![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
New Years Again
Dec. 31st, 2007 10:52 pmThis hasn't really been the best year, looking back on things. On the internet, there's the fanlib debacle, the livejournal debacles, the net neutrality debacle, the copyright debacle... (But they were debacles, isn't that something?) The stuff I'm learning at college kind of sucks, too. The older I get, the greater the number of people I disagree with, and the more certain I am we're all doomed because of that.
I had a project for an environmental class. I was going to do it on one of the billion bad things, but then I remembered that this puts me in a crushing depression, so I tried to make my project a solution, just run over some of the more out-there theories. And there were some out-there theories that kind of sucked, but there was one that I thought was really a good idea, solving several environmental issues in one blow.
Where'd you hear about that? asked a classmate, and I stammered something about not hearing about it exactly, it was from a lot of ideas I'd read but I'd put them together that way myself.
And you know, that really sucks. A lot of times I wish someone would reply that I'm wrong, that I overlooked this or that, that there's a good reason no one tried it I just missed. Because if I'm right, and that's right, then I'm the only one who sees it. And maybe I could make people see it and maybe I couldn't, and it doesn't matter because I'm not in any position to do anything about it and I probably never will be.
And yet, we're moving. We're rushing toward the future all the same. Even the conservative faction aren't trying to take us into the past really. They're nostalgic for a time that doesn't exist, and that makes it a future of a sort as well, even if I disagree with the aim. And in the end, we're human and we're making progress. Once it was progressives who limited workdays, who made a minimum wage. Now it's progressives who want health care. The mainstream media is broken and monstrous, but here we are, talking to each other. It doesn't matter how far we slide back if we remember. Change comes slow when it's inconceivable. Once people know it's possible, just taken away from them, they'll fight for it. And I do think we progress.
Mom bought Chinese dwarf hamsters, babies. They're calm and alert and beautiful, clutching at my fingers when I pick them up. When I touch their backs, I can feel tiny, fragile bones. Little things, smaller than mice. There are laws against hurting them. Isn't that wonderful? Two hundred years ago, it was okay to beat horses to death in the street. Think of the difference between then and now. Today, I heard another state is allowing civil unions. Is this great news to shout from the rooftops? No. It's progress. The people who oppose gay marriage are the oldest generation, and the people who support it the youngest. The small things today grow.
Maybe in time. Maybe not. But...we'll see.
I had a project for an environmental class. I was going to do it on one of the billion bad things, but then I remembered that this puts me in a crushing depression, so I tried to make my project a solution, just run over some of the more out-there theories. And there were some out-there theories that kind of sucked, but there was one that I thought was really a good idea, solving several environmental issues in one blow.
Where'd you hear about that? asked a classmate, and I stammered something about not hearing about it exactly, it was from a lot of ideas I'd read but I'd put them together that way myself.
And you know, that really sucks. A lot of times I wish someone would reply that I'm wrong, that I overlooked this or that, that there's a good reason no one tried it I just missed. Because if I'm right, and that's right, then I'm the only one who sees it. And maybe I could make people see it and maybe I couldn't, and it doesn't matter because I'm not in any position to do anything about it and I probably never will be.
And yet, we're moving. We're rushing toward the future all the same. Even the conservative faction aren't trying to take us into the past really. They're nostalgic for a time that doesn't exist, and that makes it a future of a sort as well, even if I disagree with the aim. And in the end, we're human and we're making progress. Once it was progressives who limited workdays, who made a minimum wage. Now it's progressives who want health care. The mainstream media is broken and monstrous, but here we are, talking to each other. It doesn't matter how far we slide back if we remember. Change comes slow when it's inconceivable. Once people know it's possible, just taken away from them, they'll fight for it. And I do think we progress.
Mom bought Chinese dwarf hamsters, babies. They're calm and alert and beautiful, clutching at my fingers when I pick them up. When I touch their backs, I can feel tiny, fragile bones. Little things, smaller than mice. There are laws against hurting them. Isn't that wonderful? Two hundred years ago, it was okay to beat horses to death in the street. Think of the difference between then and now. Today, I heard another state is allowing civil unions. Is this great news to shout from the rooftops? No. It's progress. The people who oppose gay marriage are the oldest generation, and the people who support it the youngest. The small things today grow.
Maybe in time. Maybe not. But...we'll see.
