/lit/ - Literature

>>15501788
>Where things much better 20 years ago before the internet really came around or where things just as terrible back then?
You know how Zizek talks about how AI and brain-computer interfaces will remove the private area of thought? Social media and technology have already done most of that.

The internet used to be better too.

if you want to ruminate on the decline of the west go with houellebecq.

>>15501788

unironically marx

The actual issue is marketing, the internet used to be better as you said before marketing took it over

>>15501814
For the internet it's mostly marketing and monopolies. For stuff in general it's that fax machine creep, like way back you could go home and no one could contact you, but then everyone got house phones, and some got faxes or answer machines which meant you have to look at the message eventually, and so on until everyone had a smart phone and was instantly contactable by phone or email or im or social media... there's no time to be inside your own head.

>>15501788
Men compete and most lose. I guess you could be grateful polygamy is not prevalent

>>15501788
This is the effect of the current technological level being combined with the capitalist mode of production, which determines how technology is employed. There isn't really any good work on the intersection of those two, because this problem isn't really much relevant for the communists, which are the only ones equipped to explain it, especially since it will in a significant part solve itself when those guys get proletarianized and hence forcefully dragged out of their little isolated prisons. And those that manage to stay afloat will find some meaning in supporting the reaction.

>>15501804
eh

rise in single motherhood and no philosophy or spirituality to fall back on or inspire

>>15501788
literally me without a glass of Bourbon

>>15501788
Have you seen whats going on in the world today? Its a fucking mess, pedophiles at the high level and getting away with it, climate eroding to eventually the Earth will become a barren wasteland, thats just the tip of the iceberg. You wonder why so many young people are checking out of society, killing themselves or just not wanting to participate, what do they stand to win? We must imagine Sisyphus in Occulus Rift goggles

>>15502084
>We must imagine Sisyphus in Occulus Rift goggles

What does that even mean? Some sort of video game and american movie references?

This I why I hate this board, some fucking Amerishit thinks everybody are from the Amerishit culture globohomo tainted culture sphere and instantly understands some fucking Jim Carrey rubberface comedy references "muh oglo boglo goggles see the real world remember the hollyshit movie"

holy shit you are retarded

>>15502263
calm down

>>15501788
I'm pretty sure things were just as terrible, the wreckage just didn't get to blog about it.

>>15502084
Bit mean. I don't do videogames, but I get that he means videogames as a meaningless life-filling activity.

>>15501788
Forty years ago New York was a violent wreck (film symbolically related) that violence has been shipped out and enhanced.
Capitalism brings poverty, imperialism And destruction.

Read wherever you like, but socialism is about creating a rational and compassionate world

>>15502084
>>15502294

They sell children, they rape children while you fuck around on Facebook. Professionally trained serial killers murder children while you play pathological video games that turn you into a subconscious serial killer by-proxy. I suggest throwing your computer and game consoles in the garbage if you really want to make a progressive step towards freedom, otherwise get back on YouTube and jerk off to more cartoons and funny cat videos and then go relax and completely immerse yourself in new world order video game mind control technologies that rewire your ability to process information, and then go eat the new world orders poisonous food that you paid for with non-existent worthless Illuminati ones and zeros.

The corporate and political elite have masters degrees in macroeconomics and geopolitics and mind control programs that date to early days of psychoanalysin when in contrast most people have a subscription to Netflix and the latest iphone.

>>15502300
>shipped out
To where? Other countries?

>>15502263
>doesn't know about Sisyphus
>can't look up the most mediatic piece of virtual reality hardware

>>15502333
nvm, you post on a certain general on /vg/ don't you?

>>15502263
This is your brain on reactionary politik

how do i get off 4chan for good?

>>15501788
I would say it is worse, people have begun to identify through what they consume, their identify is nothing but a pile of brand slogans.

>>15501797

This is an interesting take, now nobody wants to keep his thoughts for himself. Everything needs to be published and ventilated (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram) counting that there is public out there to give you attention. No privacy at all (by choice).

Where can I read more of this?

>>15502300
based movie

>>15502361
Obama oversaw the continuation of the Bush police state when he militarized the police in this country. They knew days like this were coming, though we’re not like Syrian cities quite yet.

>>15502377
>No privacy at all (by choice)
>Where can I read more of this?
Communist manifesto

>>15502372
i need to have an answer to this
i've been stuck here since 2011

>>15502333
unbelievably based post.

>>15502372
>>15502415
localhost 4chan.org
localhost 4channel.org

>>15502375
That's nothing new. Brand conformity has been around for decades but it's just become hyper in recent years as brands are attaching themselves to social causes. It infuriates me as someone who belong in that lgbt grouping (yea yea degenerate etc heard it all, get a new tune) Pride parades are now endless streams of marketing and corporate fellation.

>>15502263
OBSESSED

>read capitalist realism once

we all feel this and theres a hivemind being emerging

have anyone here been listening to Merzbow lately

>>15502429
of course it existed, but there is no comparison to what it is now.

>>15502458
thanks for raping my fucking ears

>>15502415
>>15502372

We're all here because we need community. I think we're all lonely people; I came here because I have no one to talk to about lit and philosophy.

We are all here in this horrible place that we ourselves have made horrible, because there is nowhere better for us.

I found 4chan in 2008, and at first was hesitant to visit the place since it seemed full of viruses or whatever. It didn't appeal to me at all and the real world seemed like the place where it was at. The internet was good for finding songs for free and reading about conspiracies, but otherwise real-life still seemed to be the focal point of experience. Now it's twelve years on (wow) and I've pretty much logged out of real life completely and only exist as this amorphous, wandering entity travelling from site to site, board to board, thread to thread, no longer even feeling any real connection to my IRL name and identity (physical, historical, etc). Needless to say I've never had sex or formed a romantic relationship, and the last time I kissed a girl was due to rather sluttish persistence on her side and youthful physical appearance on mine. Now I don't even have okay looks or the capacity for potential youthfulness allows ("maybe he's ambitious and will make something of himself!"). I simply rot away in a rented room, smoking ten cigarettes a day despite not really enjoying the taste or sensation, walking around shit-talking myself, posting on various boards hoping for some form of interaction even if it's just someone responding to a post in whatever way, and sitting in my computer chair ruminating on some embarrassing or shameful thing I've done in the past before forgetting which specific thing I was dwelling on and laughing a little, pathetically, when I'm reminded just how many possible shameful / embarrassing / cringeworthy / scary things I could have been reminding myself of. My libido is dead, my brain just feels depleted. For years I have literally lived week-to-week, telling myself that I'll resign from my unskilled but okay-paying, bottom-of-the-ladder job the following Monday but not doing so and getting through the week on the premise that I will quit the following Monday. When you lose your sense of humour and enthusiasm you approach life like a highly self-aware newborn child, and anything you think about exploring or committing yourself to seems pointless in advance, to the point where you begin to reduce everything to a kind of resource which you can mine for emotions that will make you want to keep living and mine some more. It feels so pointless, although I don't promote the idea that such things aren't worth committing to or experiencing. Just another blogpost, another feelpost, another effort to articulate some opinion about something I don't really care about. Someone replies, which causes something in my mind to feel somewhat excited and content, and then it's back to walking around alone, back to smoking another cigarette due to some low-level compulsion, back to dwelling on past mistakes. What's worse is that I know this post doesn't contribute anything to anyone reading it. You know the score, you grasp the emptiness, yet you don't bother dwelling on it and allowing it to hollow you out.

>>15502066
>sean connery is considered a twink by today's standards
where did it all go so wrong?

>>15502510
if we would all work together we could make /lit/ a great place to stay important ideas. The revolution has to come from inside

>>15502510

>>15502515
I've read it and sort of can relate

First parts of your posts are literally me, been here since 2008 or 2009, went through downward spiral of fapping to everything from traps to incest probably the first year around.

Anw, I somehow created a doppelganger of myself (or one that is here) irl where I have a sort of career in eastern europe whith love/hate relationship towards it and I also managed to put on this irl masked persona to land me three gfs already (and I always want to end it since I never really connect, tfw no gf is a meme, it doesn't get better for us).

Just wanted to say that your post is insightful and I serisously think that all of this is a sort of untapped territory and theres a momentum for semthing to come out of it and it wont be just school shootings

>>15502510
i tried to quit 4chan and after maybe 12 hours i started to get extremely lonely and i realised that this place is my only communication with other people

>>15501842
This is why we have to kick all mormons asses. They want all the chick to themselves, self bastards.

>>15502510
>>15502619
This. Where would I even go? I have nobody to relate or talk to but anons here. The alternative is worse

>>15502263
>doesn’t know sisyphus.
>angry at literally nothing
This is the saddest Europost.

>>15502361
Absolutely, look at the shifting of industry to other nations. It is “da jews” that are causing all our jobs to leave ( though i am certain some ceos are jewish), its rich bastards that want to penny pinch, because giving livable working conditions is too much a bother for their wallets.

>>15501814
Surveillance Capitalism -Shoshanna Zuboff if anyone wants books about this.

>>15502639
i was hoping that getting a job would fix this by making me interact with people but i spend 6 months job searching with no luck and then corona fucking hits

>>15501788
It's mostly just deluded doomers that think the <5% of people unable to establish normal social lives represent the majority.

>>15502708
Same here man. Except I got a job and still interacted with people and loathed it, mainly because the people felt hollow and conversations boring. Got laid off, searched for a job for 6 months finally got hired, worked for two weeks and then laid off again because of corona.

Really feel like this universe is against me

>>15502515
You're obviosly stuck in a negative feedback loop. Not much i can say to help. Just remember you can always go cold turkey and just cut away from the internet. Do literally anything else but sitting in front of a computer

>>15502333
Them trips of echoing truth. Right on anon

>>15502740
delusional bloomer. most people are jaded and miserable. trust me

>>15501810
truth

>>15501788
The Bible
Anybody who thinks our problems are political are narrow minded

>>15502263
>Sisyphus
>American
Newfriend is embarrassing himself

>>15502263
>this is your brain on reddit.

Me in OP's pic. 31khv. There's no point, I have no political existence. Everything I do or own will be inherited by arabs and africans. My children would have to adapt to some pointless favela existence. I have above average intelligence but I don't have what matters; a positive outlook, the right connections, money or a mindset ruthless enough to make it in a cutthroat environment. I am the detritus of the west and it doesn't really bother me anymore

>>15502740
Meanwhile in reality 35% of millenials report not having a single close friend.
That's self reported so most likely underrepresents the issue because people won't admit to being social 'losers'. That's probably going to be worse for zoom zoom once they leave the artificial high-school/college bubble of oversocialization. I assume the problem is worse for men considering they always get let sympathy, although it probably very bad even for women with those numbers.

