Civilization is a Lie

Take your meds.

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>>14934994

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>>14934944
It's not the human interaction that makes civilization fake, that just helps it keep up the facade.
The real culprit here is the idea of human exceptionalism. Everyone thinks that they are better than their instincts, better than the animals, plants, planet, nature/ So many humans walk around with their heads up their asses, thinking that they can just use everything on the planet as they like. It's okay, after all, god said it was okay to keep on using until it's gone. He's just gonna come fix it all soon anyway.

>>14934944
You cant blame the people themselves. Because if they dont conform than others wont accept them. And we cant help but leave out others for being weird.

>>14935036
Thisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthisthis

http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-harsh-truths-that-will-make-you-better-person/

>>14934944
It's not society that's broken, OP. It's your idea of exceptionalism; your idea that "be yourself" is the RIGHT way to life.

[spoiler]It's not.[/spoiler]

>>14935121
Being yourself is fine. But you are an animal, an animal that evolved to be with others of your kind, helping one another and living in harmony with the land that supports you. Never forget those things. Give to the land and you shall prosper. Give to your brothers and you will be happy.

Are you saying that modern civilization is a lie? It seems pretty real consider how it is.

>>14935188
What I'm saying is that civilization is based largely on ideas which we invented for the purpose of maintaining a hierarchy. So you aren't really "you" most of the time. You're basically an actor

This thread is cool.

>>14934944
well it works for mankind
if it doesnt work for you you are the problem

>>14935201
Yeah. For civilization to work you need to pay into the system, lose a little to gain a little; I don't know why this is some big revelation. I think it's all right.

>>14935210
Mankind suffers every day.

>>14935220
Does it matter to you?

>>14935220
Life is suffering.

>>14935227
What a load of bullshit.

>>14935036
"Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together."

>>14935242
Prove me wrong
>protip: You can't

>>14934944
Recommended reading:

48 laws of power

You have presented the perfect scenario in which to recommend this book

Also civilization ? society. Society is a part of civilization but it is not civilization in itself.

>>14935248
Very easily I will do so.

Life in this context means "the experience of living".

In order to experience "suffering" and know that this is an experience of suffering you need to have a previous experience of non-suffering in order to distinguish suffering from non-suffering.

>>14935248
I'm happy with the fact that I am alive, even if I do experience suffering. You aren't spouting some noble truth, you're just choosing to not value existence. Existentialism>Self hating Buddhist bullshiit

>>14935227
Life is what you make it. if you want life to be suffering then that is what it will be.

Bottom line is thought that the universe is indifferent, so you might as well enjoy your time here.

Unless for whatever reason you don't want to do that, and in which case don't.

>>14934944
Well, duh.Dishonesty is fundamentally necessary to negotiate pretty much any social situation, or to coexist and work alongside others. This is why the most successful nations (in terms of health, happiness, low crime, etc) tend to have socially sanctioned forms of dishonesty and passive-aggression.

>>14935201
It's not just about hierarchy. It's about community. Hierarchy is part of that. Like all social animals, we're hierarchical, but dishonesty is necessary even alongside social equals.

>>14935264
Desire to enjoy life is not enough, it also takes effort and insight.

>>14935227
Life is suffering if you let your "pain body" take over. The part of you that can't look away from a deadly car crash or can't change the channel whenever Nancy Grace comes on telling you that your neighbors are all child rapists. The part of you that delights in seeing people treated poorly. Maybe you get a little jolt of energy whenever a plane goes down or a public shooting happens.

If you feed off of the bad shit that goes on, you turn away from the good. Sure there is probably more human feces on the planet than there is food but you shouldn't go around making shit sandwiches for lunch just because it's more abundant.

Just like how much evil is in the world, it's a byproduct of humanity. We eat negativity and violence and we shit out evil and war and more negativity and the cycle continues.

>>14935260
The fact that difficulty and imperfection exists is what is meant by "Life is Suffering". I interpret it as the Buddha's way of saying "Deal with it".

>>14935285
Difficulty and imperfection do not exist.

"You walking on the street"

"You see an hunchbacked man"

"What an ugly guy, he sure is imperfect, he must have a difficult life" you think to yourself.

You exist, and the hunchbacked man exist(hypothetically), but difficult and imperfect are both concepts relating to value judgements you made.

>>14935297
You get shot in the chest, A brick hits you over the head, your house burns down. Oh, what an easy, perfect world I'm living in!

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>>14935303
lol

>>14935303
>You get shot in the chest, A brick hits you over the head, your house burns down.

You won't hear me complain about it.

