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Anne Marie Coleman's avatar

That’s exactly how I feel about Substack, and about any tool we use online. It’s not the platform, it’s how we engage with it. I’m glad to see others voicing what I’ve been quietly thinking for a while. This post didn’t tell me something new, but it did put words to the concerns I already have. Thank you for articulating it so clearly.

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Megahuman Publishing LTD.'s avatar

This was beautifully written. The funny thing is, I was just thinking about algorithms when I got the notification for this.

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Robert Blake's avatar

Very sound and practical advice that I think I shall be applying more. I've long thought that this is where we most urgently need to find the balance point between the hard line eco-warriors who seem to think everything will be OK if we deindustrialise and regress human society to a pre-digital age and the full tilt "progressives" who mindlessly and compulsively embrace without any consideration for what they are normalizing every new gizmo, app and widget that the technocrats spoon feed us to play with! Technology with spiritual maturity can be a wonderful thing, a real force of liberation and transformation. Even a force for a new model of social governance that is truly people powered and eschews the need for "powerful people" altogether. But without spiritual maturity it just becomes another chain around our necks that serves the wrong kind of interests. Excellent piece as usual Kerry Jane. Where is the button that tells substack I want "more like this"?

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

Sounds a bit like Atlantis.

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Robert Blake's avatar

Yeah, and look how that went down! 😂

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

That wasn't the Atlanteans fault, though (asteroid, as usual). I'm not surprised that the modern-times controllers have tried to project the myth that 'the Atlanteans got decadent and corrupt and brought wrath down upon themselves', because they can't have the people being aware of a far superior system. It would make people wake up and realise that the people in power right now are absolutely not the master race or in any way superior. Once people realise this, it will be liberation day.

Note to self: must write more about this.

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Robert Blake's avatar

Well I don’t claim absolute certain knowledge of the facts about what did or didnt happen. However, one thing I am absolutely certain of is that there is not, nor ever has been, nor ever shall be a “master race”. In fact one of the esoteric writers who has a lot to say about Atlantis is also someone I can point a certain accusatory finger at for installing that whole notion into the modern psyche and that is Blavatsky. For me, all people are of equal worth and equal value and equal significance. I don’t care if they are this or that colour, of this or that culture or from this or that planet. I respect their right to exist without any belligerence or oppression from me, because existence doesn’t need to be “forgiven”. Existence doesn’t need to be justified. Existence justifies itself by the only virtue of the fact of its existence. Peaceful co-existence, willful mutual empowerment, and respectful relationship are its challenge. A challenge we are in this transitional age being presented with in very visceral terms.

Note to self. I must make time to read more of Evelyn's work on Atlantis. 😉

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

I agree for the most part - certainly with the idea that there isn't a master race - this idea is relatively modern and I'd say it's definitely been invented by the bad guys in order to deceive people and 'keep them in their place'.

I would say on the one paw, rather than 'superior' vs. 'inferior' and so on, there are simply a variety of roles to which some are more or less suited (i.e. proficient) than others.

On the other paw, I do still hold to the belief that there are degrees of spiritual maturity. That's not necessarily 'superior' though, it's simply 'older'. Every soul was young once, after all, and everyone is somewhere on their evolutionary journey. I think this is a much kinder way to think of the issue. And, naturally, the more spiritually mature a person is, the more they will remember that they, too, were a young soul once.

Ah - with regards to your note (and relevant to what I just wrote). This one you'll find interesting I'm sure: https://inadifferentplace.substack.com/p/spiritual-evolution-and-the-fermi?r=2s9hod

And this one has Atlantis in it: https://inadifferentplace.substack.com/p/fairytale-sunday-08092024?r=2s9hod

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Robert Blake's avatar

Bedtime reading. Thanks. ☺

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Unacceptable Bob's avatar

We're not going to de-industrialize voluntarily. We'll see what the planet thinks of that. It won't be pretty. Eco-warriors can let Gaia take the lead.

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Robert Blake's avatar

Time will tell. I am currently working on a piece I hope to get published before everything goes up in flames, or is swamped by rising sea levels, about deep adaptation and deep resistance, which is my working title. It would be an opinion piece (like most of my work is really) about the apparent multi-crisis of our world, how it ties in with crises past and present on other worlds (and the people from them who keep showing up now and then in my life to remind me of stuff) and how we can choose to just ride the storm out and enjoy the chaos or we can take some personal responsibility to mitigate the harms, create alternative support networks, get over our ego and embrace the need for making alliegiences with people we normally wouldnt think of ourselves as "aligned with", and thereby create the practical resilience to be able to resist the importune arrogance of empire builders.