>>15502263
i suspect this is subtle bait if so well done sir 7/10 i keked

>>15502263
>doesn't know sysiphus the american war hero
show some goddamned respect cuck

they want you atomised and hooked to the power grid

>>15502510
i'm here because i'm a depressed midwit that will never achieve anything so i come here to try to learn something and have friends because people in real life despise how much i lack personality or will to live
i never learn

>>15502515
>only exist as this amorphous, wandering entity travelling from site to site, board to board, thread to thread, no longer even feeling any real connection to my IRL name and identity (physical, historical, etc)
books on not becoming or becoming nothing? i have the exact same feel since a child, i used to cry with the actual feeling that i was disappearing, now, years later, i finally feel that i disappeared once for all.

>>15502515
reading helps bro
embrace your pain and understand you will never be alone feeling it, and it's okay to feel it
I wish I knew people like you/me from around here so I could physically be with them

>>15502967
>>15502985
>>15502993
>>15502515

They are left wing.

>>15501788
>90%
Do incels really believe that?
Most guys are out there having fun and having gf's because they played sports, were sociable since they were kids and did not suffer parental abuse.

>>15502263
Bait

>>15503479
LIAR you're LYING

>>15503479
no everyone is miserable like me. cope harder

>>15501788
>90%
Maybe 10%

>>15502377
A warped view of freedom you have there fren. Cultivated performances still allow the privacy one desires, the median of electronics demands privacy. You assume a picture is a soul.

>>15503738
SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP

>>15503479
30% of men are incels

>>15503479
I know most guys and that is definitely not the case. Only about 10% have regular sex. 40% perhaps get lucky once a year or once in a few years with a random hookup or a short lived relationship but can go for equally long spells of a year or two with no sex at all and 50% basically have no sexual life to speak whatsoever (not counting prostitutes). All the polls vastly underreport this because men won't admit it but I am on good terms with a shitload of guys ranging from total Chads to computer geeks and betas and this is the result.

i want peace

>>15503889
As to how this came to be. It's very simple, first the guys who are on the lower end of the totem pole are already fucked. Then you have the average guys who *could* get sex more regularly but are in increasing numbers starting to decide that it is just not worth it. In the past if you were average you were basically guaranteed success with opposite sex with minimal effort, now you are consntantly living as a faceless average guy in the blob of average guys who simply do not have a chance to compete for a girl's attention span against the numerous options of local celebs, athletes, musicians, CEOs and models she is exposed to on social media. As an average guy to keep an average girl's attention span on you, you basically have to be a God at reading and manipulating social situations into your favor and constantly keep this facade up before she can change her mind due to the Chad notification she just got on her instagram. It's simply not worth the hassle and even if you do everything right she could leave at any point . Of course, needless to say if it takes so much maintenance from average guys, imagine what kind of hoops a below-average guy has to jump through to achieve the same level a response a Chad gets just by doing nothing. It's obviously a rigged game and nobody wants to play it anymore because internet and the destruction of traditional norms have rigged it beyond what is reasonable. I feel bad for women too, instead of forming meaningful relationships with guys in their league, the media and society and the top women whom they all want to copy, compete with and whom they listen to all direct them towards pursuit of only the very top tier of men who are basically unattainable for most women, because there are simply not enough of them. I believe many average women would be happier pairing up with average men, but they can't be happy now because the social pressure and social opportunity presented by apps pressures them all into competing for whoever is determined to be Chad in that instance, they can't receive validation from their peers for dating an average guy who is just another puzzle in a faceless blob of average guys.

>>15502377
Marshall McLuhan

http://www.marshallmcluhanspeaks.com/prophecies/1967-privacy-in-the-electric-age/index.html

Most families in the world have both parents working. Children are getting neglected and put through education where underpaid teachers give even less of a shit about them. With no feelings of love belonging it's hard to build a personality.

>>15502263
>"What does that even mean?"
>volleys internet meme phrases and buzzwords in succession
>indignant over nothing

You are the cancer.

>>15501788
Unironic read Kaczynski

>>15503939
dont forget, betas have infinite porn to go back to, reinforcing that beta attitude. but why dont you faggots do anything about it? go blow some power plants or synagogues or something.

I turned 24 the other day and I'm still a virgin. Nothing seems more impossible to me than having sex, and I've completely given up on the idea that it will ever happen. Nothing seems more to me out of reach. I think it would be easier for me win a Nobel prize than to fuck a woman.

It's not 'them' and there is no 'us'

>>15504147
Well if you care that much about it, there's always prostitutes. I guess what's actually unreachable is a normal relationship with a woman.

>>15503479
90% is meant hyperbolic.
Also, why are most answers about virginity and not all the other, more important stuff like lacking fundamental orientation in life?

>>15502377
baudrillard

>>15501788
things are not terrible. The world is terrible, ok, but young people are just fine.

>>15504175
>more important stuff like lacking fundamental orientation in life?
Probably has to do with the demographics of this website.

Literally Democracy. Fools have been given more than the illusion of freedom.
t. Socrates

denial of death. literally answers any question you have about why people are the way they are

>>15502967
Oh yeah? Maybe it's time for you to start believing in yourself.

>>15504267
as in people subconsciously deny they are mortal and so they don’t try to make something of themselves with what time they have or try to take care of themselves?

>>15501788

>>15504296

>>15504306

>>15504317

Video games replace real world goals and achievements.

Porn replaces women/relationships.

The destruction of manual labour jobs to the third world leaving them with few options (minimum wage work) that doesn't motivate them.


There's obviously more such as society actively helping girls over boys and the attacks on traditional boyhood (fighting, clubs, etc).

>>15501788
You choose to live like that. The times are better.

>>15504292

I can't do a very good job summarising it because he covers a lot of stuff. Check out Terror Management Theory for actually empirical experimental data on the stuff Becker talks about

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terror_management_theory

>>15504292
I think we live as if we're immortal, maybe because otherwise we'd never get the motivation to do anything.

>>15502377
>This is an interesting take, now nobody wants to keep his thoughts for himself.
Yes they do. You just don't hear them on the internet, so you assume they don't exist. You're an idiot.

>>15504385
I don't gain motivation for being immortal. Nothing is worth being done today as it may be posponed for tomorrow.

z

>>15504147
In a couple months I'll be turning 24, I'm a virgin but I don't even try. I used to use tinder a few years ago and I would practice talking to girls, I generally had good reactions but I never escalated things so here I am lol

>>15504317
The abolition of man is a good thing, things need to be destroyed before they can be improved upon. People romanticize human history, but it's not where we should dwell and stagnate in, there are going to be much better modalities of existence than what we've been used too.

>>15504645
>>15504147

Newly turned 24 and still virgin club. I think what helps is realizing it was always this bad throughout history (probably worse). Sex, relationships, love is not for us brahz, we should do what every man did before i.e. live dangerously

>>15504874
Yeah I'm starting to think this. I don't know why I was put on this earth but it definitely wasn't to fuck

>>15504656
Youre an idiot.

>>15504656
>things need to be destroyed before they can be improved upon
Attempts to create a "new man" have all failed and just improved the damage inflicted on man

>>15502517
When women could just swipe left on him b/c they can just keep swiping and find someone better

>>15501810
Absolutely based and true

>>15501788
Internet turned to shit over the last 15 years.

Also pic related is interesting - switch from discipline society to achievement society has been shitty for most.

>>15501788
Mark fisher

>>15505559
anyone else here a STEM burnout?

>>15505888
medfag here

It is interesting how there are some subtle shifts in culture. Right now there seems to be a general sense of pessimism and hopelessness for the future. This is in stark contrast to the 60s or the 90s which generally were filled with optimism, when everyone believed the future would be better. Now no one even seems to have a vision what a good future would look like.

This pessimism pervades modern young adult literature (hunger games to thirteen reasons why), movies and music. Trap is generally melancholic and someone singing about molly percocet is a far cry from twist and shout.

>>15502263
ignore all the other (you)s fren you are based.

>>15502985
Kierkegaard, espacially either/or.

>>15501788
>financial crisis turns everyone under 40 into the equivalent of feudal russian serfs
>young people have no money, no jobs, no women, NO STAKE in society
>boomers wonder why the nigs are chimping out and white bois are turning into women
Unironically Steve Bannon has a better take on current events than any domain expert I've heard over the last couple of years.
If you want a book pic related predicts a lot of whats happening right now as well.

>>15506078
can i get a rundown?

There was a thread in /mu/ today complaining about newfags and how young people in the 18-25 set were ruining the damn site. I asked him if perhaps that wasn't for the best, that this site should be used for young men without having to have their naivete shattered and he responded by saying that the site had become too soft. I disagree, I think it is a far harsher place now than it has ever been. Maybe it's precisely because us 'oldfags' hang around and compare a golden heyday to a mediocre current day that the place is so terrible now. It can't be anything else, we won't let it. We should be checking out of 4chan the way we're checking out of society. For the same reasons- it cannot contribute anything to us, and more importantly we can no longer contribute anything to it.

>>15506091
i don't think you should leave. newfags can't relate to each other and look to oldfags to learn what to think and feel. if oldfags left, 4chan would just turn into some sort of ad-revenue generating blob in the vein of reddit or tumblr even more than it currently is, since the feds wouldn't let it transform into its final organic culmination, a terrorist cult.

>>15506028
Because humans can be compared to apes and automatons in the same time. We have instincts which we have the duty to fulfill like automatons. We have to run around and trigger serotonin, in the short or in the long run.

Idleness gives people no sense of challenge, therefore the dopamine and serotonin levels are low, since there is no comparison to be made between a happy and a possible sad state.
We wanted to ascend by dint of technology, but our primitive nature dragged us down into this mire of depression. Just because we don't fulfill some unwritten tasks bestowed upon us at birth. By 'we' I mean most of humans, especially zoomers.

>>15506089
>can i get a rundown?
The wiki page, especially pic related pretty much some it up
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strauss%E2%80%93Howe_generational_theory

>>15501788
We have done with Hope and Honour, we are lost to Love and Truth,
We are dropping down the ladder rung by rung,
And the measure of our torment is the measure of our youth.
God help us, for we knew the worst too young!

>>15506091
There is always generational shift. 4chan isn't being ruined by the normal flow of newfags and veterans that exists in any community, it's being ruined by the change in the medium itself, introduced by too much popularity (victim of its own success syndrome) and above all, phoneposters. Phoneposters see the site as just another social media site, they only come here to skim for 5-10 minute bursts and look for things to say one-liner replies to, usually meme catchphrases because they think 4chan is "the meme website" because they're fucking high schoolers.

