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<font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">=</font><div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2021/01/ecological-collapse/">https://www.alternet.org/2021/01/ecological-collapse/</a></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" /><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx twet</font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>
</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>'Ecological Ponzi scheme': Dire scientific assessment warns humanity in denial of looming 'collapse of civilization'</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Jessica Corbett and Common Dreams January 13, 2021</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">   </div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>In an example to the rest of the scientific community and an effort to wake up people—particularly policymakers—worldwide, 17 scientists penned a comprehensive assessment of the current state of the planet and what the future could hold due to biodiversity loss, climate disruption, human consumption, and population growth.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">"Ours is not a call to surrender—we aim to provide leaders with a realistic 'cold shower' of the state of the planet that is essential for planning to avoid a ghastly future," according to the perspective paper, co-authored by experts across Australia, Mexico, and the United States, and published in the journal Frontiers in Conservation Science.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>
</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Co-author Paul R. Ehrlich of Stanford University's Center for Conservation Biology—</b>who has raised alarm about overpopulation for decades—told Common Dreams his colleagues "are all scared" about what's to come.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">"Scientists have to learn to be communicators," said Ehrlich, citing James Hansen's warning about the consequences of "scientific reticence." Hansen, a professor at Columbia University's Earth Institute and former director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, testified to Congress about the climate crisis in 1988.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Ehrlich was straightforward about how "extremely dangerous things are" now and the necessity of a "World War II-type mobilization" to prevent predictions detailed in the paper: "a ghastly future of mass extinction, declining health, and climate-disruption upheavals (including looming massive migrations), and resource conflicts."</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</span></div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">"What we are saying might not be popular, and indeed is frightening. But we need to be candid, accurate, and honest if humanity is to understand the enormity of the challenges we face in creating a sustainable future," said co-author Daniel T. Blumstein of the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability at the University of California, Los Angeles, in a statement about the paper.</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">"By scientists' telling it like it is, we hope to empower politicians to work to represent their citizen, not corporate, constituents," he said in an email to Common Dreams.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>The paper, Ehrlich and Blumstein pointed out, comes in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic—which, according to Johns Hopkins University, has killed nearly two million people. Over the past year, the Covid-19 crisis has provoked calls for humanity to end its destruction of the natural world to prevent future public health catastrophes.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>"We're all seeing the shocks to our global systems</b> now from Covid and the rise of authoritarian leaders," Blumstein said. "Because our current ways of life are ecologically unsustainable (we're living in an ecological Ponzi scheme), we fully anticipate more—and more deadly—pandemics in the future. We expect civil unrest, wars, and famines. We are all shaken by the likelihood of the collapse of civilization as we know it."</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">The new warning from scientists, Blumstein noted, cites over 150 other papers "documenting the diverse and shocking decline in biodiversity and planetary 'health' and their consequences." Among the cited sources is a World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) report that in September revealed an "average 68% decrease in population sizes of mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles, and fish between 1970 and 2016."</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">"In the midst of a global pandemic, it is now more important than ever to take unprecedented and coordinated global action to halt and start to reverse the loss of biodiversity and wildlife populations across the globe by the end of the decade, and protect our future health and livelihoods," WWF International director general Marco Lambertini said at the time.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>The co-authors—including William J. Ripple of Oregon State University, who last year led thousands of scientists in declaring a climate emergency and earlier this month led a call for "a massive-scale mobilization to address the climate crisis"—echoed Lambertini's message while also underscoring the importance of increasing awareness about what's actually needed.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">"Humanity is causing a rapid loss of biodiversity and, with it, Earth's ability to support complex life. But the mainstream is having difficulty grasping the magnitude of this loss, despite the steady erosion of the fabric of human civilization," the paper says.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">"In fact, the scale of the threats to the biosphere and all its lifeforms is so great that it is difficult to grasp for even well-informed experts," said lead author Corey Bradshaw of Australia's Flinders University in a statement. "The problem is compounded by ignorance and short-term self-interest, with the pursuit of wealth and political interests stymieing the action that is crucial for survival."</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>The paper explains that "while suggested solutions abound, the current scale of their implementation does not match the relentless progression of biodiversity loss and other existential threats tied to the continuous expansion of the human enterprise." According to its authors, "That we are already on the path of a sixth major extinction is now scientifically undeniable."</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>
