2016 Wrapup

As this foul year of our lord 2016 draws to a close, the need and desire to make sense and summation of it all is stronger than ever. A lot of bad things happened. A lot of famous people cherished by those of us jacked into the 24/7 media cycle passed away. Geopolitically, some really bad stuff went down. From Brexit to the rigging of the Democratic Primary in the United States to the election of Donald Trump to the White House. For the rest of the world, Africa is still hurting from political uncertainty, the Middle East is rife with conflict while their wealth reaches levels never before witnessed on Earth. Australia is destroying its corner of the planet and South Asia is reeling from pollution, lack of resources, and overpopulation among other things.

These are the terrible aspects of reality that are drilled into us on a daily basis by every media outlet. We have reached a point where we actively take part in reinforcing the focus on the negative events through social media. But we must not forget that inertia exists. A lot of really great things happened in 2016.

We have begun producing renewable energy at a rate that is unprecedented. The latest foreign oil pipeline planned for construction across the United States was successfully thwarted by peaceful protest. A new prime number was discovered in 2016. A new form of data storage was pioneered that could store information for billions of years. SpaceX successfully demonstrated their reusable space craft concepts. Major breakthroughs were made in overcoming physical paralysis.

Here is a more comprehensive list of scientific breakthroughs that occurred in 2016.

Unfortunately, the society and culture at large in the first world is still reeling from the near-flawless disinformation and propaganda campaign that has been leveraged against citizens by state-sponsored organizations. For the most part, dread about the future is the most pervasive emotion among Americans. The fact that our political processes and institutions are corrupt and ineffective at achieving the common goals has never been more clear than right now. Yet, due to the effective propaganda and masterful inception of uncertainty through social media outlets, Americans still mostly support the politicians and systems that they decry and complain about. This reality does not make a whole lot of sense at first glance; but upon further examination, this state of seeming disarray becomes obviously crafted and expertly controlled for the benefit of the few humans who possess control of the world’s capital.

This is not a conspiracy. This is how it is and there is no way it can be disproven. Literally no one disputes this as being true. Instead, we just ignore it.

2017 will not bring some end to the onslaught of terror that occurred in 2016. This will continue to get worse for the world at large according to the media. Social media participants will continue to echo the doom and gloom parroted by the news outlets with the highest exposure and thus the social landscape will continue to grow more desolate. The economy that most middle and lower class first-world humans will continue to shrink and income inequality will become titanic and unconquerable.

Perhaps more people will pull the plug on the feeds that wage psychological terrorism against them. Maybe people will decide to stop honoring a system they complain about. Could public servants think about the oathes they took to serve their citizens and realize that there is no oath that binds them to their governments?

Few people are willing to take responsibility for themselves and their decisions. When this changes and the pool of individuals who recognize their complicity in the state of the world becomes larger than a small percentage of the whole, Earth will experience the advancement humanity has dreamed of for centuries.

Watch less television. Read more books. Acquire new skills. Improve your existing skills.

Good luck.