>Oh, what an easy, perfect world I'm living in!

Here you are conflating easy with perfect and still failing to understand that they are concepts relating to value judgements.

>>14935303
If bad shit never happened, everything would be perfect and perfection would cease to exist. Everything needs a counterbalance.

>>14935319
I think I would hear you complain about it. I'll leave it at that.

>>14935337
I never complain, except as a means of joking.
I'm very conscious about not signaling weakness.

All very unrelated to our discussion.

>>14935273
>desire to enjoy life
>desire
I don't think you understand. there is no desire, because if you are desiring then you are not doing.

>effort
believe it or not it takes less effort to be in a positive state of mind than a negative one

>insight

Look at the little insight animals have as compared to yet, yet they are still content or even happy

>>14935281
Jeez suck Tolle's dick some more why don't you

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>>14935364
>I don't think you understand. there is no desire

You: "so you might as well enjoy your time here.
Unless for whatever reason you don't want to do that"

So I think here, it is you who does not understand what you are responding to.

>if you are desiring then you are not doing

Desires are essentially sub-conscious. If you desire something, the desire is not going to disappear just by you "doing" whatever.

>believe it or not it takes less effort to be in a positive state of mind than a negative one

Believe it or not, your "wisdom" is nothing but new-age garbage.

Overcoming suffering is not about having a "positive" state of mind, it's about doing away with the un-fufilled expectations that are the source of your suffering.

>Look at the little insight animals have as compared to yet, yet they are still content or even happy

You want to be senseless like an animal, and in due time, you will be.

>>14935372
Never heard of him.

Don't forget that all of the key points in this thread are very true, but are also very good for business. Culture now teaches us that image reflects personality, and a good image shows individuality. So basically, spend an assload of cash, buy the image you want to project: sporty, rebellious, whatever, and people take you on sight alone. It's all bullshit, yes, but it's very profitable bullshit.

>>14935441
you can enjoy without wanting to enjoy

yes, desires are self conscious

you're right but expectations aren't the only thing keeping people from being content

how not to be senseless? How to be more aware?

>>14934994

Because the Koolaid is apparently empty. :D

>>14935205

Agreed.

>>14935503
pretty much this.
showman ship.

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>>14935271
But what is the true worth of a value system that's primarily based on fraud? Like, consider this example that you may or may not identify with:

Imagine you are a man who works in a corporate environment and there's a female coworker you find sexually attractive. Unbeknownst to you, she finds you sexually attractive as well. You both want to act on these feelings. But you can't act on these feelings without violating your roles. Speaking generally:

>As a woman, she cannot approach you first, or she's considered a slut.
>As a man, you have to pretend to be interested in something other than her sex, or you're a pig.
>As employees, you cannot express your mutual interest in sex to one another while employed.

Even if you do eventually become a couple, you're both just taking yet more roles. Individually---"boy/girlfriend," or "lovers," "friends-with-benefits," etc.---and also as a unit---"a couple," "a thing," etc. The hierarchies you inhabit require you to behave certain ways for as long as you are in this situation. Even if neither of you want this, you still have been conditioned to conform to a role, so you quietly tolerate it together. This could go on between the two of you for literally your entire lives. The only thing that might end this cycle is when one of you finally breaks from their role and actually tells the truth for once.

So rather than a quick, efficient, and (most importantly) honest meeting where you both tell each other what you want from the other person, have sex, and move on with your lives, with everyone being fine with it, you have to engage in this extended ritual where all the parties involved have to feign ignorance and pretend to not want what they really want.

>>14935253
This book is a joke and was the "Supreme Gentleman's" favourite.

Please don't take it seriously.

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>>14936853
"A man who enters into the body of a wife who is not his friend is doing the same thing as if her were sleeping with a prostitute...Similarly, a wife who yields or seduces a husband whom she despises is little different from a prostitute; both are pretending a conquest and a surrender that does not exist.

It always seemed astonishing how much terror exists in marriage...[A husband and wife] may have been very successful at developing an elaborate series of rituals, conventions, by-laws, and customs that enable them to hide their terrors from one another and from themselves and from the world around.

A man and woman may marry each other because they feel physical passion for each other, because society expects them to get married, because they think marriage will firmly establish their masculinity or femininity, because marriage will please their parents and make them acceptable members of middle-class society, or because they have nothing else to do but get married.