More users posting, and less and less effort behind the average post, means the site starts to have a watered-down, faded feel to it. The fact that it's held on this long is a testament to how strong 4chan's culture is, at least residually. But eventually the dynamics of zoomer culture will just dilute it completely. Crossposting with reddit is way more common than it used to be. Discord is another big problem, discord is like a bridge between two islands that allows people who MAINLY live on the shit island (redditors, tourists, normies) to spend much of their time on the good island but always go home safe at the end of the day. They never have to actually acclimate and learn the culture of the good island and become naturalized to it, so you get what happens in any place, it's just a bunch of fucking tourists talking to other tourists and all the native charm is lost.

>>15505888
Currently in my 6th year of a 3 year bachelor. I just can't be bothered anymore. Will probably get kicked out after this year (haven't attended a single class/exam in 3 years), though the exams I've attended I had really good grades

>>15506028
Pretty much the lil peep syndrome?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heJNHYCSsIc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvV5TbJc9tQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rkJ3L5Ce80
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jRKsiAOAA8
>It is interesting how there are some subtle shifts in culture. Right now there seems to be a general sense of pessimism and hopelessness for the future. This is in stark contrast to the 60s or the 90s which generally were filled with optimism, when everyone believed the future would be better. Now no one even seems to have a vision what a good future would look like.
>This pessimism pervades modern young adult literature (hunger games to thirteen reasons why), movies and music. Trap is generally melancholic and someone singing about molly percocet is a far cry from twist and shout.
What I would perhaps ask, is how much this has to do specificly with the increasing economic insecurity and incapability for many to maintain a middle class living standard and career paths having become a lot less predictable compared to 30 or 40 years ago when you simply had drastically less choice (if you wanted to go to college you simply chose the nearest in-state one and didn't even bother looking far beyond that).

>>15506122
I'll read it when I have time it looks very interesting but when does the current iteration of the cycle end and what comes next?

Houellebecq is king regarding this. Atomised.

>>15501788
Simple, no wars to weed out the pussy ass faggots so these wimps spend all day wallowing in self-pity and bitching and moaning about how unfair it is that women don't let them stick their peepees in her holes when they're pathetic losers that have literally nothing to offer women

>>15501810
what a brainlet take. people are wrecks because they can larp as socialists to try and demand more from the labour/housing market?

1/13
PREFACE
Many of you need a wake-up-call. A slap in the face. A bucket of cold water. To snap out of this fucking phase of laziness and procrastination. To light a fucking fire under your asses.

The Internet offers all the advice you could ever need on how to get your life together. You have websites, you have books, you have the advice of other people, and you even know yourself what the fuck you have to do. But you don't know how the fuck to take action. You know how to swim, but you're too fucking scared to dive in the deep end.

So here I am to explain to you clearly why the fuck you aren’t taking action towards your goals. And how to fix it.

>>15502333
>They sell children, they rape children while you fuck around on Facebook. Professionally trained serial killers murder children while you play pathological video games that turn you into a subconscious serial killer by-proxy.

This sort of thinking is this generation's satanic ritual abuse

>>15501788
Decline of the west, Spengler

>>15506445
2/13
INTRODUCTION
You always know what you need to do. If you could only follow it, you’d start seeing results. There’s no debate there. If you take action and systematically work towards your goals, you’re going to see progress. That’s just how life works.

Succeeding in most areas of life isn’t actually that difficult. 90% of success is showing up. If you can maintain a clear head and do what you need to do, work consistently towards your goals, and make steady progress, success isn't that hard to come by.

But people just aren’t willing to put in the work. Why? We’re too ugly. We’re too tired. We’re too lazy. We fear failure. We’d rather sit back and click through Netflix to watch a show we don’t even enjoy. We’d rather play another game of Fortnite and waste away our precious time here on a meaningless game. We’d rather sleep another two hours. We’d rather watch that hot pornstar get fucked by a BBC and then jack off.

Don’t lie. It’s what you do. But in reality, it’s what all of society does.

But just because everyone else does it doesn’t mean that you should. Stop living like the rest of the sheep out there and reclaim your independence. Start respecting yourself. Take responsibility for your own life. And don’t live your life like one of the many mindless drones out there indoctrinated into society, pawns to corporations and business, wasting your finite existence on a hodgepodge of meaningless and unfulfilling technological stimulation.

>>15502333
Having a salary in a high gdp pp country, having children at said age, 30-35, continue to play video games, board games, read e.t.c Travel to countries where you have purchasing power to enjoy a week before work... What has changed bud?
>They sell children!?
life is better without the gulags, or am is my poisoned brain already too far gone?

>>15506449
3/13
THE VICE OF SELF-IMPROVEMENT
Most guys here live in a perpetual state of over-analysis. You read a hundred posts on 4chan, you read a couple more articles with click-bait titles, you read a couple self-help books, you watch Youtube videos, and you keep pretending like you’re taking massive action. Every once in a while, you feel like you have a fucking epiphany, and this makes you feel as if you’re learning and moving forward. When in reality, you’re stagnating and making zero progress.

“Self-improvement is masturbation.” You can thank our lord and savior Tyler Durden for this underrated piece of gold. You’re pretending to yourself that you're making progress without actually changing anything. Instead of being a pathetic, miserable fuck who does nothing, you're just a pathetic, miserable fuck who reads feel-good self-help bullshit, goes to the gym, and repeats affirmations to himself in the mirror.

In other words, stop covering yourself in layer after layer of fake pretenses, motives, and qualities. Stop searching endlessly for that next epiphany, and for that next piece of meaningless, external motivation.

Look within. Ask yourself what you truly want, what you truly desire out of life, and how the fuck you are truly going to change.

Don’t “improve” your current self. Change who you are.

>>15502517
Everyone back then was a fucking DYEL until movies and entertainment convinced us that the only way to be considered a man is if you're roided up

>>15506456
4/13
THE PLAGUE OF INACTION
I’ll take a wild guess and throw this out there—if you could list 10 things you could do right now to move towards your goals, you could easily rattle them off.

You all know what the fuck you should be doing. You all know you should ask that girl out, study fucking harder, hit the gym, open that business… you know you need to fucking do it. You know you it’d be good for you and you know it’s the right thing—but you don’t fucking do it!

You just sit around in a haze of useless procrastination and perpetual laziness, telling yourself you’re going to do that fucking thing tomorrow. And then tomorrow comes. You’ve woke up late, you’re feeling like shit, and something else came up. And so you put it off until tomorrow. And so on.

A few weeks or months later you look back and you realize that all that valuable fucking time has passed and is never coming back. And you’re no closer to your goals.

And the more this happens, the more you rationalize to yourself that nothing good will ever come of actually taking action, the more you decide to devolve into escapism, the more you condition yourself to accept defeat, and the more you fall deeper and deeper into a bottomless pit of defeatism.

You tell yourself that there’s no point in trying anyway. You never feel like doing anything. All you want to do is saturate your empty mind with a bunch of stimulating, pixelated nonsense and try to distract yourself away from your valueless existence through video games, porn, TV, and the endless stream of distractions at your fingertips.

>>15506461
5/13
We have a psychological term for that—“learned helplessness.” In a famous experiment, scientists gave electrical shocks to two groups of dogs—one that could stop the shocks by pressing a lever and one that couldn’t. Later, when given the chance to escape by jumping over a small barrier, the ones who had been able to press the lever immediately escaped. The group of dogs who had no lever just lay down on the floor and whined as they were being shocked.

The same effect is one of the major causes of depression. You repeatedly fail, learn that you’ll always be a failure, and struggle without escape. And when you’re actually presented with the chance to take action and change your life, you’d rather just stay defeated and mire in your own misery.

You’re probably realizing right now that everything I’m saying applies to you. And I’m going to tell you how to break free from this self-imposed prison.

FEAR OF FAILURE
If you were 100% guaranteed to succeed if you asked that girl out, started your business, and started lifting regularly, would you hesitate to go ahead with your goals? Absolutely not. You’d immediately do it.

You’re afraid to commit. You don’t want to tell yourself you’re going to quit porn and video games. You don’t want to commit to starting a new life. You don’t want to commit to breaking free from your endless cycle of procrastination. You don’t want to commit to anything.

Why? Because you’re afraid of failure. You don’t want to try and fail. What’s the point of trying anyway if you’re probably going to fail? Right?

Let me tell you something. You’re going to fucking die. You’ve only got one life. Every second you waste living below your potential is never coming back. Ever. You’re the youngest you ever will be right now. Think about that for a second.

>>15506464
6/13
If you keep allowing this pathetic fear of failure to control you, you’re going to live out a sad, depressing, miserable existence for the rest of your days. And you’ll be buried six feet under and everybody will be glad you’re finally fucking gone.

So, what do you do?

Make a goddamn fucking decision. Silence the voices of self-doubt and avoidance rationalization, and just do it. Commit to the decision. Write it in a journal. Tell a friend for accountability. Change your fucking environment.

Stop rationalizing, stop watching motivational Youtube videos, stop reading Reddit posts, and stop passively wasting your time waiting for that time to come when everything suddenly changes and you realize it’s time to start taking action. That time will never come. Ever.

Tell all those inner voices to shut the fuck up and just make the FUCKING DECISION!

Start small and spiral upwards. Turn the shower cold for 30 seconds. And then a minute. And then go full fucking Bond and don’t turn it warm. Talk to one stranger a day. And then two. And so on. Go in small incremental steps that will exponentially push you further forwards.

>>15501788

I just hope I'll be able to see the world come

TUMBLING DOWN

TUMBLING DOWN

TUMBLING DOOOOWWN

with my own eyes to be frank.

>>15506467
7/13
COMFORT ZONE/FEARING DISCOMFORT
Yeah, it’s fucking easy to wake up at noon each day, throw a pack of instant noodles on the stove, and sit back and binge ten episodes of Breaking Bad every day. Yeah, it’s fucking easy to just sit home, play Call of Duty, and avoid the gym.

It’s all you’ve ever done. And will do, if you keep living this way.

Your brain literally rewires itself to continue your habits, ways of life, and normal routines if you repeat them over long periods of time.

What you do, you become. And what you are, you do. It’s a positive feedback loop that spirals in whichever direction you choose. If you continue to act like a fucking buffoon, you will become one. Just like we say here that you shouldn’t look at what girls say, but at what they do—you are what you do, not what you say.

