2 o 2 5

[6782ce18a4161unn_atropos]

2024 is going out with a bang.


 Happy new year to you! ☺

[6782ce18a431cfox]

May you retain or regain your optimism in 2025!

[6782ce18a4458Stingm]

Happy New Year to all.

[6782ce18a45c0voodoo47]

well pretty much the only thing that didn't happen so far was an alien invasion, so things can't get any worse in 2025, right? riiight?

eeh very sure the universe will find a way.

[6782ce18a46dcfox]

Some moving p(r)ep-talk for y'all. Low-key shittin' all emotional.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGUNPMPrxvA

[6782ce18a47c8voodoo47]

well there we go.

[6782ce18a492eicemann]

Happy new year

[6782ce18a4a7cJoin2]

"2024 is going out with a bang."

It is in Gaza, Ukraine et al. Dark humour aside, what happened?

[6782ce18a4ba7fox]

The same procedure as every year, James!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ui9NfVs6FWY

[6782ce18a4e87unn_atropos]

It is in Gaza, Ukraine et al. Dark humour aside, what happened?

"Going out with a bang" because in the picture Goggles (disguises as awaiter) is about to take out Shodan and her crooks. It's concept art from the never completed game Deep Cover by Looking Glass Studios.

@fox: Urks,the swiss version 😒. Original is better!
https://www.ardmediathek.de/video/Y3JpZDovL2Rhc2Vyc3RlLm5kci5kZS80NDM3XzIwMjAtMTItMzEtMTUtNTA

[6782ce18a4fe6fox]

ARD Mediathek is likely to be geoblocked.

Probably most non-DACH people have never heared of this sketch before, including the Brits, most ironically. Short explanation for those folks: since the early 70s, it became an inexplicable and odd tradition that this sketch (Dinner for One) gets aired on New Year's Eve on German television. For petty reasons (I assume) different versions of it were produced over the time.

Thanks for the hint about Deep Cover. First time I heared about it, actually. Not the worst pitch at all.

[6782ce18a512bZylonBane]

Why is this thread titled "2 of 25"? What the hell does that mean?

[6782ce18a539asarge945]

I think it's a style thing.

[6782ce18a54e6JDoran]

Every year of the 2020's has been miserable, if you ask me. And quite a few other people, I'd bet.

[6782ce18a5614voodoo47]

as far as I'm concerned, the last year that was not miserable were 1999, so I don't even notice anymore.

the only positive thing is that I've done some math recently, and I think if I keep things very frugal, I probably can afford to retire in 7 years. not going to be travelling the world once I do that's for sure, but hey, I've got everything I need right here.

[6782ce18a5796Join2]

The rapture happened Y2K (as was prophesized) and we were left behind, or something. I've always "joked" that this was the case. Of course I don't really believe this, but they were better times for sure, and I never could have imagined it'd get this bad.

Still, it could always be worse. It's not WW3, just a big decline from the standards at the turn of the millennium. My life is going OK. I just don't like what everyone else is doing, broadly-speaking. Fucking everything up for us and future generations, that is.

[6782ce18a58edJDoran]

The Mayan calendar ended in the year 2012, so maybe that was then the happiness level of the world dropped off a cliff.

Or maybe the when the Large Hadron Collider was switched on in 2008.

Like you, Join2, I'm not serious about the above, of course. But wow, the world really does seem monumentally more miserable, boring, dull and humourless than ever before in my fifty-four years of life. I would put my feelings down to just extreme depression and my own situation (back and leg pain, working long hours at work, not sleeping, etc) but everyone seems to be really down, too. It does sort of feel like the world is winding down to something.

[6782ce18a5aeffox]

Me and many of my peers also vaguely felt that the turn of the millenium was some kind of historical tipping point. It was a particularly weird year for sure. However, I'm not able to deduce how much of that feeling came from simply being at a certain age (just coming out of adolescence and still living a pretty wild and chaotic life of which the consequences started to surface), what came from the media pushing the millenium buzz-themes full-force. Some actually important changes were taking place during that time or at least put on the horizon (like the introduction of the Euro-currency, for example).

Looking back, all that was just a build-up to the much less debatable tipping point that came with 9/11 in 2001. This undeniably shifted gears a lot.

Btw: I'm not a believer in supernatural stuff (and never cared to look deeper into it), so I was never intrigued by the Mayan-calendar thing. However, I find it morbidly fun to read the Nostradamus-"prophecies" that keep coming up in the media in January of every new year.

