Today I sent out my latest Substack newsletter, titled 'There's a Problem with the Money.' This piece consists of material from this blog combined with some new stuff to tie it all together. It follows a piece on the theft of individual power and another that lays out often overlooked aspects of our shared circumstance. Already, the series feels like it has direction. Like it's going somewhere. But where?
I could continue into finance and economics, but that might be too boring. I also could jazz things up by doing a whole newsletter as a fictional scenario describing adoption of an alternative currency system. But I'm feeling like it might be more interesting to set the topic aside and instead consider something more immediate.
There are several directions I could go from here. The next piece could be about ecological ethics, mind control, trauma and abuse, Big Pharma incentives, or something lighter. Maybe UFOs or AI.
One thought is to focus more on the cultural landscape. On the stories people are telling now that so much of the covid narrative turned out to be untrue, and on the new models of media censorship now becoming prevalent. A good rant about woke totalitarianism is another possibility, though it would have to be a respectful rant because I know my readers.
This whole process is forcing me to organize my ideas in a new way. It's also reminding me of how unusual my perspective really is. I've already accepted that we live in a dystopia, while most people are focused more on imaginary future dystopias. I neither fear nor worship technology, but see it as a critical and broadly good part of the equation.
My views in these areas are tricky to convey. Some of my more controversial beliefs are trickier still. Like, I don't believe that democracy is the best possible form of government. And I doubt the American system even qualifies as a democracy these days. We don't have free and fair elections. Our elections are expensive and unfair. And even if they were perfect, I'd advocate for a better system. One that doesn't inflict the tyranny of the majority on everyone.
Perhaps more controversial is an idea that I rarely make explicit. This is the idea that we can actually change the world. That it's in our power to transform society into something better. But this isn't power we just have sitting on a shelf, ready for us to use at our leisure. It's power we have to claim.
A final direction I could take my series is into activism. I favor clean water and oppose defacing art for abstract reasons related to misunderstanding climate change. I also feel like activism is changing as the world goes digital and I'm not at all clear about where it's headed. Guess we'll see what I come up with.
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