You tell yourself you’re going to start a Fortune 500 company, but you can’t even get out of the bed in the morning. You tell yourself you’re going to be fucking Casanova but you can’t approach that pretty girl at Starbucks drinking her fucking vanilla Frappucino. Stop deluding yourself and face reality.

So, what do you do?

Train yourself to appreciate discomfort. “Get comfortable being uncomfortable.”

You’ll never get anywhere in life if you do whatever you feel like doing. Love the discomfort and embrace the thrill. The pain of regret is worse than the pain of discipline. And ironically, putting yourself through discomfort will make your life miles better than you could ever imagined it to be.

How can you train yourself? Take cold showers every morning. Sleep on the floor with nothing but a blanket and a pillow. Dance in public. Intentionally force yourself to take risks.

Facing your fears head-on and pushing through discomfort is the fastest and most effective way to self-mastery.

Rewire your brain to be excited for new challenges. “The beast that bears you fastest to perfection is suffering.” - Meister Eckhart

>>15506472
8/13
Successful people love discomfort. They embrace the challenges. Without it, they would have nothing to live for. It’s what keeps them going.

Your “comfort” zone isn’t really “comfortable.” It’s just a place of stagnant procrastination and lack of progress where you just sit around, rotting internally and corrupting your potential. You only choose to stay in it because your fear of the unknown overwhelms your current discomfort.

No progress in life ever comes without pain and suffering. None.

PROCRASTINATION
The average person wastes 8-10 hours a day. Video games, Netflix, mindless browsing, cheap dopamine hits, etc. It doesn’t really matter. All procrastination comes from the same root cause—thinking that you have more time.

When you have a paper due in an hour, you’ll fucking finish it. If the bar is closing in ten minutes, you’re going to have ask the girl back to your place. If you have a terminal illness and have just days to live, you’re not going to be fucking watching TV or doing any of the other bullshit that we fill our lives up with.

When there is a deadline, you’ll get it done. Apply Parkinson’s law to dramatically increase productivity in your life:

“Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.”

In other words, however much time you get to complete a task will be how much time you take to actually finish it. If you are given three weeks to finish a process paper, you’ll likely procrastinate the first two and half weeks and finish it on the last few days. If you are given two hours, you’ll fucking crank it out. It’s just how we work.

You think you have tomorrow. You always do. And how often do you actually do what you told yourself you were going to do when the day comes?

>>15506476
9/13
“The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today. You are arranging what is in Fortune's control and abandoning what lies in yours.” - Seneca, the great Stoic philosopher

You don’t have the future. So stop expecting to do things in the future and stop looking forward. You only have today. Don’t fall into the trap of telling yourself that you’ll have time later. When that time actually comes, you’ve likely forgotten all about that goal and you’re even busier.

So what do you do?

Write down your fucking goals. I can’t overemphasize this. Writing your goals down has been scientifically proven to dramatically increase the chances that you meet them. Articulate them, describe them in fine detail, and journal about them frequently. Every morning.

Create positive feedback and accountability. Write out a checklist. Nothing will feel better than taking your pen and drawing a line crossing out the goal you’ve just accomplished. Nothing will feel better than having a checklist completely crossed off at the end of the day. And then taking the paper, crumpling it into a ball, and tossing it in the trashcan like Kobe in his prime.

Set a time limit. You don’t have infinite time available to you. How you allocate the finite expanse allocated to you is significant beyond measure. Force yourself to meet the goal by a deadline. Set a date. Whether it’s a few days, weeks, or months from now, set a date. A specific date. Don’t make it unrealistic. But don’t be lenient on yourself either. If you’re not serious about meeting your goals, you never will.

>>15503939
aim lower cunt, plenty of uglies for ya

>>15506478
10/13
WAKE UP TO REALITY
Consider this scenario for a second: “Imagine for a second that you have a senior thesis paper due at midnight tonight. It’s five o’clock in the afternoon, and you have thirty more pages to write. You’re sitting at your desk, exhausted, tired, and absolutely spent. You’re coming off an all-nighter and all you want to do is hop in bed. Bags of Doritos and chips are strewn across the floor around you. Seven more hours, you think! How the hell am I going to fucking get through this?

But you do. Even though you’re feeling like absolute shit, you push forward. You only get one chance to finish this thesis paper, and if you don’t, you’re fucked, you’re going to fail, and your life will turn to shit. You won’t graduate college and everything will head downhill. So you finish it.

For the next six months after you graduate, you have your own personal goals to wake up at five every morning, lift four times a week, start your own business, and lose thirty pounds.

But of course, what the fuck happens? You fear failure. You fall back into your routines. You fall back into your comfort zone. Your behavioral addictions begin to control you. Six months pass, and instead of being closer to goals, you’re even farther away from achieving them then you were before.

As a result of your failures, you’re set forth on a downward spiral in which you get a shitty career, marry someone you hate, stay overweight, have a financial crisis, become mired in existential anxiety, and fall into depression. Your life has turned upside down, and you consider suicide. Everything falls down around you, all your friends and family leave you, and you try to drug yourself senseless to numb yourself to the pain. Eventually, you die of an overdose.”

>>15506480
11/13
Failure was not an option with the fucking thesis paper, was it? Failure is never an option when you have a job, is it? If your boss tells you to whip up a two-page report on the company’s financial status by tomorrow, you’re going to do it. If you have an opportunity to get a promotion, are you going to waste it?

So why the hell is failure an option with regards to your own goals? Why are the goals society imposes upon you more important than your own?!

Why does getting to class on time matter more to you than heading to the gym? Why does sitting in your little office cubicle in your 9-to-5 job matter more than getting your fucking life together? Why is an essay due date more important to you than living up to your own life potential?

So get off your ass and start moving!

THE FINAL FRONTIER
You get 5,200 weeks in your life. And that’s if you’re lucky enough to live to the ripe old age of one hundred.

Not many weeks, is it? You might be an eight, a fourth, a third, or maybe even half of the way through that. But it doesn’t matter. This is all you get.

You don’t get to live another life. All you will ever see and think in this world is happening right before your eyes. And you’re just wasting it away.

Billions of years of random atomic collisions and lucky mutations have led to your very fucking existence, and you’re wasting it on critically-acclaimed TV shows and video games. It doesn’t matter if you believe in an afterlife or not—you know that this is all you will ever get, here.

“A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.” - Charles Darwin

You’ll never be twenty years, five months, and three days, six hours, and two minutes old ever again. Every moment in our lifetimes is a once-in-a-lifetime moment. We’re the only organisms capable of understanding our own mortality and the value of our existence, and we do nothing about it.

>>15506484
12/13
None of you truly understand how fucking short your life is. How this is the only chance you’ll ever get to exist here. You only have one childhood. You only have one youth. You only have one chance to live your twenties. And your thirties. And so on. You only get to choose a career once. There are no second chances, no rewinds, and no redos.

You’re on a train hurtling in only one direction—towards the end of your life.

You think you “understand” that we’re all going to die, that you only get one life, and blah blah so on. Right? Fuck no. You don’t understand it one bit.

If you truly understood the fucking value of your own existence, the shortness of life, and have internalized and accepted your own mortality, you’d be living a completely different life than you are now.

Let your fear of death and your understanding of your ephemeral, finite existence here push you to greater heights than you could have ever fathomed. After all, it is the only chance you will get.

What do you have to lose?

CLOSING THOUGHTS
Hopefully I sparked a fucking fire within your minds. That's what you need. You need to absolutely obsessed with success. Or you will get nowhere.

If you think motivation doesn't last, is bullshit, and doesn't work, you're not motivating yourself properly. Stop buying into other people's opinions and think for yourself. Of course you’re not going to feel like working all the time. But that’s what motivation is for.

People understand motivation wrong.

Motivation isn’t always something that makes energy and vitality course through your veins. Motivation doesn't mean waking up in the morning, feeling on top of the world, and ready to crush anything in your path. Motivation doesn’t always make you want to fucking fight gorillas. It doesn’t make you want to climb fucking skyscrapers. In fact, it doesn’t even mean that you feel great.

>>15506486
13/13
Motivation is knowing that you have to do something no matter what the fucking cost, and then going ahead and doing it. Even if you're tired, cold, and depressed, you’ll do it. Nothing ever happens without motivation.

”Discipline” is just motivation when you’re feeling like shit. Motivation isn’t just a fickle emotion. It’s the knowledge, and drive, with the full force and strength of your being, that regardless of consequences, you must achieve something.

And life's fucking hard. Nobody is disagreeing with you. But it's time for you to stop letting life passively control you, and for you to become the master of yourself and fucking destroy life once-and-for-all.

You can complain all you want, play victim, and cry about how unlucky you are. About how shit the cards you were given in life are. Go ahead. But nothing will change, and you’ll go on living a pathetic life you are.

Man the fuck up, I say.

It’s all on you. Nobody will change your life except you. No book, no Internet article, no quote, no video, and no philosophy will help you change your life, unless you choose to.

You’re dying right now. Stop sleepwalking through life and wake the fuck up.

How long are you going to wait before you start living the life you’ve dreamt of?
So, get out there, WAKE THE FUCK UP AND TAKE MASSIVE ACTION!

>>15504338
Spot on. I'd add to this the fact that mainstream media becoming less and less redpilled each year since the 80s, the rise in single-parents (women raising sons), beta dads not knowing how devastating these internet traps can be due to growing up in simpler times, etc.

Economic safety nets but not cultural ones

>>15501810
How does a change in economics change the rot made by technology? Marx as a response to the current crisis of the soul is beyond retarded. Some things are more than economics.

>>15506489
Man shut the fuck up.

old social structures are being dismantled and the death of spirituality. this is great if you are the ubermensch who can will your own structure into reality, but turns out most of us flounder if we aren't shown a clear path to travel.

>>15506550
theory of alienation

>>15502263
Imagine calling someone else retarded after that rant.

>>15506489
>>15506486
>>15506484
>>15506480
>>15506478
>>15506476
>>15506472
>>15506467
>>15506464
>>15506461
>>15506456
>>15506449
>>15506445
To what extend can this shitfest simply be explained by depression?

