their own too, won't have to sacrifice their health because of the health care system in Canada (if the current system holds) - then again, the way that we're screwing up the air right now, they're probably going to need it.
Condemnant quod non intellegunt.
We are already taxed to death, much of it under the guise of helping those in need. The trouble is, the only ones helped are those in power.
We carry such a ridiculous load that that real squandering of our future happens at the Government level. They already take in enough money to do everything we want and more. The key is removing NON-ESSENTIAL functions from the government. The key is removing the ability to attach RIDERS to any appropriation bill. All appropiration bills should be single purpose. Like a highway bill that stays strictly tied to the highway system, not a bill saddled with monuments, civic buildings, and swimming pools.
Its time for people to say, Ask not what my Government can do for me but instead, Tell my Government what it cannot do.
The Constitution granted specific rights to the government, it is time we reminded them of that. The Constitution did not grant us rights.
Amendment X.
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
As it says, we give it rights. It is high time that people woke and realized that the government isn't the solution to our problems, we are the solution.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I don't think even now we understand the full relationship between Saddam, the Sunni/Shiite/Kurd mess, Al-Queda (sp?), and other volatile groups, people, and events in this part of the world.
t _8 969.html
If you don't know, then, by definition, you do not have the facts.
Without the facts, you will not be able to make a logical risk assessment.
If leaders had to wait until all the facts are available, we would never have any action.
Incorrect.
For one, those who oppose those leaders would simply conceal some facts, and render those leaders incapable of action.
Why do you believe that? We did not know everything Japan was doing, but that did not stop us from war with them after Pearl Harbor. That was only one fact.
Strong leaders take action on educated (as informed as possible) guesses.
This isn't about "strong leaders". This is about, as you had previously stated, the consequences of our actions or non-actions.
There have been lots of "strong leaders" in the world who have lead unwisely.
If you suspect your teenage daughter of having sex, do you wait to see her pregnant before having a chat with her, or do you try to keep her from those consequences by a "pre-emptive" strike and talking to her before (hopefully) she ends up pregnant?
Fact: people have sex.
Fact: sex can lead to pregnancy.
Fact: my daughter falls under the category of "people".
Conclusion: I need to speak to my daughter about sex.
Why would I have to wait? All of the facts indicate that I should have spoken to her about sex before she hit puberty.
Decisive leaders, like decisive fathers, act based on the preponderance of evidence, not on having all the facts.
Again, there have been lots of "decisive leaders" (and "decisive fathers") who have chosen unwisely.
Being "decisive" is not the same as being "correct". Remember that.
Once you have all the facts, it's too late. Once the first plane hit the tower, it was too late to stop the second plane!
http://www.fact-index.com/a/ai/air_france_fligh
1994. 10 years prior. Yet we took no action to prevent such an attack.
We had the facts, we could have taken action. We did not.
Again. Step #1. Know fact from fantasy/opinion.
You are operating under the fantasy/opinion that we did not know that there were risks or that we cannot take preventive actions until after an attack. Don't confuse your opinion with fact.
Reagan and the Bushes borrowed money while they were president. Clinton paid it back. It's that simple.
Table of U.S. Parties and Economics
Sigh, in the surrounding din of the modern world such a powerful message can only be likened to windchimes in a hurricane.
At least people like Lessig and John Stewart keep trying.
most of us don't even bother to look up from our fed trough long enough to do that.
Worst. Sig. Ever.
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Unlike the "golden generation" we don't all have kids. We don't all want kids like they did back then. A large percentage of my generation see children as an unacceptable burden. We don't have em, so why would we vote for a politician that considers their future interests over our immediate interests? Here in Australia we recently just had an election dominated by "family oriented" policy. This was squarely aimed at the last generation, not my generation. The vast amount of people my age (25-30) and living in the cities see child raising as a chore. If we have children we make as much use of professional child carers as possible. Assuming we don't all change our mind tomorrow (and after all, that isn't too unlikely, the maternal drive will probably hit the females of my generation in just another 5 to 8 years) will the next generation be just like us? From what I've seen it will, and if it isn't then it sure is going to have an uphill battle. So where will the generation after that come from? If are large percentage of us just stop having kids then where will this new generation come from? And if there is no next generation, then why bother making a better world for them?
How we know is more important than what we know.
I am a 17-year-old student, months shy from voting age.
As a HUMAN, I care little about what I can do for my country, but what I can do for another HUMAN. I constantly think about what I can learn, and develop theory of what can be. What I want my life to do. What valiant effort I can assert with my knowledge, with my talents, and with my desires such that I can help the HUMAN race. I do say HUMAN because we are ALL HUMAN, regardless of nationalities, race, gender, or religion, survival and advancements of civilizations will depend on private citizens to get off their asses to donate their assets to the WORLD.
I want to use my desire to be an engineer to learn how to create a device I would call an ONIB (Optic Nerve Interface Bridge) to rid people of blindness due to destroyed/dysfunctional eyes. I would like to see a transistion from fossil fuels to nuclear energy (fission or fusion) or perhaps a newer electrical energy source.
I would love to become a true philanthropist, a person whom would have to abide by a budget to meet the economical demands of life (Net household income ~$70000).
Alas, there is no foresight of an improvement in the world. There is no reason for an improvement if the HUMANS of the world are content to not have any collaboration, because those with power shall always abuse their power. The human nature itself is what creates a dismal future for my generation.
Karma: Good, or bust!
If you really want to worry about our kids, let's take a real, good look at our schools and what they're doing to our kids (to us.)
t m
Today it seems like a given that everyone should be taken from their close communities, neighborhoods, etc and subjected to to an enviroment so oppisite a kids spontaneous, highly intelligent, independently motivated learning experinces.
This is an extremely interesting book (readable onine) detailing a long time public school teachers research into the true history of forced education: http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/toc1.h
~Anztac
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Is he making a case for future aborted fetus suffrage?
...when the government takes 50% of my paycheck to use for social welfare and engineering?
Perhaps, if the government took less...folks would be more charitable?
As it is...I give a few hundred $ a month to charities of my choice. I'd give more if I had more to give.
Whoever modded the parent "Informative" should take a moment to think about the true definition of 'fiscal responsability', and put that into context with domestic and world events throughout the time period covered by that chart.
Just because the Democrats got lucky to be in power during one of the greatest economic booms in our history, and avoided having to deal with major world conflicts like Desert Storm, does not make them any more 'fiscally responsible' than Republicans.
"Creativity is allowing ones self to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep" - Scott Adams
Kennedy spoke to Baby Boomers' parents, as the boomers were mostly in junior high and elementary school. These parents had survived the Depression, won WWII with our allies, and built the US into the richest country ever, finding middle ground between communism and fascism rather than complete a takeover of a world shattered by war. But they spoiled a "Me Generation" who accepted Vietnam until it started killing them by the 10s of thousands, who voted for Nixon *twice* until he started losing, who rejected Republican dirty tricks for about 4 years, until they fell in love with Ronald Reagan's amnesia, and who are the hardest core supporters of Bush Jr as he burns their children's country before their eyes. The media has always favored the photogenic misfits to define their generation as hippies and antiwar liberals. But their legacy of selfishness is coming home to roost before they even shuffle off the scene, and we'll have to carry their debts to our graves, no matter what we ask of our country, or otherwise.
--
make install -not war