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this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2024
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Lovecraft Mythos - Cosmic Horror
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H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos is a shared universe far larger and more terrifying than that of humanity, where ancient, malevolent beings known as the Great Old Ones slumber in the depths of space or time. After Lovecraft's death, the Mythos has been expanded and developed by many authors, including August Derleth, Clark Ashton Smith, and Robert E. Howard. These and many other authors have helped to flesh out the Mythos into a rich and complex Dark Universe.
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"could, theoretically", sure.
but in practice those condemnations are too broadly applied and don't reflect the constant struggle for progress or range of human success.
What an appropriate subject of conversation, because I'm pretty sure by the art style this is Existential Comics.
The use of "in practice" suggests an absolute morality, which I think Lovecraft would object to, and I think many Lemmy users would as well. That aside, pretty much the only counter to this is that we've toned down the war, slavery and brutal exploitation over the last 200 years. The last 10,000 before that and probably the last 200,000 before that are kind of the same thing happening over and over again. What's more, nobody can adequately explain why it's suddenly started to improve, or if it will stay that way. For all we know, we live in the turbulent transition period between agrarian hereditary autocracy and dystopian high-tech hereditary autocracy.
All in all, humanity is (morally) shit by humanity's own standards. By nihilistic or existential standards humanity is neutral, as is everything else. Cthulhu's standards are canonically beyond comprehension.
"The use of "in practice" suggests an absolute morality"
how?
The ability to choose how you act suggests and "absolute morality?"
"which I think Lovecraft would object to"
why?
he had pretty black and white beliefs, like ranking races objectively.
"I think many Lemmy users would as well."
I don't see your polls for all of your conjectures-
"That aside"
oh you're just writing stuff that you don't even care enough about to support.
"the only counter to this..."
a pretty good counter to this is the justification of collective punishment
One person from a city of a million people commits murder, and you agree that The logical conclusion is to execute the population of that City in its entirety.
that's a poorly reasoned and executed reaction.
Why are you executing all those children? Why are you executing all the mothers and fathers and couples, the teachers and firefighters tirelessly working to create a better society?
what about the animals in that city, are they all spared and taken care of after your genocide?
No? cthulhu destroys the entire ecosystem as well?
obviously collective genocide and indiscriminate destruction is not the answer to specific acts of sporadic violence.
it's a lazy , cynical, convenient solution embracing the cowardly destruction of life it purports to censure.
"humanity is (morally) shit by humanity's own standards"
No, humanity is shit by your limited standards.
I'm not sure how to respond to that many one-liner points all at once, so I'll pick and choose (quite) a bit.
Speaking of, your last point is literally just "no u", so no, I'm not going to run a poll of users. It's pretty insulting you'd expect effort that lopsided.
Lovecraft certainly had an (ahem) strong affinity for human, specifically white, specifically Anglo-American morality, aesthetics and general ways of doing things. He also acknowledged and deeply hated that there were other ways of doing things. In fact, the whole point of his Mythos was that, in a universe then-recently discovered to have multiple galaxies full of billions of stars each, nothing may be universal (and that we should be afraid). His letters make that pretty clear.
If you're a moral relativist, there is no practical side to morality separate from the theory, since it's an arbitrary construct. You choose a theory of morality, and then the theory and it's application is all you have.
I'm not agreeing with Cthulhu here. We were talking about the whether these are valid, non-hypocritical reasons he could want to destroy humanity, which is a separate question from if he then should. It's possible to not believe in punishment at all! Then you came in saying humans are pretty great actually, and that's the claim I'm really interested in examining. You didn't substantially respond about that, though.
"I'm not going to run a poll of users"
nobody asked you to, and you not having this knowledge is precisely my point.
I'm specifically pointing out that you're drawing conclusions based on your assumptions about how tens of thousands of people think that you have no evidence for.
"you'd expect effort that lopsided."
I do not expect you to source or logically reason out your conclusions; that is the problem with your assumptions, as I mentioned in my previous comment.
"I'm not agreeing with Cthulhu here."