</b></div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 0);"><b>"With such a rapid, catastrophic loss of biodiversity, the ecosystem services it provides have also declined," </b>the paper explains. Consequences include "reduced carbon sequestration, reduced pollination, soil degradation, poorer water and air quality, more frequent and intense flooding and fires, and compromised human health."</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Highlighting estimates that the human population will near 10 billion by 2050, the scientists lay out how "large population size and continued growth are implicated in many societal problems," from food insecurity, soil degradation, biodiversity loss, and an increased chance of pandemics, to crowding, joblessness, deteriorating infrastructure, and bad governance.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The paper also details the planetary impacts of dirty energy and carbon-intensive food production, and says that "while climate change demands a full exit from fossil fuel use well before 2050, pressures on the biosphere are likely to mount prior to decarbonization as humanity brings energy alternatives online."</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">A section on failed international goals declares that "stopping biodiversity loss is nowhere close to the top of any country's priorities, trailing far behind other concerns such as employment, healthcare, economic growth, or currency stability."</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">"The dangerous effects of climate change are much more evident to people than those of biodiversity loss, but society is still finding it difficult to deal with them effectively," the scientists note, while decrying "utterly inadequate" efforts by governments to even try to meet the targets of the landmark Paris climate agreement.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">They further decry the recent rise of right-wing, anti-environment agendas in countries including Australia, Brazil, and the United States—which recently denied President Donald Trump a second term. Ehrlich expressed hope that President-elect Joe Biden will work to deliver on the climate promises he made as a candidate</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">.</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Biden's vow to rejoin the Paris agreement "is positive news," but "it is a minuscule gesture given the scale of the challenge," Ehrlich said in a statement.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The president-elect "is moving in the right direction," Ehrlich told Common Dreams, pointing to the selection of former Secretary of State John Kerry as his climate envoy. However, "the Paris goals are increasingly looking inadequate," and "Biden's political opportunities to do anything major may be greatly constrained," he added.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Blumstein stressed that "recycling, using less plastic, eating less meat, taking public transportation, and flying less, while all important, will simply not create the rapid change we need now to save much of the Earth's biodiversity and our lives."</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">According to Blumstein, "We need rapid political change."</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">He urged voters to elect leaders who will end fossil fuel use as well as "eliminate perpetual economic growth and properly price externalities so that the environmental costs are built into the price of a product." He also emphasized the importance of access to education and reproductive control, and the need to rein in corporate lobbying and enact campaign finance reform so politicians serve citizens' needs.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>
</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>"Ultimately," Blumstein added, "we must focus on making equity and well-being society's goals—not the constant accumulation of more junk."</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">In their paper, the UCLA scientist and his 16 co-authors "contend that only a realistic appreciation of the colossal challenges facing the international community might allow it to chart a less-ravaged future."</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">It is "incumbent on experts in any discipline that deals with the future of the biosphere and human well-being to eschew reticence, avoid sugar-coating the overwhelming challenges, ahead and 'tell it like it is,'" they conclude. "Anything else is misleading at best, or negligent and potentially lethal for the human enterprise at worst."</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The Earth Is a Ponzi Scheme on the Verge of Collapse - Alternet.org ›</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">A decade closer to catastrophe: Looking back at the mayhem of the ... ›</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Study confirms fear that intense ocean acidification portends ... ›</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Fifth of countries at risk of ecosystem collapse, analysis finds ... ›</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Climate tipping point ecosystem collapses may come faster than ... ›</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Humanity has already had four major ecological collapses: how can ... ›</div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/09/scientists-explain-why-the-wealthy-struggle-with-empathy/">https://www.alternet.org/2020/09/scientists-explain-why-the-wealthy-struggle-with-empathy/</a></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">matt r salon</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>a new study reveals that people from higher income backgrounds struggle with certain aspects of empathy when compared to individuals who have lower incomes, who are better at reading people’s emotions.</b></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167220914116" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">research paper</a>, which was published in the “Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin,” asked individuals from different class backgrounds to infer others’ emotional states by looking at images of their eyes and to attempt to assume the visual perspective of other people.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The findings suggest that our socioeconomic status may affect the way we see and interact with other people.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Researchers know that there are many things can make it difficult for one person to effectively empathize with another, including neurological conditions like autism and psychological illnesses like schizophrenia. In their study, researchers Pia Dietze of the University of California, Irvine and Eric D. Knowles of New York University attempted to better understand how social class specifically influences Theory of Mind.