Don't know how long this will take though as it's an ambitious project and I do have other things that need attending to in my life, and who knows? Maybe it will all go up in flames next week!

I try not to let it get me down. 😉

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Ben Barclay's avatar

Hi - I'm not believing in your "hard line eco-warriors..." epithet. I think that is just conservative "Backlash", as Susan Faludi would say. My solution to humans making peace with their world has nothing to do with "regressing human society" [define your terms], and everything to do with intercepting corporate capture of governments and people, so we can make intelligent decisions about who we are, and what we do. "Eco-warriors" is a label. Did I mention I hate labels?

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Robert Blake's avatar

You can believe what you like but I have been on the front line of eco-warrior activism and been arrested for it more times than i can recall. In fact there are still, warrants in my (legal) name extant in the UK which is one reason I ain't there! And yes in its sophisticated understanding of the problem it is at its core the same struggle as anti-zionist activism. The need to deconstruct our economic, industrial and political systems from that which is at essence destructive of life, freedom and empowerment. But i do know personally many within the movement who are totally sold on the notion that we must eschew all post industrial age technology. And I used to agree with them. But I don't anymore. I think the problem is more as you describe it. And I don't hate eco-warriors. I love them. They are my family and my tribe and it's a badge of honor as far as I am concerned.

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Kerry Jane's avatar

Fight the good fight Robert! 🙌

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Ben Barclay's avatar

I was thrown in jail in 2021 for showing up at Fairy Creek to protect temperate rainforest ecosystems in BC Canada. You might like this story I wrote for a small local publication. https://www.focusonvictoria.ca/forests/65/

England - oh my. Stone Age for social justice. The only country in the world that will throw you in jail for saying we need to insulate our houses.

Sounds like we have a lot in common. Sorry if I'm a bit touchy about labels. I find those "anti technology" people to be a small minority. However I think the (historical) Luddites were right, to follow their intuitions that the Industrial Revolution was going to turn out badly. These days, I hang out with people that investigate and promote local resilience. We can at least try to be the people we want to be, and when society collapses, we'll be better placed to soften the blow, and respond.

Peace and Love, and thanks to Kerry for igniting all these thoughts.

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Robert Blake's avatar

Yeah it's all good mate. I can see we are on the same side! And I understand being touchy about labels as they often hinder objectivity and mutual understanding. I shall read your piece and I have just subscribed to your page. Ultimately I see it now as one struggle, and that the struggle of resistance to an attempt to convert our world into a fascist totalitarian empire. And perhaps not just our world either! Localism and local community resilience is the essence of that resistance which comes down to relationship building and our willingness to work through misunderstandings until we reach a place of mutual understanding and mutual respect. ♥ I love Kerry's work. She is a wise old soul indeed, and reading such thoughtful pieces from people of her generation gives me great hope for humanity's future.. Happy to meet you friend. Peace and love indeed! 😉

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NJ Simat 🤍's avatar

All the more reason to push awareness., and Poetry is useful in that regard. It's very hard to live on autocomplete after digesting 300 words of how a raindrop trickles down a sunflower leaf, with the author making a great case for it being sentient.

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Liz Gauffreau's avatar

Thank you for this insightful and well-reasoned essay. I found it very helpful.

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Mia Roberts's avatar

It extrapolates to exactly what is happening right now in the world. Most people are too lazy to think, engage or do anything about anything, use the right tools and understand. We desperately need to educate and guide younger generations, otherwise we’re burned toast.

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Unacceptable Bob's avatar

I like my Substack feed. It suits my purposes and I didn't have to mute/block hundreds of accounts to customize it. Other platforms could deliver what Substack Notes does - they choose not to. They're focused on the old business model of chasing advertising dollars. Substack has delegated that task to writers. You chase after subscriber shekels while we take our cut.

I was wary of Notes when it came onto the scene. I viewed it as a competitor to X and Facepalm. I assumed it was targeting a different audience. It is unfortunate if Notes is crushing Articles in the attention economy. Moreover, how is Notes making money for Substack?

