A question to you all

[GDS_Starfury]

Your friends Stalin. Mao, and the Japanese in China killed millions but that was for POWER, not Genocide.

there are a LOT of ex russian republics and Koreans that would strongly disagree, particularly the Ukrainians.

[GDS_Starfury]

Keeping a lid on revolting populations doesn't sound like very routine problems to me.

its the youth that are tired of religious authority and oppression.

[FarAway Sooner]

I'll go back to my original statement for those who found it TLDNR.

Mathematically, people are less likely to die in military conflict today than they have been in a long time.  Sir Andrew's charts aren't the only ones that talk about this.

Media has played a huge role in making us feel unsafe, because fear sells better than sex or threats to make people smell Gus' unwashed lingerie after it's been in his gym locker for a week.

[JasonPratt]

Before the thread gets RPF-locked, I'll suggest the hypothesis that genocide is always done for the sake of power, though the power involved can vary in kind, scope, and degree.

Also, we're always heading toward a new world war, generally speaking. Moreso than usually sometimes.

[Gusington]

Slash, WWI and WWII may have started politically, which is arguable, but devolved into ethnic cleansing on a scale we can barely embrace in 2023 at every conflict point around the globe where those wars were fought. And beyond. Like race riots in the U.S., for example.

[ArizonaTank]

Military death rates are one thing but what about civilian death rates? 

There needs to be a study on civilian death rates caused by war, crime, dictatorial regimes, etc. 

Civilian death rates are tracked in the above. 

Here's actually a great resource that that the graph came from that goes into it way better.

https://ourworldindata.org/war-and-peace

I agree that we live in a more peaceful world than previous generations.

What is different is that technology has made news reporting more efficient.

Humans are hard-wired to react to danger signals, and the news media happily feeds them to us. It keeps us clicking and driving up their advertising revenues.

This is not new; Hearst and Pulitzer famously made a boatload of money pushing fear and sensationalism during the 1890s and 1900s for example.

What is different is that today, anybody with a decent computer, and some free time can create believable images and stories, real and faked. Good actors and bad actors can then distribute this real and fake news globally in an instant. "Influencers" have used this technology to build careers, large audiences and lucrative revenue streams by feeding us the most recent 'outrage' and 'existential crisis' on a minute-by-minute basis.     

This 24-hour cycle of bad news makes us feel like we are continuously in the "s$#t can," to use the technical term.

So even thought I think things are better now than they have been throughout most of history, our constant diet of bad news and outrage still makes us feel like our world is falling apart.

However, having said that all of that, I do think there is a potential major danger on horizon. The situation brewing in the Pacific seems very pre-WWII-like to me.

[Windigo]

There's also way too many people on this planet. Leave me alone and get off my lawn.

That's the spirit Gus!

[Windigo]

We have also had long periods of peace which were interupted by war.  The Congress of Vienna comes to mind as the most extreme example, a century of peace followed by the two worst wars in human history.
There is also criticism of Pinker's Better Angels of Our Nature:https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/mar/13/john-gray-steven-pinker-wrong-violence-war-declining
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-02148-1

I actually agree with the criticism that Pinker is far too optimistic that human nature has improved leading to less military conflict. 

I'd argue more that the decrease in war is only partly tied to secular humanistic improvement but much more tied to the great powers being so financially interconnected and inseparable with weapons stockpiles so potentially catastrophic that war is increasingly not a palatable or profitable option.

This has been, to my mind, why wars have gotten smaller and fought more often with and among secondary or lower powers.

IMO, this is pretty close to the truth.

When physically fought wars become high risk affairs and offer little in potential profit to the combatants' cabals (right word? maybe?), why inflame the masses?

BTW This lowkey internet war we got going needs to be hammered down ASAP, it's already putting long term fractures into western societies.

[Windigo]

There can be no denying that the whole Middle East is ready for a massive bloodletting

literally no middle eastern country wants a regional war right now.  theyve all got their own problems and many are barely keeping a lid on their population revolting against religious extremism.

