Hacker News Reader

Comment by throwawayyear22 | Hacker News Reader

In regards to the media, parents could be more dismissive of the doom and gloom. Instead I watch parents repeat in front of their children that corporations are evil, sea level will rise by 10's of feet soon, racism everywhere, reverse racism everywhere, the China Communists will take over the world, that the U.S. doesn't manufacture anything, etc.

I recall one adult in my entire childhood that laughed off a doom and gloom discussion and one other that said "relax you'll be fine". It immediately paused my chronic anxiety as calm is contagious.

View on HN

There is a book called “Simplicity Parenting” which I highly recommend. Basically, you’re right. Parents can cause PTSD in their children by fretting about current events. I’m my opinion, it is our job to insulate them until they are of an age where it’s appropriate to begin such exposure.

Hi, one of those parents here.

I have on occasion reminded my daughter that the world she’ll grow up in will not be as abundantly beautiful as it is today. Just as it isn’t for me compared to when I was younger.

I’ve also, at those times, reminded her that she has the power and responsibility to be a good steward of the world because nothing is writ in stone.

Just reminding you that cautionary tales aren’t always simply doom and gloom. As an adult who grew up with parents who were dismissive of the worlds problems, I felt sheltered and out of touch when I finally learned about some of the problems we would be facing as humans on this planet.

I have no desire to set up my kids like that. People like my parents took our world and shit on it for all of the generations that follow. They felt it was more important to be positive than face consequences. If we have another boomer generation, we _are_ goners.

> I have on occasion reminded my daughter that the world she’ll grow up in will not be as abundantly beautiful as it is today.

You have to know you're almost certainly wrong though? The world has been marching forward and forward every year to assume this next "catastrophe" is the one we can't solve is honestly ridiculous.

With all respect, the claim you are framing these stories as "cautionary tales" is questionable given certain tone of your writing.

Also the PP had examples where the counter example is simply demonstrated. That's what parents should do instead of repeating them with implied certainty. Of most concern, I can't recall a single doom story from my childhood that came true or that I could work on by the time I was an adult(e.g., we'll be out of oil in 25 years, the Russians will drop a bomb on us any day now, the Japanese will own the US soon, world population growth will lead to world wide famine, collapse of the USD, Social Security will end in 10 years, etc.). My childhood years (and possibly most of my life) were lost to depression, negative rumination, anxiety, and hopelessness. It was only until I limited interaction with doom-sayers that I finally have a clear, calm, and focused mind and that is a prerequisite for solving meaningful problems.

This sounds horrendous. The worst thing that you could say about your parent’s approach was that you felt “out of touch”. What do you think your child will say about you?

The idea that if people would stop talking how the world is so bad the world wouldn't be so bad is one of the strangest patterns of thinking I've seen pop up here more recently.

The world is in a state of decline, climate change being just one of many stressors on society. Pretending this is not the case doesn't make it go away, and if anything the media is aggressively downplaying the current situation we are in.

Anxiety and despair don't have to be the only reactions to decline, but we certainly won't get past those as long as people keep pretending everything is fine.

The world is not in decline. We do not live on a "spaceship earth" because of the potential for astroid/moon mining and space based solar panels. Technological progress continues to outstrip our environmental damage done in it's persuit, and ultimately only technological solutions will get us out of the current issues with climate change. That, and a healthy amount of climate adaptation.

Apocalyptic rhtoric is both wrong and a mind virus that cripples meaningful policy discussions.

I have my problems with Steven Pinker but this is one issue where he is so correct on it's not even funny.

> Technological progress continues to outstrip our environmental damage done in it's persuit, and ultimately only technological solutions will get us out of the current issues with climate change

I think that, increasingly, people disagree with this, but it is still a minority opinion.

> Technological progress continues to outstrip our environmental damage done in it's persuit, and ultimately only technological solutions will get us out of the current issues with climate change.

You've got your causal arrows backwards. Technological progress is fueled by environmental destruction and our use of fossil fuels. I recommend Smil's Energy and Civilization as a relatively neural view on the relationship between our energy usage and civilizational progress.

I understand where the mass denial comes from, recognizing the current state of collapse we are in uproot many of the essential structure of meaning we use to survive so our minds won't trivially let us see them.

Still it is ultimately healthier for everyone to come to grips with this rather than struggle through more and more aggressive and cognitively dissonant forms of denial.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com