197
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] Etterra@lemmy.world 48 points 10 months ago

IMO the problem really took off when smart phones entered the equation. When any idiot can get online with almost zero barrier to entry, then every idiot will get online. It's why I like Lemmy; it's not popular and the difficulty to access it is marginally harder than Reddit's.

Once the Internet was saturated with idiots then marketing and monetization followed along. Capitalism is seriously the 5th Horseman of the Apocalypse.

[-] NielsBohron@lemmy.world 20 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

I agree with everything you said, except I would argue that capitalism is the Sixth Horseman of the Apocalypse, seeing as one of the original four was already replaced during a translation. The original text were interpreted as "Conquest, War, Famine, and Death," and the story I remember from my New Testament course in college was that in the early 1900's, it was thought that Conquest was too similar to War, so they used one of the later passages that specified that the horsemen would bring death by "sword, famine, plague, and the wild beasts of the earth" to rebrand Conquest as Pestilence. In fact, now reading up on it from Wikipedia, apparently the first two horsemen were likely both supposed to represent war, with the white rider (Conquest) representing "righteous/justified war" and the red rider (War) supposed to represent "civil war," which is interesting.

In fact, given how vaccines and modern medicine have dramatically lowered the death by infectious disease in the 20th century, it's likely time for another rebranding (relevant xkcd), so I'd replace "pestilence" with "capitalism" or even "profit" if I were feeling flowery.

edit: Upon further reading, apparently the third horseman (Famine) could also be interpreted as a form of capitalistic excess, since it's accompanied by a voice that describes rising market prices for staples such as bread and is carrying market scales. Traditionally, this is thought to indicate Famine as loaves of bread would be weighed during food shortages, but the accompanying voice seems to indicate that luxuries are still available, so I could easily make the argument that the passage is about the rich tending to their own needs while ignoring the needs of the poor (which sounds an awful lot like modern US politics/capitalism).

Edit 2: So I guess I'd rebrand all three of the riders preceding Death so that I'd interpret things as "Imperialism, Extremism, Capitalism, and Death," or put a little more poetically, "Conquest, Discord, Avarice, and Death"

[-] paraphrand@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago

Those would be good App names. One is already taken…

I assume I’m just unaware of the others.

[-] crapwittyname@lemmy.ml 3 points 10 months ago

Comments like this restore my faith in the internet

[-] NielsBohron@lemmy.world 7 points 10 months ago

Haha, I'm just glad at least some people enjoy reading them, since I can't help but write them (and listening to my endless digressions down Wikipedia rabbit holes is exhausting for my partner).

[-] shalafi@lemmy.world 3 points 10 months ago

In Good Omens Pestilence has retired and Pollution took his place. And if you haven't read it, it's damned clever and funny.

[-] NielsBohron@lemmy.world 2 points 10 months ago

I have read it, but I forgot about that detail until you reminded me. I probably have to reread now :)

this post was submitted on 02 Nov 2023
197 points (96.2% liked)

Technology

58115 readers
4141 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots


founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS