About "Humans Are Bastards" and misanthropy in general

No you wouldn't, except perhaps in the afterlife. You'd be dead.

As I see it, humans — though flawed — are heralds of Good in Creation. Other beings are just not equipped to deal with good and evil: a tiger, a shrike or a wasp cannot care about the suffering of their preys, they just lack the intellectual ability to even understand the very concept.

I think that Yudkowksy (but I might be mistaken in this) said that we, as in "the human species", are the light of the world. I cannot entirely agree in this; but we certainly are one of the main channels through which the Light reaches the world.

edited 25th Mar '12 5:55:18 AM by Carciofus

But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas.

I think this may be because some people don't really know what mature and insightful is (it's kind of a complex concept). But they don't want to look stupid, and they want an easy answer. They see on TV (and sometimes in literature) that the most cynical or misanthropic character seems to be the smartest. So they figure cynicism and misanthropy must be a sign of intelligence. It helps that the misanthropic character is sometimes portrayed as cool.

Also, there is the idea that introverts are smart. People sometimes (erroneously) think that introverted=misanthropic. So they might make the jump that misanthropy is smart (even though neither misanthropy nor introversion mean that a person is automatically smart).

Also, it's easier to complain than it is to offer solutions.

edited 25th Mar '12 11:21:43 AM by BlackElephant

I'm an elephant. Rurr.

I would think it's because of the human tendency to keep in memory only painful or bad events. Cynicals say everything is going to go sour, or to fail. So this kind of talk appears to be true, because your memory is reinforcing it. So you go and think "well, there is something to it...".

Eh, at it's core, much of it from teenagers is that much of the media they consume early on is all sunshines and lollipops for the most part, and their parents enforce this. As a result, when they get to the rebellious age, they go the opposite. This only applies to a small amount of people on its own. Then, their friends see it and it spreads like a meme.

Fight smart, not fair.

Well people are people, so why should it be that you and I should get along so awfully?

The 5 geek social fallacies. Know them well.

?

Fight smart, not fair.

I think it's a song.

"Roll for whores."

The 5 geek social fallacies. Know them well.

Yeah. It's Depeche Mode, get some education, people

Unbent, Unbowed, Unbroken. Unrelated ME1 Fanfic

Come on, why'd you insult someone over something like that? You might've been joking, but still.

You, too. I don't wanna be the serious police here (though I kinda have to to some extent,) but try to be nice.

edited 25th Mar '12 7:59:13 PM by BestOf

Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.

Gee, sarcasm.

What I was pointing out, in a roundabout way, was that reasons people give for hating humanity are often, in the greater scheme of things, kinda petty.

I mean sure, we can be real jerks, do things like commit genocide, steal, cheat, and NOT GOOGLE THINGS, but we can also do all sorts of good things. Ultimately, I think it all works out to people being on average, well, average.

And while I've seen serious arguments for Humans Are Bastards, most of the time I see it from people recently disillusioned from myths they once held about, say important historical figures (*I cried buckets a few times over that sorta thing*), or seeing a particularly egregious example of the Bystander Effect.

The 5 geek social fallacies. Know them well.

Yeah, I know you didn't mean to offend anyone and nobody probably would've taken offence, but still, Pot Hole it or something. We're mostly a text-only forum so if it's easy to avoid a misunderstanding with some joke-ruining Pot Holing, I think it's worth it.

If I seem a bit on edge, it's because I just thumped 11 insulting posts from a silly thread and that kinda stuff puts one's uncivility radar on the more sensitive gears; possibly oversensitive.

Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.

That's simplifying what Rousseau wrote. It's not society that fucks people up, as otherwise he would not have admired the Swiss democratic model so much. Besides I don't necessarily have to agree with everything Rousseau wrote, so I'm not sure what you're trying to say, other than "Rousseau said that 'society fucks people up into an evil person'. You said Rousseau is right. Therefore you agree with Rousseau that society fucks people up". You can check some stuff he wrote here: http://pages.uoregon.edu/jboland/rousseau.html

edited 25th Mar '12 8:20:11 PM by germi91

"It is true that we are called a democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few."

I swear to god, half my thumps are from people taking me too seriously. No biggie. And it's always nice to get a PM.

Anyhoo, I' not trying to imply that Humans Are Bastards is necessarily not a valid viewpoint, but from what I've seen it's usually arrived at from a more emotional as opposed to logical mindset.

edited 25th Mar '12 8:20:51 PM by inane242

The 5 geek social fallacies. Know them well.

I think it may be a combination of the two. A person who subscribes to this view might be letting their emotions do the thinking, but they come up with logical justifications for what they believe with that at least. It'd be impressive if it wasn't so depressing.

Insert witty and clever quip here. My page, as the database hates my handle.

Well, one of the beauties of the human mind is that it can always find logical justification for what it believes.

The 5 geek social fallacies. Know them well.

Very very true. Even if it is a warped form of logic at times.

Insert witty and clever quip here. My page, as the database hates my handle.

That's why you should always try to argue a point to a friend before arguing it to a group.

The 5 geek social fallacies. Know them well.

Seems like a sound method (unless you completely ignore what the friend has to say).

Insert witty and clever quip here. My page, as the database hates my handle.

That's why the friend should be your own mother.

She knows you, and is probably wiser than you.

Worked for my debate class.

edited 25th Mar '12 8:55:19 PM by inane242

The 5 geek social fallacies. Know them well.

It Probably has something to do with Hanlon's Razor, It's feels more charitable to think that humans are evil rather than simply stupid and short sighted.

"Coffee! Coffeecoffeecoffee! Coffee! Not as strong as Meth-amphetamine, but it lets you keep your teeth!"

We're not evil, but we've got some major issues to work out.

One thing we've lost in the denser areas and are rapidly starting to lose in the rural ones too is a sense of unity and hospitality; the vast majority of random people you meet on the street are decent folks who have been convinced by the news that everything is out to get them. As a result, they become standoffish and difficult to approach at best, and accepting of sleaziness as the norm at worst. It's true that we're less violent than in previous centuries, but more than anything it feels like it's out of fear and overcaution than anything else — a passive, cowed peace rather than an active kindness.

The other thing is that for a people who are mostly decent, we're sure good at setting up hierarchies that disproportionately reward the most ruthlessly manipulative and sociopathic of us. Government, business etc. aren't bad things in themselves, but they do tend to get very ugly very fast because we suck at picking people to man them, and we really suck at differentiating meaningful oversight from smokescreen bureaucracy.

edited 4th Apr '12 5:08:45 PM by Pykrete

I don't understand what is point of "Humans are bastards" mentality unless you just want to talk about how great you yourself are or try to make yourself somehow be "smarter" than stupid optimistic people. If you truly believe that humans would have been better off never born, why do you continue living and talking about it?... Whats the point? SO yeah, I don't really see it as genuine because it usually means that person is reclusive somehow because its easier to think everyone sucks when you don't talk to anyone.

"why do you continue living and talking about it?"

This at least I can answer...Namely it's very hard to kill oneself. People get cold feet and just can't even if they may want to. We've had a user here before, now banned, whose one reason for not doing so was that they couldn't override the natural defenses that kept him from doing it.

If someone wants to accuse us of eating coconut shells, then that's their business. We know what we're doing. - Achaan Chah

Thats not what I meant, I meant why do you keep living with yourself if you feel like you and everyone else is bastard. Why you don't try to do anything about it?