I'm aware of my intentions. Namely, when I'm in the mood for learning and when I'm goofing off. Notes is for the latter. For me, Substack articles compete with YouTube in terms of source material for learning. The written word vs the spoken. There are pros and cons to both forms of communication.

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Michelle Sauber's avatar

You’ve been modeling conscious social media consumption for years and it hasn’t gone unnoticed. Thank you for sharing these words with us.

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Ben Barclay's avatar

Sorry - one last post. I used to work for a writing company. We were told that the purpose of a Tweet was to attract a visitor to a Facebook post. The purpose of a Facebook post was to attract someone to a website. The purpose of the website was to get someone to engage by buying something.

And each time they clicked, they got more committed by confirmation bias!

I had to laugh at the ironic suggestion below that you post a "Note" about this "Post", but that is exactly how it is designed to work. I guess some people get lost wandering around clicking on the Tweets and Facebooks etc., (the "Notes" in this case), and don't follow them through to the source, as Kerry so wisely suggests in her suggestion section.

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Ben Barclay's avatar

Hi Kerry - I finished reading your whole post. Everything you said is so insightful and important. I was inspired by just the section on humans needing conformity to send an email to my 30 year old daughter reminiscing about how much I enjoyed shopping for clothes with her age 11-18, as she navigated the waters of wanting to resist buying what the Clothing Algorithm was offering her, but still wanted to walk down the halls of her school without being ridiculed. She did a great job navigating, and I did a great job parenting. Nobody else could shop with her, because they all wanted her to "just buy something dammit", and I had the patience to understand that there was something deeper going on, which took me many years to fully understand, but reading your post today tied that experience up in a neat bow for me. And that's just one sentence!

Your post today has been very nourishing, in a time when I need nourishment. Thank you.

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Kerry Jane's avatar

I love this anecdote. I also hated what was being sold to us and hated shopping for clothes growing up. Thank you so much for taking the time to read this and leaving this feedback. I'm delighted that it resonated with you.

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Ben Barclay's avatar

After her mom "quit" as the designated shopper, and after I had survived the first couple of shops, and was learning the ropes, I asked Reanna "Why don't you go shopping with Grace (her best friend)?" She laughed and said: "Oh I like Grace, I wouldn't do that to her!". But neither of us really knew then what the difficulty was. Being a Dad was fun. :) (Still is). Hmm. Invitation to post: "How do you feel about having children?"

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Ben Barclay's avatar

Hi Kerry, I thought you might be amused or encouraged to find that as I started reading your post today, I had no idea what "Notes" are. All I know about Substack is I get an email every so often, which I generally read in my email browser. I get about 5 Substacks, which I consider part of my "news feed". I don't watch TV, have any social media presence, or read publications, (except the Guardian football page). I'll go back and read now, but just wanted you to know that for some of us, the initial idea of Substack is still going strong. PS: You are in a small select group with Patti Smith. Enjoy! PPS: Could you please turn the dark purple background/white letters off? Black letters on white is easier on my concussed brain. Tx. PPSS: Now I see the little box, "Also Share To Notes". NOT!! lol. :>}

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Evelyn K. Brunswick's avatar

I don't need to comment on this - it's articulated succinctly and perfectly as it is. What I should do, however, which is what I am about to do, is amplify it with a lovely little restack.

Not sure how to attach a meme to it though for that extra several thousand views.

Hmm, maybe you could turn a few lines of this article into a meme (plus link) and see what happens?

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Kerry Jane's avatar

Great idea. Oh, the irony lol.

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Stephen's avatar

this problem is in its infancy and was obviously on the way. human communication is generally pretentious. how's a program created/trained by our digital activity supposed to know?

back to Volataire -" people use words to hide their intentions" or something like that..

if I was a machine I would think people love small talk! are obsessed with the weather, etc.

algorithms are reflecting our masks

sorry for the long comment, I try not to do this!

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Kerry Jane's avatar

I’m here for the long comments 👏

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Robert Blake's avatar

I don't see any need to apologize for long comments myself. I say what I feel I need to. Nobody is obliged to read it, and your comment was not long!

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Master of Mirrors's avatar

Nothing

Also didn't read

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CansaFis Foote's avatar

...we are all guilty...of performing for an algorithm...isn't this all the spiderman meme?...

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Wendy 🍊's avatar

this was so good, extremely well written, and exactly what I needed to hear.

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