Great, that's one down.
"Then you came in saying humans are pretty great actually"
you are incorrect.
I said "collective genocide and indiscriminate destruction is not the answer to specific acts of sporadic violence"
"that's the claim I'm really interested in examining[your own claim that humans are pretty great]."
That is a claim you made, not a claim I made, but there's plenty of supporting evidence.
What specifically are you curious about regarding "humans being pretty great"?
"You didn't substantially respond about that, though."
a natural response to not having received any questions.
Alright, since you seem like the kind of person that appreciates hyper-literalness:
Do you intend to imply that "the constant struggle" makes humanity more worthy than our actions would imply, yes or no?
If yes, than you're saying, relative to what was previously implied, that humans are pretty great. I supplied some reasons that they aren't.
If no, why do you have a problem with what I said?
Alternately, if you do not have a problem with what I said, why are you here?
"you seem like the kind of person that appreciates hyper-literalness"
not really, I'm more of a stickler for accuracy, consistency and intention, and you really noodle around with those.
"Do you intend to imply..."
nope
"why do you have a problem with what I said"
you were defending the reasoning for global genocide(I know you're whistling a different tune in later comments, I'm talking about why I refuted your earlier defense of genocide) as a response to me saying that global genocide is not an appropriate punishment for humanity's failings.
I don't have a particular problem with you as a person, I'm pointing out flaws in your reasoning and I feel that your affirmation of genocide as a viable punitive response to humanity is disgusting.
maybe distasteful now, rather than disgusting, since you've backpedaled your support for genocide in recent comments.
it's not you in particular, I feel the same way about everyone in this thread who are cynically giving genocide the thumbs up as a concept or "joke" while probably posting "supportive" Palestinian flags and comments on social media.
Same thing. Most people find it abrasive and unnatural, but I can roll this way too.
Please quote the earlier defense of genocide.
"Please quote the earlier defense of genocide."
it's kind of long, but sure.
bear in mind that the topic is global genocide, the context to your comment is my disagreement that global genocide is justified, and you are arguing that cthulhu's reasoning is valid:
"...the only counter to this is that we’ve toned down the war, slavery and brutal exploitation over the last 200 years. The last 10,000 before that and probably the last 200,000 before that are kind of the same thing happening over and over again. What’s more, nobody can adequately explain why it’s suddenly started to improve, or if it will stay that way. For all we know, we live in the turbulent transition period between agrarian hereditary autocracy and dystopian high-tech hereditary autocracy.
All in all, humanity is (morally) shit...
you further claim that humanity is shit by humanity's standards, but are speaking only for yourself and by your own reasoning, thereby identifying your own personal and singular standards, rather than "humanity's".
you have robustly defended the reasoning for global genocide.
I robustly defended humanity being unsavory. I did not robustly defend genocide. To justify Cthulhu's premise is to not to justify his conclusion. I left the logical connection between the two unexamined.
"I robustly defended humanity being unsavory."
defending a position that nobody is attacking.
"I did not robustly defend genocide."
The comic is making the joke that because humanity is so bad, cthulhu will commit global genocide.
your argument, in response to my comment that condemns global genocide, is that cthulhu largely makes good points points.
for global genocide.
you're defending the reasoning for global genocide.
"To justify Cthulhu's premise is to not to justify his conclusion."
his conclusion is inextricably tied to his premise, and you pointedly did not separate the two in your comments until I pointed out to you that you are defending genocide.
"I left the logical connection between the two unexamined."
you say "all the rest could theoretically apply" referring to your agreement with cthulhu's reasonings for global genocide.
you explicitly make that connection.
It is not inextricable. From a utilitarian perspective, for example, humanity could still produce far more utility that it's many indiscretions remove.
It was not pointed - it was merely omitted for the sake of expediency, along with commentary on the fictional nature of Cthulhu, or the fact that in cannon he does not speak English.
To say "could theoretically" is not the same as "does" - there are many ethical systems that have been proposed.
"It is not inextricable."
it is within the context of the comic and my comment, which your comment is responding to.