They can go through a courtship, even one of considerable duration, talk very calmly and rationally about the future, engage in socially approved or socially disapproved intimacies, and still be perfect strangers to one another. They can go through the horrendous ritual of the wedding ceremony, risk their bodies in the trial of their first act of love making, adjust to each other's peculiarities and eccentricities, even give birth to children, share the same bathroom and the same television set, live in the same house and drive the same car, and still remain, in the radical sense of the word, strangers. Vast areas of the relationship, including its most intimate dimensions, are covered by an immense conspiracy of silence in which problems do not exist because they are defined out of existence."

"The Friendship Game" by Andrew M. Greeley, 1970

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>>14934944

>>14934994
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_PAHbqq-o4

>>14934944
The problem is, OP, by setting ANY kind of standard for somebody you're still setting a standard for somebody else, so you can say that society makes people the baker or the crossing guard or policeman, but to bring down the barrier of fake societal roles is still resulting in altering somebody's behavior, even if it's in a lucid, I'm not part of the system sort of way.

>>14935220
Meaning it works doesnt mean its efficient.

>>14938086
That's pretty meta.

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>>14935201
What if individuality is the illusion? What if humanity or rather a society behaves like a colony of ants or bacterium, like a subconciously hive-minded organism? What if our individuality is just an illusion of grander and our decisions are just all according to the mass colony?

>>14935260
So life is measured in varying degrees of suffering? Kinda life how all physical feeling of texture and all that is just varying degrees if pain...

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>>14937275

>>14938392
The first noble truth of Buddhism. "Life is suffering."

>>14934944
>Has anyone here given much thought to the fact that when you interact with people, 99.9% of the time they're being disingenuous?

Quit hanging around hipsters and embrace new sincerity.

>>14934944
I've thought about it, OP. It's a little depressing. I find that being honest and being myself helps bring honesty out in others... so they reveal themselves to me very quickly. I get to know people very fast as a result!

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>>14936853
>>14937275

Who made this? A cave person?

>>14938392
>So life is measured

No, life is not measured in anything.

>in varying degrees of suffering?

Non-suffering is not a lesser degree of suffering, it's whatever isn't suffering.

So if you think you're suffering whenever you're not satisfied, then feeling satisfied would be experiencing non-suffering.

>Kinda life how all physical feeling of texture and all that is just varying degrees if pain...

You don't call it pain before it hurts.

Bumping because I want to read this thread when I wake up as it pertains to my psyche and interests.

>>14934944
>the fact that when you interact with people, 99.9% of the time they're being disingenuous?
facing reality is so difficult for most people so they perpetuate illusion with every ounce of themselves

>We're raised in a society that requires us to conform to certain roles
sort of, you can face the consequences of going against this which I encourage everyone to do for the experience, you can then learn to pretend to conform, people think you do but you don't

>>14934944R
Yes I agree with you. Let them wear their masks, may they fuse to their faces and be buried in them. Thus spake Zarathustra

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>>14941128

>>14941124
It's all right here! http://archive.4plebs.org/x/thread/14934944/

You are welcome!

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>>14934944
Welcome to the world of the awake! It's a lonely place and so many of the asleep will call you crazy that you start to question that at times, but once awake you can never see things their way again.

Captcha: fact ontaoet

>>14941162
newcomer to the thread here, haven't read all the way through yet but what you said makes perfect sense to me, today I feel exactly that way about things

>>14941363
Sadly, I've been living this for the past 15 years. I'm all to familiar with it.

>>14935364
Seek neutrality, that is the thing the vast majority miss is that you don't want to tip the scales to one side or the other. In a state of neutrality, you are not feeding either extreme. To feed one extreme or the other you are helping to create the other extreme from the one being fed. Feeding the positive extreme means that the negative extreme has to counter balance in order to keep things in harmony.

>>14935341
>I'm very conscious about not signaling weakness.
then you have issues

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>>14937275

>>14941510
My awareness of this only began about 3-4 years ago, but my exposure was quite intense and prolonged

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>>14934944
There is no one else to meet. What other person is there but the person you are for social interaction?

The reality is that you are who you pretend to be because you pretend to be who you really are.

The act is not an act.

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>>14942264

>>14935281

>there is probably more human feces on the planet than there is food but you shouldn't go around making shit sandwiches for lunch just because it's more abundant.

I think this should become a motivational poster or something. Just sayin.

>>14934944
This explains why some people become loners because when you are an honest person that prides yourself on being honest socializing can be a real pain when you have to be full of shit while everyone around you is equally full of shit it really does crush ones soul after a while if they ever become fully aware of it

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>>14935281

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>>14942610
>white text on white background

>>14935271
>This is why the most successful nations (in terms of health, happiness
The western world is anything but happy.