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" font-size="font-size" large="large"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">"[Theory of Mind] encompasses a range of competencies that together enable people to solve problems in a world full of other minds,” the authors explain. “Examples of ToM include our ability to infer people’s emotions, understand others’ visual perspectives, trace behavior to actors’ underlying intentions and desires, and grasp the fact that others’ beliefs might misportray reality. We focus on two facets of [Theory of Mind] in this work: emotion perception and visual perspective taking.”</font></span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The authors concluded, both from their research and by analyzing previous research (some of which they felt was unreliable), that “higher social class is associated with attenuated [theory of mind] performance,” with individuals from higher income backgrounds struggling more to ascertain the emotions and empathize with the visual points of view of other people. One possible explanation for this is that “lower-class individuals—owing to their greater levels of cultural interdependence—may appraise other human beings as more relevant to their goals and well-being than do higher-class individuals.”<b> This would also help people from lower classes to “spontaneously calculate other people’s perspectives.”</b></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Dietze and Knowles also point out that their conclusion “stands in clear contrast to the common discourse concerning neurocognitive deficits among the lower classes.”</b> They also note that “decades of research documents that lower-class individuals are more likely to exhibit attentional deficits and display impaired working-memory performance. The evidence provided here suggests that these deficits may be domain-specific. Indeed, we show that lower-class performance outcomes are reversed in the social realm.” The term “domain-specific” refers to the theory of learning which holds that there are multiple forms of intelligence rather than a single way to assess where one has cognitive strengths and/or weaknesses.</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">This is not the only new research which sheds light on how being wealthy can lead to harmful psychological behaviors and personal habits. In July a </span><a href="https://www.salon.com/2020/07/13/the-affluent-are-in-denial-about-their-class-privilege-research-says/" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">different study</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">individuals from affluent backgrounds would often deny their class privilege by “increasing their claims of personal hardships and hard work, to cover [their] privilege in a veneer of meritocracy.”</span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>“Flying in the face of meritocratic prescriptions, evidence of privilege threatens recipients’ self-regard by calling into question whether they deserve their successes,” the authors wrote in their study. “Evidence of class privilege demonstrates that many life outcomes are determined by factors not attributable to individuals’ efforts alone, but are caused in part by systemic inequities that privilege some over others.”</b></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Another </span><a href="https://www.salon.com/2020/06/23/the-affluent-are-consuming-the-planet-to-death-study/" target="blank" rel="noopener" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration-line: none; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">study</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">, this one published in June in the journal Nature Communications, argued that the </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">consumption patterns of the affluent are so egregiously unsustainable from an ecological standpoint that only a concerted effort by the wealthy to consume less can prevent catastrophes like global warming, pollution and biodiversity loss.</span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; margin: 0px 0px 17px; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“The affluent citizens of the world are responsible for most environmental impacts and are central to any future prospect of retreating to safer environmental conditions,” the authors wrote, adding that “existing societies, economies and cultures incite consumption expansion and the structural imperative for growth in competitive market economies inhibits necessary societal change.” They advocated “a global and rapid decoupling of detrimental impacts from economic activity,” pointing out that </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 102);">“the world’s top 10% of income earners are responsible for between 25 and 43% of environmental impact” while “the world’s bottom 10% income earners exert only around 3–5% of environmental impact.</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">”</span></font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
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</font><div><a href="https://www.salon.com/2020/06/23/the-affluent-are-consuming-the-planet-to-death-study/">https://www.salon.com/2020/06/23/the-affluent-are-consuming-the-planet-to-death-study/</a></div><div>
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</font><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">// ppl make us happy, not stuff</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4" /><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/personal-health/rampant-consumerism-unfulfilling-work-and-lack-social-connection-all-factor%20Why%20Depression%20Is%20Rampant%20in%20Our%20Times" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;">https://www.alternet.org/personal-health/rampant-consumerism-unfulfilling-work-and-lack-social-connection-all-factor</a></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div>
</div><div>Why Depression Is Rampant in Our Times</div></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">=</font></div><div style="font-size: small;"><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="" /><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx</font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></font></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Capitalism has distorted our understanding of community — and it’s making us vulnerable to manipulation</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Written by Valerie Vande Panne / Independent Media Institute December 12, 2019</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>When we talked about community just a generation or two ago, it was understood we were talking about people, not brands—what they enjoyed or cared about, and not where they spent their money. But the definition of “community” has been hijacked by consumerism.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">This article was produced by Local Peace Economy, a project of the Independent Media Institute.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Companies will pay top dollar to know who belongs to which communities, and those labels of community are all about brand loyalty.