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I believe your statements are hyperstitious.

You are assuming an outcome and giving everyone in the system an "excuse" for showing up and doing this. That excuse is sufficient for them to destroy their future one decision at a time.

I also believe my statement is hyperstitious.

It creates personal responsibility for every individual actor in the system, and makes them way their votes for the future against the short-term gains of their actions.

I've seen people respond well to my hyperstitious stance.

I've had a phone operator for my local hospital drop a 4-figure unjust surprise bill by reminding them that they and their children also need to go to hospitals, walking them through what the system was doing to me and my family, and asking them if they were comfortable with that knowing they'll be on the other side of this phone call at some point.

I'm using this same philosophy with my local school district to drive meaningful change for handling cases where a teacher is caught abusing a student - and seeing positive results (though I'm not counting my chickens quite yet).

I'm using this same philosophy with my HOA to bring back community building events like potlucks and lemonade stands, things that have disappeared because of the liability of organizing them. (In our current low-trust society, a child needs to procure event insurance to run a lemonade stand on HOA property in case someone fakes a fall in front of their stand).

Regulations like these are great for crony capitalists and lawyers - they're awful for small businesses and families.

People simply doing the right thing because they believe it is the right thing is good for small businesses and families - and awful for crony capitalists and lawyers.

When it comes to our current society and driving the meaningful change most of us would like to see... I believe throughout history people have died on a hill for far less.

I'm in the camp of helping people see a better path forward, and I'm seeing positive change around me in my life when I deploy my philosophy. Your mileage may vary.

tl;dr: I believe your pessimistic take is a self fulfilling prophecy that reinforces people voting against their own self-interest one decision at a time.




Ok Good luck, I believe a lot of the mechanisms that fostered those behaviors make sense in a small community, where reputations and community bonds were crucial for well being, but we now live in the age of global capitalism, and global labor forces, and global competition. Those mechanisms don't scale so to speak but do enable you to win some local battles, and hopefully gain some friends/respect.




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