>>15506648
depression is just a name for the symptoms. says nothing on its own about causes or solutions

>>15502263
based

I feel the internet affected me positively overall. In general, I feel this is a bad period in time to be born into if you adhere to the expectations it tries to indoctrinate you with.
>get a job
>get a wife
>get baby
>consume
The good thing about the internet and even mass society is that it gives you a glimpse into things you probably wouldn't notice if you weren't born under these circumstances. For example, people might seem special and unique snowflakes if you're born in a village, but if your work or daily activities involve meeting people you start to detect patterns and similarities that unironically make you wonder if you're experiencing scripted events. People are not that special, and you probably aren't that special either - and realizing this might not be special in modernity either.
There's a clear call to investigate more into life and why we're here at all and what all of this means, but that goes completely against our modern cultures. You aren't supposed to ask questions, especially not fundamental ones that are deemed as silly.
Personally, I have no empathy for the people that cry about how they don't have a wife or a good job or whatever. Many of them barely seem self-aware. It's either "muh jews" or "muh capitalism" with nothing else. Even those that pretend to care about god are basically braindead reactionaries without any interest in it beyond getting a needed feeling of community.
I genuinely feel in my heart that with every passing day I get closer to god. It may not be the god of tradcucks, but it's certainly a god. There is a greater meaning - maybe not in our individual lives but in looking at everything that's happened and continues to happen all around us. And if you don't believe that, if you can't believe that... I'm not sure what reason there is to be alive at all. I'm tired of the normalization of mass indoctrination done by societies to make everyone think that life can only be lived one way.
Live however you feel is meaningful and die for it if it comes to that.
Deleuze warned us about this.

>>15506489
Thanks anon, I've been putting off my piano lessons but I feel fired up now.

>>15506648
Depression isn't a real illness. You feel depressed because you subconsciously know that you are making shitty decisions and therefore living a shitty life. Just man up and fix your problems.

>>15502333
based randy prozac

How can i stop being fake ? i feel like i have no inner voice

>>15506617
>theory of alienation
This still doesnt solve the issue that the technology that facilitates the breakdown of social bonds would still be available under a communist regime.

>>15501788
The pic is actually true though. If you can't find your own reason to be happy in today's world with all the ways available to you you are honestly just a coward.

>>15501788
>What are some decent books that explain why so many young, western guys (and girls) nowadays are such godawful wrecks?
I don't think this is something new or something that is worse now then it ever was. Life is hard, most people are messed up in some ways. Always was, always will be. I could be wrong but its just what i think

>>15501788
I don't know any literature about contemporary youth problems but it seems to me they bare some resemblance to superflous men from Russian literature, read Pushkin's Evgeny Onegin

>>15506550
>Some things are more than economics.
lies

>>15506852
seconding with Oblomov.

>>15502377
of course people want private thoughts and privacy but the internet provides no suitable means for that to happen, you either have almost completely private discussions between very small groups of trusted individuals or everything else isn't all that private and may as well be public. the closet analogue to semi-private discussions for groups in public places like pubs or parks is things like irc, discord, facebook groups, whatsapp, etc, but even then everything can still be recorded and immortalised and society is yet to adapt to that. 20 years ago the worst a social falling out would lead to is maybe a job loss or being required to move areas but that would have been pretty drastic, these days a relatively minor mistake or wrongthink is likely to follow you around for the rest of your life if you're required to have an online media presence which is becoming mandatory as everybody and everything moves online. treating people like they're attention whores and deserve the falling out they get because they had a discussion on twitter 11 years ago to 20 followers with no likes or retweets undermines the serious change in the way we communicate and the consequences that come from it

>>15506445
>"self-improvement is masturbation"
>proceeds to write a 13-post essay on how to improve yourself

>>15507090
>BREAKING NEWS: CHRONIC MASTURBATOR POSTS ON 4CHAN(NEL)

>>15501788
Stop masturbating. Do sport. Read. Here, you are already better than 80% of young males.

>>15502333
You go too far in some aspects,and that sadly makes you look like a schizo, but the elite using psychologic methods of crowd control while the average population is in a panem et circenses scheme is 100% TRUE.

bump

>>15505559
>switch from discipline society to achievement society
what does that mean

>>15501788
Heidegger

>>15502263
>Occulus Rift goggles
>muh oglo boglo goggles
an apt description

>>15501788
The only difference between today and 50 years ago is we can publicly see everyone's misery. It's not like people were much happier fifty years ago. It's just the only ones able to make art or leave things for the future were the ones who could. Before that it was murder and genocide for centuries

>>15508243
This is not true. Look at the growth in suicide rates over the last 30-50 years. People were on average happier (or at least less depressed) than they are now. Recommend reading the essay this anon posted: >>15505559 which is one of the better conjectures I've seen on this and why it's happening.

>>15502377
Private thoughts contained some element of independence no matter how miniscule. With everyone airing thoughts in the open it is much easier to contract a meme illness and become a vessel entirely filled with implanted ideas. One ceases to have an individual identity and aligns with a collective identity that tirelessly broadcasts its own triumphant existence. The loudest broadcast prevails over truth and indeed becomes the truth which adherents uphold. A culture dominated by the lowest common denominator. Only capable of low resolution universal expressions and nothing with personal depth of unique experience.

I posit the belief that mankind (in the west) experienced its happiest years from 1950 to 1990. Things just aren’t the same now.

>>15506719
What if I don’t know what my purpose is

>>15501788
Pornography and videogames

>>15502377
Ignore all the other recommendations. Psychopolitics by Byung-Chul Han speaks explicitly on your question, talking about how the recent push for diversity in all areas of life is only so people spice up their social media with their actual personality, essentially doing the data mining for the corporations. In order to feel special, people put all of their inner thoughts and feelings on the Internet. But let’s say they have a less than perfect opinion or feeling, the feedback or backlash they receive forces them to change it and conform to what’s accepted.

I want to die

>>15501788
Niggers.

>>15502517
>sean connery is considered a twink by /fit/'s standards

Fixed that for you. Most people would consider his body to be in good shape. (And females care more about face and height anyway.)

You people realise having a smart phone or computer is optional, right?

>>15501788
Industrial Society and Its Future by Theodore J. Kaczynski

>>15502263
>he didn’t watch the Netflix original about the infamous Mormon rappers, Sisyphus and Oculus, and their rise to fame in Salt Lake City

>>15505559
>>15508777
Based Byng-Chul Han posters.

>>15502300
>rational and compassionate world
Yep, you're retarded

>>15506719
I'm awfully certain quite a few very intelligent therapists and psychiatrists have written lengthy books about how treating depression is substantially more complicated than "just man up".

>>15508926
Barely

>>15509413
>intelligent therapists and psychiatrists
There are indeed countless intelligent conmen and grifters; that doesn't make the snake oil they're peddling any more effective.

>>15505559
thanks this was somewhat interesting

>>15501797
This is only part of it.
Limited privacy together with a highly politicized and judgemental society is what's really causing damage.

I don't think there is a realistic way out of it with democracy so we better pray for a collapse that's not too bad and we get something better than communism or facism.

>>15508926
Not for much longer. Just wait until its too inconvenient not to have brain implants and a universal ID in your wrist

>>15506424
You understand that all the brave people would die and the cowards would survive?

>>15509667
Isn't this what happened with the World Wars. An entire fighting generation was lost so bitch boys took over and ruined everything?

>>15509436
Isn't depression chemically measurable?

>>15509677
Russia lost even more men but they didn't turn into pussies, or at least not as much

dostoyevsky describes it pretty well

>>15501788
are other people like this? I thought it was just a me problem

>>15506339
it correctly predicts that we are currently in a time of crisis and that when the boomer generation politicians are replaced by the millennial generation politicians we'll to see a shift into an era similar to post WW2.
The hope is that the crisis is only the pandemic and social unrest and does not spiral into WW3, which lets be honest is pretty high with China being cunts at the moment.

Here's a recent article about the authors thoughts on current events
https://www.advisorperspectives.com/articles/2020/05/20/neil-howe-the-pandemic-and-the-fourth-turning

>>15509683
That doesn't mean it needs to be treated chemically.

>>15506719
This, and i say this as someone with depression. The only people I've met with depression who have the same symptoms as I do are women who have postnatal depression: everyone else had life problems they didn't want to fix or were too dumb to see as problems. I had my life more in order before I started any treatment, and if I could do it over, I would never have gone to a doctor because they fucked up my physical health worse.
>>15509436
Is bang on the money. I would have been better off with a doctor who recommended drinking more water to combat dehydration from crying than any doctor who prescribed pills.
I've learnt to avoid doctors because of the bullshit they put me through only for them and the drugs companies to admit that the drugs have no real effect whatsoever except making people with life problems numb so they might focus on their life problems, or else fucking them up so badly in other ways they drop out of treatment and solve shit on their own.
Everyone I've met who thinks they were cured by a doctor were either looking for sympathy and attention or just did not fucking know that paying your rent/mortgage on time or not being a dick to people or eating regularly or other simple fucking bullshit you should learn as a kid would make their lives less stressful. The diagnosis now is more likely to mean "morose idiot" instead of anything like uncontrollable crying or insomnia that makes you look like The Machinist no matter how much you eat. It should be a crime they're allowed hand out pills like they do, doubly so since they had to admit false advertising in court. I still have my life more in order than most fucks I meet with "depression" and none of them wake up at 4am to cry while doing chores, because most of them wake up at 11am to bitch about how chores are necessary to not have your life go to shit.
>>15501788
If you want to see some fucked up shit, anon recommended a book called Crazy like Us and it explains a lot of why everyone is "mentally ill" suddenly. It's about doctors trying to help and fucking up the whole world because they are American and assume there is a pill that cures shit like tsunamis and it's the same pill that also cures depression. Because obviously there must be a pill for that because America would like there to be a pill for everything.

>>15509683
No. The APA has never supported a mono amine theory of depression because the only people who believe in the serotonin theory of depression are drugs reps and doctors who get free lunches off them. The guy who first made the serotonin theory retracted it when he got better equipment.

Theres so many resources and tools available for creative work. Go out there and make something frens!

>>15508199
>"Disciplinary society is still governed by a *no*. Its negativity produces madmen and criminals. In contrast, achievement society creates depressives and losers. [...] The positivity of *Can* is much more efficient than the negativity of *Should*. Therefore, the social unconscious switches from *Should* to *Can*. The achievement-subject is faster and more productive than the obedience-subject. [...] With its idea of freedom and deregulation, contemporary achievement society is massively dismantling the barriers and prohibitions that constituted disciplinary society. The dismantling of negativity serves to enhance achievement. [...] Depression - which often culminates in burnout - follows from overexcited, overdriven, excessive self-reference that has assumed destructive traits. The exhausted, depressive achievement-subject grinds itself down, so to speak. It is tired, exhausted by itself, and at war with itself. [...] It wears itself out in a rat race it runs against itself."