</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The shift of how we see community started with the original offline attention merchants and worsened by the digital age. Think “Nine out of Ten Doctors Smoke Camels”—the beginning of the cigarette smoking community, validated by medical doctors. Or the massive amount of marketing Coca-Cola did in the early 20th century, embedding the alternative to wine into America’s subconscious to the point that Coca-Cola and American patriotism, or Christmas, are quite nearly one and the same. If you’re a part of the American community, the message was, you drink Coke.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Since those days decades ago, there are a few ways “community” has been injected into the consumerist part of the internet, some more overt, and some more behind the scenes<b>. For instance, there’s now an industry that was unimaginable not long ago: Social media community management,</b> <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">which treats people talking about a brand as a community. Facebook has “community standards”; Instagram has “community guidelines”; YouTube has a “community tab” that channels owned by companies can use to “engage” with potential customers. But are these really communities?</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Even communities based on product or lifestyle interest—the sneakerheads or the CrossFit crowd—are reduced to marketable algorithms that show up in the ads you are fed and the Facebook and Instagram posts you see.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“Community” has been reduced and degraded by brand loyalty. Do you really want to be defined as living in a community of people who all shop for the same brand of clothing, eat food from the same chain store, and, are, more or less, homogenized by the same data analytics?</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">There might as well be a “white men in plaid shirts and jeans with scruffy beards and black-rimmed glasses” community.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Community might sometimes be these things—it’s nice to talk sneakers with someone who understands why one would enthusiastically wait in line overnight to buy a limited-edition pair—but in calling these things community, it reduces the individual and the community itself into a group of consumers who can be targeted for specific ads to make certain corporations money. Consumerism is not the primary force behind community, no matter what the MBA-wielding directors of marketing and data manipulation say.</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Community at its best, I think, is a diverse place with people who might have very little in common. The people who live in your neighborhood make up your community. And real communities are formed independently of the carefully planned, gentrified residential projects, corporate-sponsored public spaces, and chain retail establishments that do more to separate rather than to unify us.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Community is comfort; it’s multigenerational; it’s multiracial and multicultural. It is a fabric, a cloth, a napkin woven out of people’s lives and connections, paths crossing or moving in the same direction together or even in opposite directions apart.<b> It’s commitment to being present, in the moment, where you are now</b>. It’s being a kind and decent person to your fellow humans—even when you don’t want to, or don’t agree with them about politics or language or worldview. Through better or worse, community must be counted on as a feature of life that can do everything from curbing loneliness, to satisfying hunger, to providing an unseen safety net for its inhabitants.</span></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>As Kurt Vonnegut said, “We are here to help each other get through this thing, whatever it is.”</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Community is greeting people you see, every day. It means looking your neighbors in the eye. It means seeing them—really seeing them—and their humanity. It means when they are hurting or suffering, you feel it too. You can pause for a moment, on a sidewalk or in the grocery store, to share a moment of compassion with them.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">It’s life.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Often, you can spot the people who aren’t accustomed to living in a community. They walk past the same people every day, yet never look them in the eye or otherwise acknowledge their existence.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Community is not politics, or hating someone or wishing them ill for their mistakes. It’s accepting that we are all different; we all make mistakes; we are all right, and wrong. It’s figuring out how to pick up and move on from disagreement.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>It means that when problems arise, solutions are found, good and bad. It means, at the end of the day, safety, because you know your neighbors and they know you. Community like this is complex. It isn’t simple. But it is natural.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Community is precious and is how people have lived for thousands of years. Of course it’s not perfect, and of course there are challenges and issues: arguments and violence, sexual abuse, domestic violence, or murder. But it’s a place where you can count on people not like you, and they can count on you. That’s what’s at the heart of a community: A willingness to be present for those in your shared world.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>Everyday community activity alleviates loneliness, a chronic condition linked to everything from suicide to mental decline. </b>That is evidence that community can—literally—save a life, though you might never know whose life you’re saving simply by being present in your community of people very different from you. The negative health effects of loneliness are comparable to smoking 15 cigarettes a day, but you’re less likely to be lonely when you can walk around your neighborhood and see people with whom you are in a community relationship. This kind of community is not based on a unified interest or analytic (as in, “We all love Democrats/veganism/Trump/bicycling/salsa music, etc.”). Rather, it’s a “We are all here now” community.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">It’s community in the lush richness of the real world, with all its problems and differences of opinion and complexities. Because at the end of the day, it’s not the differences that matter; it’s the kindness and support we can all show each other as we march through this thing called life, together. It’s easier to see someone’s humanity when you see them every day, in the real world, doing real-world things to live.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Just like you.