Interestingly, the role of water supply will play more importantly in these areas.

[MOS:96B2P]

Keeping a lid on revolting populations doesn't sound like very routine problems to me.

its the youth that are tired of religious authority and oppression.

I think this is true for much of the youth in Iran. I wish we would do more to encourage Iran's youth. Since the Mullahs control the education system and so much of everyday life in Iran I'm surprised there is any resistance from their youth. IMO we need to "assist" said youth.

However in most Middle East countries, outside of Iran, I'm not sure the youth are tired of religious authority and oppression. I wish they were. You can watch videos of the youth marching in the streets, chanting death to America, supporting Hamas ect. This includes youth from the Middle East that attend universities in Western countries. I think this forces many Arab leaders to take anti Israeli positions in public. To keep a lid on their population including their youth.

Surprisingly the Iranian youth seem to be the exception to the rule.

[FarAway Sooner]

I think the Iranian youth have been under the bootheel of strict religious authority the longest in the region (excepting maybe the Saudis).  The Middle East has been a mess for a long time now. 

I think most of the Arab and Muslim leaders take anti-Israel positions to scapegoat "the other" and deflect attention away from their own failures.  It's the same thing that they do to the Americans, and it's the same thing that the Russian kleptocracy has done to the West in recent years.

[Jarhead0331]

I think perceptions are definitely being driven substantially by the nature of the modern media cycle. However, I think anxiety over the state of the world is due to more than just that, and while I think there are a number of factors at play, another major issue in my view is the overall lack of clear strategy and strong leadership, in the US and the West in general. To get too deep into the causes of this I think would encourage crossing over the line into RPFM, so I'll be purposefully ambiguous and general.

In the past, the US and its NATO partners had clearly defined goals with focus and a strategy to pursue achieving those goals. When there were setbacks, tragedies, losses, uncertainty and instability, there were leaders whom we could put our faith and confidence in to choose the proper path, even if it would be costly. Sadly, those days are gone and those who are piloting the ship have lost their insight, wisdom, purpose and compass. So now, when there is uncertainty or instability, we no longer have anyone to look up to with the faith that they will steer us through the night. This in turn, has led to fear, loathing and hopelessness. 

[Gusington]

^Absolutely agree on that...we need stronger leadership in the West.

In some of the videos I have posted in the last few days on the Middle East (Warographics, mostly, some TLDR) - a good point was made on Iran and Lebanon: their internal problems and crappy economies may be keeping their responses to the current violence tempered a bit.

Internal Iranian dissent probably won't keep Iranian proxies under control, like Hezbollah, but the horrendous Lebanese economy may keep Hezbollah curbed. I also did not know how large Hezbollah was: 100,000 men and equipped with a lot of modern technology. Much larger than Hamas.

Not sure how internal problems in Lebanon or Iran will keep other militias or random rocket attacks like the one near Yemen under control.

[JasonPratt]

The Houthis are sort of like



Though to extend the meme, they may soon be like

[FarAway Sooner]

There can be no denying that the whole Middle East is ready for a massive bloodletting

literally no middle eastern country wants a regional war right now.  theyve all got their own problems and many are barely keeping a lid on their population revolting against religious extremism.

Just as an aside, if we're able to totally revolutionize power generation sometime in the 30 years (e.g., fusion reactors), one of the biggest technological capabilities that suddenly becomes easy is desalinization on a massive level.  In effect, most of the Middle East would be trading an abundance of fresh water for a crushing shortfall of money from petroleum energy exports.

Lord only knows how that would work out, but it seems unlikely to solve the structural problems, which have more to do with ethnic and religious divisions and poor governance.  JMHO, of course.  I've never lived or even traveled in that part of the world, so you can take my opinions with a small grain of salt!

Interestingly, the role of water supply will play more importantly in these areas.