>>15506489
That's it. I'm off 4chan for a year and working on my goals. I will post again in one years time as a testament of my success or failure.
/lit/, you're a standout board, but in the end you're just another dopamine hit.
Thank you, motivation poster.

The main thing was we just ate our food no one took pictures of it but then again the camera hadn't been invented yet

>>15501788
>YOU LIVE IN THE BEST TIME IN HUMAN HISTORY BE EXCITED
>BLACKED.COM

>>15506701
Lots of people, especially in this thread are claiming that we are wasting our time on the internet. This often reminds me of my boomer parents, who just were not able to see what an awesome tool it is for a sharp mind.

The internet gives primary access to most of mankinds knowledge and unfiltered first hand information. Of course the plebs flock to certain places like facebook and netflix, because there they can get their instant gratification. But plebs will be plebs and its better to tolerate them, than to live without the internet at all. I mean, we have live footage from active war zones, literal world class scientists answering questions on SE just for fun and libgen for everyone. At no time in human history did we have that.

4chan by itself is still a pretty good website, most boards have domain experts with different opinions. They are easy to tell apart from the shitposters, because they can justify their positions when challenged. Such discussion is rather rare in other places.

mien kampf

>>15502429
>for decades
decades is still pretty new you narrow minded zoomer retard

>>15501842
>polygamy is not prevalent
They call it polyamory now.

>>15501842
Do you see the problem this poses for the cooperation necessary for society to function? I'm not saying people should be forced into monogamous marriage, but there is an issue here.

>>15510301
To add one more thought to add some justification.

I am convinced that any loser on 4chan is much better informed and more knowledgeable than 70% of the average normies. The amount of knowledge you come into contact here is staggering. I know more about science, art, cooking, and other stuff than most people in my age group and have no problem to hold an intelligent discussion with anyone on most topics. However, one must not lose focus on your own area of expertise and always work to improve.

Our real problem is that were introverts and do not carry our knowledge outwards and thus often cannot capitalize on it.

>>15508914
/fit/'s standards are bloatmax. Connery is a twink by normie standards.

>>15501842
>William Crooke and Sir Herbert Risley, two 19th-century English social scientists, coined the term “hypergamy” to describe their observations of inter-caste marriage in India. Women, they found, married up but never down. Crooke and Risley concluded (or assumed) that hypergamy’s root (in India, at least) is the male insistence on preserving the status of the patrimonial line. A decade ago, political theorist F. Roger Devlin revived the term and gave it a new twist. Far from being unique to India, hypergamy is in Devlin’s account universal and, what’s more, driven by female, not male, desires. “[W]omen,” he wrote, “have simple tastes in the manner of Oscar Wilde: They are always satisfied with the best.”

>When properly channeled, hypergamy can be individually and socially beneficial. It encourages young ladies to become worthy of a worthy man, and vice versa. Yet off the leash, it spurs women in unhappy and self-indulgent directions.

>This truth our culture cannot abide. That there are vices characteristic of men and not widely shared by women (violence, crudeness, skirt-chasing) is not merely acknowledged but rubbed in our faces. But any assertion of the converse is met with incomprehension, denial, and sometimes persecution.

>>15503479
I get laid pretty often, but I still live bounce from apartment to apartment with no real roots, no future dreams, and no real furniture. The only belongings that I've cared to preserve are game consoles. Hell, it would be nice to get a family, and build a house I could improve and make my own, but it seems so far away. It's so easy for a single bad event to wipe out my savings, and it's not like I live a rich life, I rarely buy clothes, maybe a couple games a year. Just seems like there's no future.

>>15510407
>Our real problem is that were introverts and do not carry our knowledge outwards and thus often cannot capitalize on it.
jokes on you, I get plenty of (You)'s by sharing synoptic trivialities with other anons

>>15502372
how do you expect anyone here to answer this question? do you go into bars and ask people how to quit drinking?

>>15502515
Hey Anon I read your post and I want to say you did a fantastic job of articulating your thoughts. I've been in somewhat of a rut for the past 4 years or so and it's cool to know that there are people who feel similar to me.

>>15502515
well, your post was good enough for me to screencap, so obviously you've at least got writing ability going for you. can't say much in terms of advice since i'm mostly in the same situation (recently exasperated by quarantine and blackpilled by riots) but i imagine the solution lies somewhere in irrationality. i think "understanding" yourself too well can be a fault, the reality of it being that you only understand yourself within the narrow channel you've forced yourself into rather than knowing "yourself" separate from that. i think the only hope is being forced out of it, maybe to one's extreme detriment but nevertheless requiring change or death.

>>15502263
>Makes fun of Americans
>Quote he's making fun of is from one the most famous (French) authors

The audacity to quote an author on a literature board, how dare he!

Humanity was never meant to progress past villages of 100 people

>>15504147
Dont be like me. Im 29 for 1 day. Still a virgin. I had a few chances but blew them away cos i cannot have a urge to have sex with a girl unless i have emotional connection. On top of that i was always shy person, not around girls but people in general sense. Now i am more open, not shy at all, can talk to girls and make advances, but im still too emotional for a man. Also, being a manlet does not help at all, especially when you live in a country where everything below 5'10' is short. Not that i am physicaly unattractive, but some things i cannot change and i accepted that. But you know, i have had my chances, even more than i tought when i recollect memories. I just needed to lose fear and apply myself more. I mean, fear is the biggest problem. Find the source of your fears with girls and confront it. Now, you are just a coward and i am a hypocrite. We will make it man.

>>15511132
It's amazing how many Americans read this as him not knowing Sisyphus, when he's confused about the VR games bit.

>>15511203
I relate to everything in this post. Good luck, brother.

>>15502372
Literally just stop coming here. You're the only one who can make this change and if you can't muster the will to do so by your own accord, without external prompt, it will never happen

>>15502458
I unironically listened to 1930 full album like a month ago. Was going to listen to more merzbow but none of his other full length albums are up on yt (apart from pulse demon in parts which has ads) and so I stopped and started listening to regular music again.

Anyone been listening to breathe carolina recently?

>“Man created in the divine image, the protagonist of a great drama in which his soul was at stake, was replaced by man the wealth-seeking and -consuming animal.”

>>15502300

>Trusting lefties

Being able to point out flaws in Capitalism doesn't make you a good person. Capitalism being bad doesn't make whatever kind of system lefties (do they even really know what they want?) would impose good. In fact, it would inevitably be much worse.

>>15501788
>so many
Quit projecting loser
And quit making blogposts, we all see through your "some books" faggotry

>>15506489
>WAKE THE FUCK UP AND TAKE MASSIVE ACTION!
>13 part motivation posts on Mongolian basket weaving forum in an unrelated thread

You first retard lmao

>>15502515
I wish I could help you but I cannot. I cannot reroute how your synaptic terminals are wired. All these experiences you are feeling is because you have got so used this habit of this is how life is that you cannot physically think about how else it would be. You can break the cycle by not changing the way you see life, but by changing your habits.
It makes my blood boil reading stuff this. The fact I have the ability to help, but i can't. These posts end up stuck in my head, and I cannot shake them off. I just want to help, but who says that I should interfere, i could potentially make things worse for these people, or worse, for myself. I will be thinking of you anon and I send you my hope and prayers.

>>15506445
>“Self-improvement is masturbation.” You can thank our lord and savior Tyler Durden for this underrated piece of gold.
Yikes!

>>15502515
If you really want to change and are receptive and have faith, I can transmit some energy to you anonymously. I picked it up from my guru, who himself picked it up from various Eastern teachings like Taoism and Hinduism. The Hindu yogis call it kundalini and the Taoists call it qi. You should feel an unusually heightened state of mind. Or do you? It depends on the state of the recipient, as well. Some people might laugh at me and call me schizophrenic but I’ve experienced it myself. The energy can be transmitted at a distance to those who really need it. God helps whom He will.

If this post struck a match in you, the best response would be to study all of the world’s great religious and mystical traditions unbiasedly, without having any particular attachment to a specific tradition. Various saints, gurus, and prophets will bless you. This may be difficult for you, however, if you’ve been conditioned to be particularly attached to one religion, which for most Westerners today is what they call “Christianity,” their own modern sentimental interpretation of Christ’s life and teachings. God bless you all. I don’t use this board much since I had an awakening about two years ago, so pay attention to this post closely, you won’t see something with this quality often. And if you think I’m arrogant or deluded, that’s your loss.

>>15506445
Ok, now shut up

>>15501788
Death of the west
Pat Buchanan

>>15509257
The only rational world is a compassionate world, you might think violence is intelligent but you're a retard

>>15512254
citation needed, stupid pussy ass homonigger

>>15511720

>Trusting the status quo

Do you even really know what they want? (no, and you clearly don’t want to) just because they’re “lefties” doesn’t mean it’s inevitably bad, in fact! being able to avoid the flaws of capitalism would make it markedly better

>>15512485
You what? You that war lover from a week or so ago?

>>15504338
This, but don't forget literal hormone altering chemicals in plastics.
t. Boys Adrift

>>15504338
It's not helping girls. It's lowering the bar on intelligence for girls, so women who would previously be seen as intelligent are now lumped in with mediocrity. It's vastly increased the pressure on women to be fuckable, to the point they start advertising their sexual availability on Instagram at 13, while also telling them not to use that fuckability to secure a marriage contract. This results in women who think they are smart to be on the dock carrousel til 30 when they realize their chance at contributing to the next generation is gone or has left them with no partner and three genetically distant children who cannot form sibling bonds and who have no male role models.
Traditional value of females has been devalued so the women who used become intelligent whores who could live by their wits are gone and the women who became wives and mothers due to their mediocrity are left with no security or standing.
If it were only attacking masculinity, the problem would not be so pervasive because the traditional female roles would provide a bulwark. You don't attack just one side of a linked pair if you want to engineer their failure.