Some of his (and some others) verses about recent years were actually eerily specific and accurate, although you never really know how much the translations were spun to fit by whoever publishes them as part of a lazy filler-piece.
 

[6782ce18a5c1esarge945]

I don't think it was the new millenium, I think it was 9/11

The twin towers falling collectively demoralized the USA and brought in a cynical, suspicious and fearful attitude which has slowly destroyed everything.

[6782ce18a5e33fox]

Putin rose to power in 1999, G.W. Bush in 2001, islamic global terrorism escalated. Geopolitically that set the stage for a lot of shit that still worsens and affects us today in "the west". Now we have Putin, Xi Jingping, terrorists, Trump (plus X) successfully tag-teaming what was left of the "old world order" and the balance of powers. And because the end does not justify the means, wokeness has to be mentioned too because of its radical attempts at rewriting societal norms and traditions.

But it's no use singling out isolated events. Everything happens in a context and what we feel about it, is totally subjective and completely dependent on circumstance, of course. I really think that the effect of the Internet on our personal outlook on life, humanity and the world is often underestimated. It's a very double-edged sword and I'm not a fan of "ignorance is bliss" but becoming desillusioned (and more easily manipulated at times), sure is making it harder and takes things to more extreme levels. I'm not sure if we're able to take this much input without harm. Well, actually we do know that empathic persons take harm from being confronted with traumatic images. How is consuming news of all the bad things that happen all over the globe (without any influence on it) any different?

I'm still waiting for India to join the geopolitical game. Still a bit of an unknown factor to me. Their current leadership and system does not instill a lot of hope though.

[6782ce18a6079Nameless Voice]

I've definitely felt that the last year or two have been a lot darker and more depressing, on a world stage, than any other time in my lifetime.

We're reaching combined catastrophes of cataclysmic climate change that no one wants to take action on, late-stage capitalism eroding living standards by making housing unaffordable for younger people (amongst other things), and the complete collapse of any pretence at human rights or international law, as evidenced by the televised genocide in Gaza being fully supported by all of our governments, and actively promoted by all of our media outlets.

The promise of free access to information on the internet has been co-opted by algorithms designed to push consumerism and disinformation, while the last vestiges of journalism have been crushed and replaced with copy-pasted press releases and propaganda.

Meanwhile, no one actually bothers to check any facts or even think about anything they are told.

Dark times, though luckily most of those are vast global problems that don't really affect me personally, at least at the moment, so I guess that's something?

[6782ce18a6178not tiphares]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34JKpYsvMO8

[6782ce18a628afox]

Oh lord... somebody trained that AI with Scopolamine-trip reports. This needs to be wiped immediately. 😱

[6782ce18a64e9Join2]

Doom and Gloom thread again. Yay!

Chaos is the default state of reality. The universe does not care what lives, dies, what planets collide or what stars go supernova. Humans brought about order, justice, stability and prosperity, highly imperfect (and that cannot be emphasized enough) but continually evolving. The west broadly-speaking by the year 199X stood as a fine example of the peak of this long grind. The future seemed bright. The past 25 years just feels like a coordinated reversal of this progress. The social contract is broken, lunacy and misinformation is all the town crier speaks, our culture is replaced by mediocrity, and you will own nothing and certainly not be happy.

What is the intent of those that steer these events?

1: Mass enslavement/general control of the populace?
2: The insane actions of an elite satanic cult that spans multiple nations that merely seek to sow chaos?
3: Coincidental convergence of the collective greedy actions of the ruling class and Yes Men beneath that clamor for the same power?
4. It was Aliens/Other

Stay tuned for more societal collapse in 2 o 2 5! Expect Diddler coverups, your purchasing power to continue to shrink as it has for the past 40 or so years, more death and taxes, simpletons and bad actors to continue to flood the public consciousness thereby diluting the waters and the Epstien Files to remain [REDACTED]. And last but not least, absolutely nothing to look forward to nor work towards except trying to maintain your semi-comfy but mundane life.
On the bright side, a drone may make its way to your living room and fetch you a cup of tea in a few years, because that's what you really need - trivial comfort and distraction while you sit on the couch and stream Fortnite dressed as a woman while simps donate in droves and tune in daily, hopeful to catch a glimpse of your lady stick.

What we really need is REAL LEADERSHIP moving forward. Men that can shoot for the stars, offers (un)common sense, unshakable ethics and principles, and a sensible vision to lead us into the future as technology continues to complicate things massively. Instead we have a bunch of incompetents, evil greedy assholes, and old out of touch zombies. Safe and prosperous voyage into the future has to start here.