Generation Mid
A couple of months ago I went down a rabbit hole exploring the history of humanity after watching this kurzgesagt vid. From our early days sharing the earth with animals that have since gone extinct, to where we are now, we have truly come a long way and survived against all odds! I watched videos about the revolutions that reshaped us/the disasters that changed us and I’m genuinely in awe of what we’ve managed to achieve in such a short amount of time (relatively). But as much as I’m profoundly impressed by the generations that came before us, I’m even more ashamed by our current one. At best, we’re mid.
Like other species, we’ve passed knowledge down over generations. Like other species, our insights don’t disappear when we die, they compound. This means new generations don’t have to start from scratch, they get to build directly on top of the past. But what we’ve achieved with this inherited knowledge (and our big brains) is part of what separates us from the rest. It’s pretty clear we’re the superior species, which is what makes our collective stupidity impossible to understand. With all this accumulated wisdom, all these advancements, why do people in the world still not have access to the basic needs?
It’s 2026. You and I happen to be alive at the most advanced moment in human history. Thanks to the many tech, agricultural, communication, logical and medical advancements, we’re lightyears ahead of our ancestors and every other species to have ever existed. Most of the threats that once terrorised them are things we’ve conquered and now take for granted. We won the survival game a long time ago. We don’t exist at the mercy of nature, we literally control it.
I think another thing that separates us from other animals is our unique ability to believe in shared fictions (currency/laws/nations). These are the tools we invented to build massive interconnected societies. But when you look at the world today, we’ve somehow become prisoners of our own creations. We treat things like the economy as if they’re unchangeable laws of nature rather than flexible inventions our human minds created.
I’m going to say something controversial but I need you to stay with me. At this point in time, poverty and scarcity are a choice. These are problems we’ve solved yet we allow them to persist. You can argue that scarcity exists in nature but in our globally connected world, we’ve overcome that hurdle. We have everything we need to redistribute our resources to ensure basic needs are met.
Poverty is a choice for as long as we choose not to eradicate it. We have the logistics, the tech and the means to make life on earth paradise for everyone but the people who need never receive because the people who have refuse to give. We’re blinded by an urge to hoard and accumulate massive amounts of wealth at the detriment of everyone else, all for a concept (money) we made up. This is the reality we’ve willingly settled for.
I’m not interested in the 1 person can’t change the world narrative anymore because it’s what I’ve used to look the other way and accept the way things are. All it did was leave me cynical and complacent. But right now, I’m deeply embarrassed of being a human. Our greatness isn’t some ambitious goal to work towards in the future. It’s here now. All around us. I’m embarrassed to exist during the absolute peak of our species' capability and to look around and realise that this isn’t the best we could do, it’s the reality we’ve settled for.
We need to stop treating poverty like it’s an inevitably and start calling it a systemic crime. We need to stop asking if a better world is possible and start demanding it. To start holding people accountable for their contributions to this reality. More importantly, it’s time to start holding ourselves accountable for our collective complacency