Why everything is horrible now

A man staring into eternal darkness/AI

If you know a lot of older people, you’ve heard this one before. It’s also popular on Facebook among those who are always on Facebook. “Everything is horrible now. The world is falling apart, and it’s only going to get worse.” Sometimes they’ll even tack on a, “I’m glad I won’t be alive to see it.”

Uhhhh, I just wanted to know if you liked the turkey, Uncle Rick.

The doom and gloom comes from people who own nice houses, have nice families, who have never personally been the victim of crime or illegal immigration or the changing economy. They were born in America in the 20th century. They won the cosmic lottery. They experienced the highest quality of life in the history of this planet. They got the new high schools, cheap college, abundant housing, and their music was sung by icons while today’s kids get Zoosha and K-Smog. Why are they so angry and pessimistic?

I wonder if they realize what they are really wrestling with and what they are confessing.

My reflex used to be to argue. How can you paint such a dark picture when you and your family achieved the American dream? YOU HAVE A FLATSCREEN TV JUST FOR YOUR PATIO. YOUR SUV HAS MORE TECHNOLOGY THAN ANY MECHANIZED WEAPON USED DURING WWII. YOUR DOG HAS ITS OWN DOG. But this was unproductive. The feelings are based on vibes, not facts. You can’t argue facts against vibes. But you can make an effort to understand where vibes come from. I’m trying to do more of that as people rely less and less on facts. I don’t want to be left out just because I make arguments supported by empirical evidence. I want in on the Vibe Wars. 

Here’s my best stab at why at the apex of human progress so many people think we live in Bladerunner. In a twisted way, I suspect there is cold comfort in believing the world is going to hell as you reach the end of your life. It makes it easier to face The Long Nap. To let go. To make peace with the end. Because others voice this belief, too, pessimism becomes a form of bonding, which reinforces the vibes supporting the belief. 

That’s not to say the olds want to die when they say they’re glad they won’t be alive to see the day we all go outside and it’s just The Road. They want to live. The titanic amount of money spent on end-of-life medical care in this country says so. But as we get older we realize the end is closer than the beginning, and we all have to live with that mind-bending piece of information.

Most of us are unprepared to glimpse into the abyss. We quietly obsess about that which we also dare not think about. We live in existential fear. Consider what that does to a person who has a Costco membership and access to the Readywise 150 Serving Emergency Food Bucket.

Partisan cable TV news comprehends the fears faced by the elderly. And the executives who run the show know the right thing to do is to comfort them as they face the end ha ha just kidding they use fear to profit off the final years of their lives at the cost of their eroding tranquility. Prominence is given to politicians who say that if we give them an incredible amount of power, they alone will fix it all. They are keenly aware that the elderly are sad because people stealing bath and body products from CVS stores in San Francisco means we’ve reached The End of Days. This late in their lives, what can older folks do? Not much. Except give money to candidates and vote for those who are willing to exploit The Final Cope. 

Is there an antidote? I don’t know. You have to be willing to face the end with peace in your heart. You have to be able to tamp down animal spirits when confronted with death. If you’re not the type of person who has ever exercised those muscles – and who can’t separate what they see every day in their subdivision from the bleakness of what the politicians say – I don’t know that it’s possible to change seven or eight decades into life. It is perhaps a tragic aspect of the human condition that when some of us come face-to-face with the darkness, we become the darkness. And choose to face it bearing a 25,000-calorie bucket.

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