"it was merely omitted for the sake of expediency..."
you made a whoopsie and defended genocide, that is what I've been saying.
I don't think you're a terrible person, you got caught up in the hip cynicism of the mob in the comments and agreed with them that genocide is justifiable.
I disagree.
"...there are many ethical systems that have been proposed."
and yet you identified with the justifications for global genocide.
At no point in the past week have I supported genocide, and defending part of an argument is not defending the whole. Nor do I expect most to read it that way in such a jocular setting.
I don't think you're a terrible person either.
Yes you have, and yes it is in the context of what you're defending.
it's good that you have faith in people to misunderstand what you've written for what you have come to assert you mean.
"...in such a jocular setting."
The jocular context of punitive global genocide based on reasoning you and other commenters find "actually" sound.
I mean, supported in the personal belief sense. I can assure you that it was never intended, even if that was accidentally conveyed.
Natural language is inherently imprecise. It only works because there's shared background to interpret it on.
Dark humour is a thing, you'll see it everywhere on the internet - I'm sure you know that. This is no exception.
there is not much of a joke here.
cthulhu decides to commit indiscriminate genocide because of humanity's violent acts.
a human agrees.
that is the comic.
because cynicism is hip and internet comments are supposed to be edgy rather than thoughtful, people are defending genocide without understanding what they are agreeing with, as you have.
most people don't realize what they're doing, but you and the other commenters are nodding along with the non-joke that everybody should be killed because humanity has problems.
that's not a joke, that's irresponsible defeatist anxiety.
I prefer to rage against the dying of the light.
The joke is that Cthulhu is usually unreasonable (at least by human standards), but is able to logically explain himself to the satisfaction of the human shown. This is unexpected.
I'll leave you with this: cynicism is hip, but it's exactly as irrational to start with optimism. You've got to start with what is, and what ought to be and work from there.
that's not the joke.
"cynicism is hip, but it's exactly as irrational to start with optimism."
being cynical doesn't help anyone or anything. being optimistic does help things.
"You've got to start with what is, and what ought to be and work from there."
this is what I do.
you and the others defending "reasonable" genocide is not working toward what "ought to be", unless you believe that what "ought to be" is giving up on life or some drastic action like global genocide (which is also giving up)
Existential comics is a humour series. I disagree, it's a joke.
If that's what you do, good for you. For every few dark jokes there's someone posting "orphan crushing machine" style glurg. Optimism in the face of horrors or no hope is just unhealthy denial.
I was not trying to fix the world with that post, I agree. Sometimes I do write something that helps someone, though. IRL I do a bunch of volunteer work.
The comic is supposed to be a joke, your attempted misdirect that the joke is about cthulhu's reasoning abilities is incorrect and doesn't track.
the comic wants to make a joke about the world being so bad that even a human can be convinced that all the humans should be killed by a world killing entity.
"Optimism in the face of horrors or no hope is just unhealthy denial"
absolutely incorrect.
this statement is a symptom of your poisoned worldview that allows you and the others to unironically defend the reasoning for global genocide.
optimism in the face of horrors is not "denial", it springs from a more complete understanding of the world that you can change things.
I know that I can change things for the better because I change things for the better, whether it's difficult or not.
people who assume things can't change are the reason things don't change.
Guess you need to volunteer more.
No, I assure you, there's plenty of people that think they have all the solutions, and given the chance would turn everything upside-down on their snipe hunt. For every good idea there's someone who thinks we just need a purge day, or a lot of tiny bunkers. The "good people that do nothing" are shit too, I guess.
Do you honestly think you can fix everything yourself? I hope not; stepping off the hard-edged debate thing a bit, I had a really rough time when I found out that's not real life.
"there's plenty of people that think they have all the solutions"
don't know how you segued here, are you trying to get something off your chest?
"For every good idea there's someone who thinks we just need a purge day"
not sure why you're veering right here either.
are you saying you thought these things before and now you don't?
"The "good people that do nothing" are shit too, I guess."
they're not great.