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">And that community isn’t the kind you find in the silo of website comments or a Facebook interest group. There might be very little uniting this real-world community outside of being in a certain place at a certain time.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Yet community is not a destination, nor a goal. It’s a way of being in the world, found where you are at, in the real world, with people most likely very different from you. </span><b style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">It’s something that</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"> cannot be purchased.</span></b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>If you see that, if you live in that, you’ll never be alone, and you’ll always be a part of something bigger than yourself.</b></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Valerie Vande Panne is a writing fellow and chief correspondent at Local Peace Economy, a project of the Independent Media Institute. She is an independent journalist whose work has appeared in Columbia Journalism Review, In These Times, Politico, and many other publications.</div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">
</div></div><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">pope francis</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">1219 dn also blk friday materialism</font></div></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/joker-a-harsh-indictment-of-neoliberalism-and-gangster-capitalism/" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/joker-a-harsh-indictment-of-neoliberalism-and-gangster-capitalism/</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></div><div><p style="margin: 0px 0px 17px; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b><a href="https://rooseveltinstitute.org/the-failures-of-neoliberalism-are-bigger-than-politics/" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">Neoliberalism as a form of gangster capitalism sells the lie that</a> destroying the Commons, the social safety net, social democracy and a sense of shared human obligation </b>—<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"> and cutting taxes on the rich — will somehow create economic growth, prosperity and “freedom” for all people. After several decades of failed experiments, such economic and social policies <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/nov/14/the-fatal-flaw-of-neoliberalism-its-bad-economics" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">have been disproved</a>. In reality, neoliberalism is “socialism” and “welfare” for the richest individuals and largest corporations — and “survival of the fittest” for everyone else.</span></font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 17px; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">To maintain control of a public that is often despondent, suffering, at times near rebellion but also cowed by learned helplessness – neoliberal policymakers and other elites <b>use the punitive and punishing power of the state to quell dissent.</b></font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 17px; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Precarious economic circumstances also help to suppress resistance and even the act of imagining alternative, more democratic political possibilities and outcomes. Mass media, schools, and other agents of political socialization have convinced many Americans (and other people around the world) that consumerism, capitalism and democracy are the same thing.</span> People who live in societies dominated by neoliberalism and gangster capitalism are told that they are ultimately responsible for their own suffering and lack of success, <a href="https://www.oxfam.org/en/even-it/5-shocking-facts-about-extreme-global-inequality-and-how-even-it-davos" target="blank" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; transition: color 0.3s ease 0s; cursor: pointer;">even as income and wealth inequality soar</a>, life chances are truncated, and meritocracy is exposed as a sham.</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 17px; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>But perhaps the greatest power of neoliberalism and gangster capitalism is the control they assert over people’s emotional lives.</b> Neoliberal elites must create emotionally self-regulating subjects if “the system” is to remain stable and not collapse into chaos. A<span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">chieving that goal is advanced through various means, including “narco-capitalism” and the dopamine hits delivered by the internet and social media, whose success is predicated on loneliness and social atomization</span>. The technology of <b>“mindfulness”</b> also does the work of enforcing neoliberalism’s need for emotionally self-regulating subjects.</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 17px; box-sizing: border-box; outline: none; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.8;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">...</font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">... Phoenix’s Joker character rejects that order of things. Indeed, he rejects the entire regime of training and discipline demanded by neoliberalism.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"> In their new book “Manufacturing Happy Citizens,” Edgar Cabanas and Eve Illouz explain the role of “happiness scientists” in enforcing neoliberalism’s power over its subjects:</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Questioning the existing state of affairs, defamiliarizing the familiar, and inquiring in the processes, meanings and practices that shape our identities and everyday behaviour are fundamental endeavours of social critical thinking….</span>"</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">That happiness scientists have often been belligerent towards critical social thinking is no secret, calling it negative, deceptive, and even dishonest. These scientists believe that we should get rid of this kind of negativity because it only fuels pointless and fruitless claims for social and political change.</font></div></div></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div style="font-size: medium;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div style="font-size: medium;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-size: medium;"><a href="https://theconversation.com/what-orwells-1984-tells-us-about-todays-world-70-years-after-it-was-published-116940">https://theconversation.com/what-orwells-1984-tells-us-about-todays-world-70-years-after-it-was-published-116940</a></div><div style="font-size: medium;">