>>15502263
Absolutely horrid bait

>>15506445
>>15506449
>>15506456
>>15506461
>>15506464
>>15506467
>>15506472
>>15506476
>>15506478
>>15506480
>>15506484
>>15506486
>>15506489

This anon's abrasive style is a work. He's sort of fashioning himself as TLP. A few of TLP's tendencies, as well as TLP's theoretical frameworks come through in what anon has written. However, I can see that he does not actually understand what he is advocating for. He does not provide the really important advice of understanding what is it that you should care about? That is the real question, and that is why so many anons here argue about Buddhism, Christianity, Philosophy, and so on. Once you have something you are truly convinced in, moving towards it is a matter of course. But following this anon's advice will land you in the same bog of materialism that you foresee today. That said he is correct about many things.
He speaks of success, but fails to ask what this success is? Should we pursue money? Fame? A book deal? Respect? A family? How do we choose what to do? He frames it as, so long as you can do all of this you will succeed (in a capitalist framework)

I cannot give you any sort of medicine for your ails, and neither can he. I can only tell you what I do. For me it is the pursuit of art through literature. It is the pursuit and not the achievement that matters. Of course you can find parallelism between this idea and the bhagavad-gita. So my advice is this: Do your duty without expectation, and do not covet it's fruits. You might ask, this runs us into the same problem this anon led us to- how should we know what our duty is? Arjuna asks Krishna this question at the end of the Gita. You may interpret it however you wish- use your intuition, and once the decision has been made, do not question it. Sometimes it will lead you into penury, and sometimes into wealth. Sometimes you will be lead to love, and sometimes to loneliness. Treat life with equanimity, or, it would be better to say, pursue a state where you can treat life with this sort of equanimity.

>no Fyodor Dostoevsky

>>15512527
FFuck you butterfly. If I saw you irl I'd knock you right in the jaw and have my way with you as is custom among barbarians. Fkin bitch

>>15512729
didnt read lol

>>15512527
>war lover from a week or so ago
There are many war loves here. Be specific.

Is Gen Z going to have an OK Computer/Fight Club moment where the dissaffected male youth embrace edginess because they can't have a gf and they hate their jobs?

>>15512797
Joker already exists

>>15509998
i'm gonna need sauce

Rebirth entails some kind of pod state first. Something will come of this. What more pod like can you get than anonymous comments stacked on top of each other. The most trapped person has the potential to be most free.

>>15512799
Fight Club ended on indifference towards the establishment. Joker is anti-establishment all the way.

>>15512729
Different anon here. Thanks for that.

>>15512841
Well Joker claims he doesn’t care about the establishment or the political aspects of what he did. And they do show negative sides of the effects of the rioting as well
>Bruce’s parents who might have been assholes get shot
>poor Bruce however is left alive
>alone in a mansion with only his butler

>>15512856
That line from Joker feels like it was added in just to make him more sympathetic to the audience, but sympathizing with him at all is enough to support an anti-establishment mindset still. Fight Club, in contrast, has a major plot point (the whole finale) around the fact that the narrator's resentment towards society is as poisonous to his independence as conformity is.

>>15512868
Yeee, I can agree with that especially the scene of him at the therapist revealing she can’t help him anymore due to getting fucked over by funding and most people with any authority being cunts. Man that movie was fucking bleak

>>15502263
>everybody are from the Amerishit culture globohomo tainted culture
>Σίσυφος
Look at him and laugh! He didn't start with the Greeks, the fool!

>>15502263
stop posting, faggot

>>15509490
nice buzzwords but otherwise I agree

>>15506489
t. Gay Hitler

>>15502515
Social media are (re)designed to keep you pacified and depressed, feeding you faux-validation points from nobodies so you could slave away afterwards. 4chan became reddit with (You) for upvotes. It also has a bonus of herding malcontent youth into easily controlled political cults, like poltards or their tamer Qtards brand, where they keep everyone as depressed as everyone else on the site.
Like any opium, it is really hard to get off to, especially after years of narcotic dependency. 4channer is the modern drunken helot, a slave pacified and debased.

>DFW was 24 when Broom of the System was published
>Zadie Smith was 25 when White Teeth was published
>Marek Hlasko was 23 when Eighth Day of the Week was published
>F.S. Fitzgerald was 23 when This Side of Paradise was published
>Carson McCullers was 23 when The Heart is a Lonely Hunter was published
>Tao Lin was 24 when EEEEE EEE EEEE & Bed were published
>Italo Calvino was 23 when The Path to the Nest of the Spiders was published
>Kerouac was 20 when The Sea is My Brother was published
>Goethe was 25 when The Sorrows of Young Werther was published
>Musil was 25 when The Confusions of Young Torless was published
>Hemingway was 25 when In Our Time was published
>Tatsuhiko Takimoto was 24 when Welcome to the NHK was published
>Ryu Murakami was 24 when Almost Transparent Blue was published
>Garcia Marquez was 20 when Eyes of a Blue Dog was published
>Nietzsche was 18 when "Napoleon III as a President" was published
>Nietzsche was 18 when "Fate and History" was published
>Nietzsche was 18 when Free Will and Fate was published
>Nietzsche was 19 when "Can the Envious Ever Truly Be Happy?" was published
>Nietzsche was 20 when "On Tendencies" was published
>Nietzsche was 20 when "My Life" was published
>Saramago was 25 years old when Land of Sun was published
>Dickens was 24 when Sketches by Boz was published
>Dickens was 25 when The Pickwick Papers was published
>Huxley was 25 when Limbo was published
>James Joyce was 25 when Chamber Music was published
>Proust was 25 when Pleasures and Days was published
>Mishima was 23 when Confessions of a Mask was published
>Bret Easton Ellis was 21 when Less Than Zero was published
>Bret Easton Ellis was 23 when Rules of Attraction was published
>Kenzaburō Ōe was 23 when Nip the Buds, Shoot the Kids was published
>Emile Zola was 24 when Contes à Ninon was published
>Balzac was 20 when Cromwell was published
>Baudelaire was 24 when Salon of 1845 was published
>Hitomi Kanehara was 20 when Snakes and Earrings was published
>Stig Dagerman was 23 when Ormen was published
>Strindberg was 22 when The Outlaw was published
>Ibsen was 22 when Catiline was published
>Milan Kundera was 24 when Man: A Wide Garden was published
>Adam Thirwell was 24 when Politics was published
>Ned Beaumann was 25 when Boxer, Beetle was published
>Norman Mailer was 25 when The Naked and the Dead was published
>Eleanor Catton was 22 when The Rehearsal was published
>Robert Walser was 23 when Schneewittchen was published
>Noah Cicero was 23 when The Human War was published
>Jorge Luis Borges was 24 when Fervor de Buenos Aires was published
>Tolstoy was 24 when Childhood was published
>Johan Harstad was 23 when Amublance was published
>Mira Gonzalez was 21 when i will never be beautiful enough for us to be beautiful together was published
>Mira Gonzalez was 23 when Collected Tweets was published
>Kim Insuk was 20 when Bloodline was published
>Evelyn Waugh was 25 when Decline and Fall was published
>Ben Brooks was 18 when Grow Up was published

>>15506489
trash posts

>>15513266
I feel like things have also been made more complicated by the lack of alternatives to the internet nowadays.
Where 15 or 20 years ago there were still plenty of alternatives to socialize even as the greatest sperg around, nowadays practically everything is organized through the internet and social media or directly on such a platform (considering for example that printed newspapers will probably have died out before the end of the decade).

>>15513395
Alternatives to what exactly? There are still live clubs you can join, unless you live in some 500 ppl village. And even there you can probably discuss planting and herding n shiet. Chances are, you forgot to how interact live with due to lack of experience. Well, drug addicts aren't exactly the most social friendly lot anyway.

When everything is devoid of live human interaction, of course 90% of people become depressed sheeple, they are effectively imprisoned in solitary confinement. This shit fuck your brain up. Even monks congregate in collectives of several dozen people, solitary monkhood is reserved for the best as a spiritual war quest, not the baseline.

for me it's about inability to find proper job, with the rest unfolding as a result of it.

Everything more decent require experience, and I'm 30+ with only customer service experience. I can't even get an intership because somewhy interships is limited to up to 29 years old... I don't know a way out of this . I already have a degree so going to uni is not really and option but i can't find any middle ground, middle position in some company because I can't meet the requiraments and there seems to be no courses/intership to get there...

i'm to old to do unqualified labour anymore. I'm really suffering.

>>15513709
Have you thought about joining the military?

>>15508573
Man the fuck up and figure it out. Life is eat or be eaten. If you're not cut out for that, you should honestly do the rest of us a favor and kill yourself so we don't have to deal with your whiny bullshit.

Yeah, well, you all talk about your wants and desires. Personal success, gf, whatever. There's a clear distinction between what's "good" and what's "bad".
But the truth is, these "good" things are mostly good for yourselves, aren't they? But, I don't think you're just motivated by pure egoism. Perhaps, it is simple mindlessness, just wanting what everybody else wants? Superiority, satisfaction, victory, worth - you've got to have it. Why? Most of these things are so hollow in the end.
You're all very lonely people. Even if you have a social life. You want to be loved, if not by other people - than by yourselves, or by God. And you want to return the feeling. Everything else is superfluous. Everything else is just a means to an end. You're taking a very indirect approach - it's quite cute, honestly.

>>15513716
Military requires perfect health, i have a minor hear issue. Can't be police officer, pilot, etc either...

>>15513766
>Military requires perfect health, i have a minor hear issue. Can't be police officer, pilot, etc either...
How big is that hearing issue? From all I know (at least in the US) getting in with minor health issues isn't particularly hard, assuming you can keep your mouth shut about it.
I recommend you ask the military enlistment general over on /k/ if they can help you out: >>>/k/meg/

>>15501788
it's all because we gave women rights. that's the entire problem with western civilization. if women didn't have rights, there'd be world peace. there'd be no war, no global warming, no HIV, no coronavirus, nothing. women are to blame for everything wrong with the world. you take away women's rights, it's world peace.

>>15513846
t. incel

>>15502300
>socialism is about creating a rational and compassionate world
That's why you purge millions of people the moment you take power, leftoid scum.

>>15513304
Does this mean I am a failure if I do not publish world literature at the age of 20? Is this a recommendation list? What is the point of your post?

the amount of retarded posts itt is astounding

>>15513855
how am i an incel when i fucked your mom today?

>>15513883
It's a venting thread.

>>15512877
That movie was so fucking bad, it felt like some Hollywood napkin take in trying to write an edgy, "shocking" character. I can't believe it doesn't absolutely shit on here of all places.

>>15508301
>People were on average happier (or at least less depressed)
Its very possible that the reason we see increase in depression rates is because people use a more psychologize language where they say are depressed instead of sad, lonely, miserable, stressed etc.

>>15514120
has a phenomenon like this been diagnosed and analysed? come to think of it, the number of alcoholics and smokers are going down, while more and more people are officially depressed.

this thread(4chan, twitter and rise of sad music and mainstreaming of nihilistic/pessimistic ideas/culture in general) is a proof that mark fisher's diagnosis in capitalist realism was right.

https://youtu.be/AhOcwhwumP4

>>15514196
huh? I just want a gf that is an exact copy of myself but with boobs, politics isn't going to help me achieve my dreams

>>15508429
Such good points. Worthy of its own thread and discussion.