"Do you honestly think you can fix everything yourself?"
did someone tell you I could or did you come to that conclusion yourself?
flattering.
"I had a really rough time when I found out that's not real life"
so it took you a pretty long time to realize that you can only control your own actions?
avoiding uncomfortable truths is probably tied into why you're finding it difficult to take responsibility for your comments here .
I was providing a counterexample. Activists are are people who believe things can change, but are always trainwrecks personally. When they're on the right side of history it's luck - there's just as as many that aren't.
I don't think I was ever like that exactly, no. And I certainly never have supported a purge day or Hoxha bunkers - those were just a couple especially easy-to-understand examples. If you want self-criticism I have plenty, but it's not like that.
That's what I was responding to in the second part about fixing things yourself. I volunteer, and it's basically like trying to piss out a housefire most of the time. We don't change things for the better perceptibly.
You're wrong about what I commented originally, but I've covered why fully so I'm just ignoring that now. Where we can maybe exchange useful information is on optimism.
preface: you know what, writing this was still fun, don't take my outrage too seriously.
no wait, don't take the outrage too personally.
take the outrage seriously, but not personally.
"Activists are always trainwrecks personally."
objectively untrue. in fact, I'm an activist and I'm killing it.
Stop making these obviously incorrect absolute statements.
absolute statements are never correct (this is a joke. notice how I made an absolute statement about absolute statements being never correct).
some people are train wrecks. some people are not.
it took you so long to write this response and you get basic facts incorrect in the second sentence.
geez.
sorry, you interrupted me in the middle of macgruber and you start off from such an indefensible, inaccurate point right off the bat.
"I don't think I was ever like that exactly"
you don't think you were exactly like an activist train wreck analogy that you just made up that nobody accused you of being?
Great. super relevant stuff you got going.
I also don't think you were ever exactly a tap-dancing hippopotamus, another thing nobody was talking about.
"We don't change things for the better perceptibly."
If you really are a volunteer and not making a difference, that sucks.
maybe try firefighting? or americorps? something that you'll be able to perceive as directly helpful with each action.
"...I'm just ignoring that now."
Great, thanks for ignoring it so much. you wrote a bunch of paragraphs about it.
"Where we can maybe exchange useful information is on optimism."
noooo thank you, we are not on the same level to be able to exchange useful information.
you're a total negative Nelly.
If you want help or a different perspective, you can ask for it, I do not need anything from your side, thank you for the oblique offer.
We aren't working together.
I am proactively pointing out that global genocide is an unreasonable punitive device, you are arguing that hey, the eldritch God advocating for genocide makes some points.
look, you're in the negotiation phase where you're trying to find common ground, but you should probably give up because none of the other phases have worked for you.
you previously thought there were arguments to be made for genocide, now you're rethinking your position.
that's great!
that's literally all I was trying to do with my comment, remind everybody who's making cynical pro-genocide comments that as practical measures or even as a "joke", none of the arguments make sense and believing that they do just shifts you further toward the authoritarian powers trying to crush your spirit and sense of community.
you eventually responded correctly by critically re-examining your beliefs.
that's great.
I'm going back to magruber.
Literally, 99%+ are trainwrecks. The ones that aren't are there by accident. There are nice people, and strong people; nobody is both.
I don't know you, but I think there's an elevated chance you're a rare exception just based on your very unconventional style. If so, you'll figure it out eventually.
Check my history, I just haven't been on Lemmy for a couple days.
The analogy continues. You can piss out a thing in the house, and that's good and why we do it, but it's probably just going to catch again as long as the house burns.
Enjoy macgruber, and have a nice life.
"Literally, 99%+ are trainwrecks"
haha, instead of "literally" when you mean "anecdotally", try "99% of the activists I know are train wrecks"
far less available comment that makes way more sense as supporting evidence for whatever point you're making.
"you're a rare exception"
I am! that's very nice of you to say, eh?
"it's probably just going to catch again as long as the house burns."
that's fine, you keep fixing it. putting out fires every day doesn't mean you're not making a difference, it just means there are a lot of fires that need your help.