</div><div style="font-size: medium;">...<span style="color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px">Orwell’s telescreen was based in the technologies of television pioneered prior to World War II and could hardly be seen as science fiction. In the 1930s Germany had a working videophone system in</span><span style="color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px"> </span><a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3815277" style="font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" color="color" rgb="rgb" outline="outline" none="none" white-space="white-space" pre-wrap="pre-wrap" overflow-wrap="overflow-wrap" break-word="break-word">place</a><span style="color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px">, and television programs were already being broadcast in parts of the United States, Great Britain and</span><span style="color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px"> </span><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/107769900608300307" style="font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px" color="color" rgb="rgb" outline="outline" none="none" white-space="white-space" pre-wrap="pre-wrap" overflow-wrap="overflow-wrap" break-word="break-word">France</a><span style="color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px">.</span></div><div style="font-size: medium;"><span style="color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif" font-size="font-size" px="px">
</span></div><h2 style="margin: 0px 0px 12px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 23px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-rendering: optimizelegibility; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif">Past, present and future</h2><p style="font-size: 16px; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif">The dominant reading of “1984” has been that it was a dire prediction of what could be. In the words of Italian essayist <a href="https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/5856/umberto-eco-the-art-of-fiction-no-197-umberto-eco" style="color: rgb(85, 117, 133); outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">Umberto Eco,</a> “at least three-quarters of what Orwell narrates is not negative utopia, but <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=u7wTAQAAIAAJ&dq=umberto+eco+apocalypse&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=orwell" style="color: rgb(85, 117, 133); outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">history</a>.”</p><p style="font-size: 16px; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif">Additionally, scholars have also remarked how clearly “1984” describes the present.</p><p style="font-size: 16px; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif">In 1949, when the novel was written, Americans watched on average four and a half hours of television a day; in 2009, almost twice <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2018/05/when-did-tv-watching-peak/561464/" style="color: rgb(85, 117, 133); outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">that</a>. In 2017, television watching was slightly down, to eight hours, more time than we spent <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/166553/less-recommended-amount-sleep.aspx" style="color: rgb(85, 117, 133); outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">asleep</a>.</p><p style="font-size: 16px; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif">In the U.S. the information transmitted over television screens came to constitute a dominant portion of people’s social and psychological lives.</p><h2 style="margin: 0px 0px 12px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 23px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-rendering: optimizelegibility; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif">‘1984’ as present day</h2><p style="font-size: 16px; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">In the year 1984, however, there was much self-congratulatory coverage in the U.S. that the dystopia of the novel had not been realized<b>. But media studies scholar <a href="https://steinhardt.nyu.edu/faculty/Mark_Crispin_Miller" style="color: rgb(85, 117, 133); outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">Mark Miller</a> argued how the famous slogan from the book, “Big Brother Is Watching You” had been turned to “Big Brother is you, watching” <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41398748" style="color: rgb(85, 117, 133); outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">television</a>.</b></span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Miller argued that television in the United States teaches a different kind of conformity than that portrayed in the novel. In the novel, the telescreen is used to produce conformity to the Party.<b> In Miller’s argument, television produces conformity to a system of rapacious consumption – through advertising as well as a focus on the rich and famous. It also promotes endless productivity, through messages regarding the meaning of success and the virtues of hard <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41398748" style="color: rgb(85, 117, 133); outline: none; white-space: pre-wrap; overflow-wrap: break-word;">work</a>.</b></span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; margin: 0px 0px 18px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; color: rgb(56, 56, 56); font-family: " libre="Libre" baskerville="Baskerville" georgia="Georgia" times="Times" new="New" roman="Roman" serif="serif"><b>...</b></p><div style="font-size: medium;"><header style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 165px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; position: relative;"><div class="article--header" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><h2 style="margin: 0px 0px 12px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-rendering: optimizelegibility; float: none; line-height: 1em;"><a href="https://theconversation.com/what-orwells-1984-tells-us-about-todays-world-70-years-after-it-was-published-116940" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">What Orwell’s ‘1984’ tells us about today’s world, 70 years after it was published</font></a></h2><p class="byline" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 2px 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; line-height: 1.2; clear: both;"><span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/stephen-groening-447861" style="text-decoration-line: none; outline: none;">Stephen Groening</a>, <span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;">University of Washington</span></font></span></p></div></header><div class="content" data-raw="" style="margin: 0px 0px 0px 165px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In the year 1984, there was self-congratulatory coverage that the dystopia of the novel had not been realized. However, an expert argues that the technologies described in the novel are here and watching us.</font></span></div></div><div class="content" data-raw="" style="font-size: medium; margin: 0px 0px 0px 165px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><span style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; border: 0px; outline: 0px; vertical-align: baseline; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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