>>15508777
>But let’s say they have a less than perfect opinion or feeling, the feedback or backlash they receive forces them to change it and conform to what’s accepted.
Also known as political correctness.

>>15514196
My sorrow has nothing to do with capitalism or the modern world, there's a much deeper profound emptiness that pervades all material existence. Things weren't better in the middle ages, nor were they better in prehistory. Existence is a fleeting dream, sadness is knowing that there is nothing you can hold on too and all things are consumed by endless death

>>15501804
dogshit take, overrated french nihilistic faggot has nothing interesting to say except to jerk off to his cynicism

>>15501797
this is a good post

>>15501788
https://thelastpsychiatrist.com/

better than any book on the subject, in short, technology has enabled all of western society to become narcissists

>>15514314
No-one who actually lives would say something so dumb. This is a textbook example of the psychological defense people employ to rationalize their own failure and mental arrest, "oh no, it's not that I've failed to live, life fundamentally is empty and not worth living. Why? Because the emptiness doesn't last forever obviously!" It doesn't even make internal sense but it doesn't have to because the point isn't to answer anything but rather to stop questions, to stop looking for reasons by suggesting there's no such thing.

>>15512729
you dont have the life experience to understand his advice and put it in the right context to understand it. For someone else out there its so spot on that its scary. Be glad that it doesn't hit you like that.

>>15502517
Sean Connery actually was a bodybuilder before becoming an actor. He just lost a lot of gains for that role.

>>15501788

>>15504306
Dalrymple, Life at the Bottom: The Worldview that Makes the Underclass

QRD?

>>15514153
>has a phenomenon like this been diagnosed and analysed?
Yes

https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/9781351118347

The Psychologization of Society explores the manner in which psychology has increasingly crept into everyday life, with nature reduced to a source of mental health, the belief in God motivated by health not salvation, sin and evil turned into psychiatric diagnosis and the market economy being primarily driven by psychology. Showing that Norway, like the United States and Great Britain, is currently subjected to a psychological worldview or "therapeutic ethos," Madsen examines an array of spheres such as media, law, religion, self-help literature and cosmetic surgery to shed light on the ways in which the therapeutic ethos, rather than simply "triumphing" over them, actually blends in with regional norms and values. A study of the psychological imprint on Western countries as a form of the global democratisation of psychologised self-care, this book explores the boundless struggle to be the "best version of yourself" in contemporary neoliberal culture. As such, it will appeal to scholars of sociology, psychology and cultural and media studies with interests in therapeutic discourses and paradoxes of health.

>>15514336
>oh no, it's not that I've failed to live, life fundamentally is empty and not worth living.
You can't save everyone, some people are just doomed. Some lives are just empty. Nobody is obviously condemning a good life, but is every life worth living? The universe is fundamentally flawed that way, biased.
Now, you will obviously respond saying that I am the one who is biased. That if I tried hard enough, I would improve. It's a belief that all poor people share - "if I was just rich, my problems would go away". If you don't have everything, there is always some void you can blame all your problems on. But, what do you do, when you have everything, at that void is still there...? No, self improvement and success is just a distraction. If I can't be happy with nothing, I won't be happy with everything either.

>>15501788
>What are some decent books that explain why so many young, western guys (and girls) nowadays are such godawful wrecks?

Although the book is not specifically addressed to this issue, pic related addresses at least some of the issues that are implicated by this question.

>>15514472
fuck off, jew
take your holocaust books to redit

>>15514461
saved. thanks, anon.

>>15514465
what laughable casuistry

>>15514465
>It's a belief that all poor people share - "if I was just rich, my problems would go away".
Its not about being rich. Its about having enough so that daily life is not a struggle and a source on constant stress and potential danger. Working 2 full time jobs, who is going to take care of the kids? Will you be able to afford them a birthday gift? What if they get invited to birthday, can you afford them to give a gift? If your car break downs on the way to work do you lose your job? Do you have have enough to fix the car? How will pay for getting the car to towed? Its okay you can just go 2 days without food to pay for that. What if you are late on rent, will you get thrown out? Where you gonna live? Will your kid get robbed and stabbed by a crackhead on his way to school? Life is hard and stressful for the poor. Its not about being RICH.

> If I can't be happy with nothing, I won't be happy with everything either.
You don't know how awesome life can be cus you always been miserable. Get a taste for the good life and you'll see your happiness levels rise.

>No, self improvement and success is just a distraction
No it isn't. Improving financially, socioeconomically. It affects your health, physically, psychologically, effects your life span, effects everything.

>>15514336
I'm the original anon, I take it all back I'm lifting weights and I'm going to be positive regardless of what happens to me.

>>15514472
good rec

>>15514476
good luck in life, tiny little boy

>>15514556
No you're not. It's almost impossible for someone to stop being a whiny self defeating cunt like that, the only thing that will snap a person out of said state is a real honest to god confrontation with reality. Only despair will convince them, but the longer this confrontation takes to appear the more bitter the regret. And there's no guarantee you won't run away when at last you're compelled to live, many kill themselves instead, something they never did do while pretending to believe their philosophy. I've been there myself.

>>15514541
Having a certain level of material well-being is necessary for happiness and contentedness. But you very rapidly reach a point of diminishing returns once your base needs are covered.

I make around $130k/year, own my house, am all told quite comfortable, but also not nearly as happy as I was when I was making $40k/year and living in a dumpy apartment. Part of that is getting older, part of it is other life stress, but wealth alone will not bring happiness.

I will happily admit that had I only been making $15k/year instead of $40k in my example, I would probably not have been as happy though.

>>15513266
>4chan became reddit with (You) for upvotes
I've noticed this too (and internalized it as well to the point where I am always seeking that endorphin high from getting a (you) or that huge rush from getting a ton of (you)s from a single post. It's distressing.

I honestly think that the old forum systems, bbs's, and usenet groups were better for honest and open discussion than anything we have today, but that's because even though you might have an avatar you were still basically anonymous. Though they also lacked the ability to just post without any attribution that we have here, which is worthwhile as well.

Anyways, I agree that (you) has ruined a large part of what made 4chan 4chan.

>>15514587
>Only despair will convince them
despair wears off quickly

>>15514640
Then it wasn't despair, just a passing fancy. It took the agony of becoming homeless for me.

>>15502333
>throwing your computer and game consoles in the garbage
Why don't you take your own fucking advice?

>>15507131
I do this and can confirm. It really is *that* easy.

>>15514648
So? Do you still have the same drive as you had back then? Or did you just get comfortable and stay that way?

99% of young people subsist on a plant-based diet. Every year people are eating less and less meat. This makes you loathe living. Why do you think religious sects have refrained from eating animal foods/have made grains and seeds a mainstaple of their diets? Because it extinguishes the fire within. and has you yearning for the ''world beyond'' (ie. you'll try to fix your depression through psychedelics and drug use) It's just as with getting too little sleep as your cognitive faculties of self-assessment decline: most plant-based eaters are ''just fine'' as they turn to hate this world.

>>15509490
>>15501832
This combined with teaching kids/young adults that you are suppose to participate and show effort.
Decent moral values, except that you are feeding a echochamber of no actual value. While being permanently online, and being stupid enough to participate in it.

I think I agree on the sentiment of it just being a creep in the direction of Fax -> Landline -> Mobile Phone -> Social Media -> Social Media on Phone

>>15512715
Its slightly more complex than that.
You have additional layers, such as having a baby essentially halting/resetting the current step of a womens career.

Got a new sexy position? Having a kid means once child leave is over, you have to start over at the bottom of that position.
So when is it rational to have kids? Either as a student(lol no), or after securing a reasonable position where climbing upwards is unlikely.
Which again amplifies the pressure downwards, since its now only weird people who have kids early.

>>15508199
I am going to guess:
In a discipline society, you do your job and claim your right.
In a achievement society, you try to make yourself look good doing that job instead of doing that job.

>>15506489
>just do it the post

>>15506489
easy to say when you're stomach is writhing, churning and gurgling nonstop. Those pushups and leg lifts aren't so easy to do when you feel the slightest bit of strain might cause an episode of diarrhea. And it's the pressure and bloat I can't just go take care of, it just persists.
How can I grab life by the balls when my heart is beating so fast, fight or flight mode, just sitting in front of the computer? When I can't form a definite thought and hold onto it for more than a second, how will I possibly plan for the future and remember it?

>>15515293
get some therapy, stop overloading your senses in front of the computer

>>15515303
I don't know how to see a doctor or a therapist. I don't know how to help myself. I have no insurance and no money. No one is caring for me.

>>15502372
if you are living with your parents or friends give them your phone, your laptop's wifi card, lan cables, etc. for a week and try it for yourself.
I said your phone because assume someone from 4chan don't have any friends so you don't have to worry about it. But you can buy some shitty dumb phone to call, and sms. You cant access internet with them.

>>15515352
Get some music (Bach's Brandenburg Concertos would be good for this), put them on your phone/mp3 player, turn off the computer, and go outside to some place as close to nature as you can get (even if you're in the city, try to find a park with trees and plants; if not go out into the woods/pains/desert/whatever). Sit or lay down, and listen to the music while you concentrate on taking long, deep breaths. Don't focus on your thoughts, just concentrate on the breathing. To the extent your thoughts wander, try to focus them on the music. Take this time to try to find some calmness. The rest of the world will wait and is unimportant. Spend at least 30 minutes (the length of one of the concertos), or preferably an hour in this state. It should help to calm and quiet your mind and body.

Good luck anon. We are here for you if you need more.

>>15515352
I don't know where you live, but there are free clinics in the USA. Just some google would help you find them. All you have to do is to ask for help, even at your local church or whatever. If you're too embarrassed, treat it like a formal business obligation or something.
If you need friends, I'm sure you could even try looking for them on 4chan /soc/.

>>15514426
>60s bodybuilders are twinks by today's standards
christ

>>15505888
Finally going back after 3 years of nihilistic self searching to finish the engineering degree I started

>>15506137
I phone post because some faggot at my apartment keeps getting the STATIC ip banned for requesting CP. use a VPN you student retard

>>15508489
That’s a false nostalgia. Stop letting your ahistorical fantasies determine both your politics and your happiness.

>>15510407
I disagree. Just visiting 4chan is not enough. Proving that is as simple as examining someone who posts to /b/. No, individually there’s no guarantee a 4channeler is better or worse than their normie counterparts, it’s what they use it for that is the catch.

>>15501842
>polygamy is not prevalent
Yeah it is. It's just not official.