Complex Numbers

Narcissists

This one's been hanging out in my queue for a while, so I don't really remember the point I was going to illustrate with it; a lot has changed since it was written. But some things haven't, so here it is.

How COVID exposed New Age Narcissism  
During this global pandemic that has disrupted life as we know it, many people have attempted to find the silver lining in the chaos

For some, the chaos is the silver lining.

Whatever my original point was, I usually appreciate the perspective of the ex-. That is, someone who used to be an insider and then found a different path. This is one of those stories.

I don't have a lot to quote from it, but it's worth a look.

An example of this paradigm shift is the mass exodus we are seeing away from the “New age/Conscious” community as it currently stands. This article is difficult for me to write, as I have been deeply integrated into this world for over 15 years. Still, like many of you, I have always felt that something was off, although I couldn’t pinpoint it underneath all of the blisstractions.

Ah, that's right... I was going to rag on "blisstractions."

There were a lot of goddesses, warriors, priestesses, and shamans, yet not enough humanity.

Claiming to be one of these things isn't a way to transcend humanity; it's a way to ignore it.

Disinformation and emotional manipulation have always been a part of human history.

In the past, it has convinced white people that Black people are not fully human. It has convinced parents to burn their own children for being witches. And it has sparked up thousands of religions and beliefs that people have been willing to kill and die for. However, due to the Internet, the speed of misinformation and manipulation spreading is at a record high, and humanity needs an Intellectual Renaissance to evolve and survive.

This is something I agree with. Intellectualism has its problems, too, but it's still better than superstition and fear.

You can believe whatever you want to believe, but ultimately, science and truth will prevail.

Unfortunately, by the time they do, it will be too late for us as a society. But hey, it's been a hell of a ride.

Someday, there will be a disease with a much higher mortality rate, which we will not be able to defeat based on how we handled coronavirus. It is easy to forget about the past that we never experienced ourselves. We never saw life before vaccines and medical advancements. But there was a time that a single plague wiped out a whopping 50% to 60% of Europe’s entire population.

I'd just like to point out here that there's an estimate floating around that the diseases the Europeans brought with them to the Americas might have wiped out as much as 90% of the indigenous population, in the 100 years or so between Columbus and Jamestown. Without this unintended biological warfare, the American continent would have a very, very different population right now.

Anyway, like I said: the article's worth a read, even if it says some hard things.