>>14935303
>Totally missing the point

1. The word is culture, not civilization.
2. You are paranoid.

>>14945155
I swear that posts like these are made by paid shills trying to stop the general population from becoming enlightened. See how they have to rely on accusations and personal insults? They always feel the need to bring into question someones mental health and label people as crazy in order to set the status quo.

>>14945191
Maybe you're the one paid by shills to let people feel alright about spewing out garbage and nonsense to make them lose sight of what's clearly happening in front of them.

>>14945217
Typical shill tactics. Accuse other people of what you're guilty of first, so they can't legitimately make it known what you're doing.

>>14945252
Typical shill tactics. Accuse other people of what you're guilty of first, so they can't legitimately make it known what you're doing.

>>14945258
#rekt

>>14935243
Chief Seattle

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>>14934944

>>14947277
So if I was to see a man beating and fucking a woman against her will me interpreting that as rape could be wrong by your beliefs? Think your logic is flawed a bit...

>>14934944
It's not a lie. It's a trick. All doors lead to the same place if you're trying to find a way. Society is built that way.

>>14947694
How can you be certain it isn't RPing, and she's actually a masochist and him a sadist?

>>14934944
Maybe homeless bums aren't really mentally ill, but are just acting contrary to how people in society act. You know: less robotic and are actually being themselves?

>>14947735
The whole "against her will" part explains that it is not "RP'n" ,a masochist allows the situation. Either way there is a such thing as truth and not everything is subject to interpretation.

>>14947826
How do you know the will of an other?
I thought this thread was going to be more interesting.

History is a lie. All throughout the esoteric traditions of the ancient world, there are pieces of a puzzle we have yet to solve. There is an esoteric undercurrent, revealed in full by none I have read, which has been whispered in secrecy since the ur cultures of babylon, egypt and india. Many ancient writers spoke of a bronze age, an iron age, a silver age, and a golden age. Some say this cycle goes forward. Some say it goes backwards. Still others say time is an illusion, that perhaps all is circular and we must hope for the age of light even when declining into the dark ages... Modern science seems to borrow this schema too. Prehistory is divided into the stone age, the bronze age and the iron age. Some tech magazine consider our modern age "the silicon age". Deleuze & Guatarri (IIRC) have an interesting part in one of their books where they speak, perhaps jokingly, of metals being the consciousness of the planet. They talk about how flowers form a symbiotic relationship with the bees that use their pollen to make honey and in the process spread it around to other flowers allowing them to reproduce. Perhaps, similarly, they reason, humans have a symbiotic relationship with the metals and rare earth elements beneath the crust of the planet. We mine them and use them in our computers and jewelry and pipes and so on... but only because they want to be used. Speaking of metals, many alchemical texts from different cultures talk about the man of gold. This reminds me of Plato's Republic and his commentary on the caste system The ruling caste, the priests/philosopher-kings, possess golden souls. The military caste then possess silver souls. Then there are the artisans and workers with bronze and iron souls. Plato's Republic is presented as a fantasy utopia but some say it actually a true life dystopia and that we live in it now... "the empire never ended..."

>>14936853
Vision #1: Perception of the All-in-One. Behind the veil of illusion you realize that your partner is woman in all her guises: goddess, queen, perfect lover, sister, mother, childhood companion; lewd temptress too, man-eater, whore, black witch, angry Kali: devourer of worlds. Only the persuasive simplicity of the commonplace vision habitually blind you to the fact that She in all her moods and costumes continually plays for your sake at the game of embodiment. In your relationship you two take turns imitating for each other all the male and female roles that crowd your imagination -- images out of dreams, movies, childhood books -- hiding (and seeking) behind the familiar masks that pulled you together in the beginning. The image of All-in-One supports the notion of spiritual monogamy: there is truly only one Goddess(God) and She(He) is now, was, and ever will be at your side. (In the words of the immortal Fats Waller: "If that isn't love, it'll have to do, until the real thing comes along...")

Vision #2: Perception of the One-in-All. Beneath the shimmering surface of things, you suddenly see that everything is alive, divine, and profoundly sexual. Every man and woman that you meet yearns to be your lover. (In his "Song of Myself," Walt Whitman managed to write down a glimpse of this unitary vision.) Every flower, tree, stone, or drop of water is a divine essence that demands your immediate erotic attention. Why are you holding back from this invitation to the dance? The image of One-in-All supports the notion of a spiritual promiscuity so shameless that it includes not only every living creature in its gooey affection but the vegetable and mineral kingdoms as well. Goddess(God) is in everything and Goddess(God) is Love.

Reconciling these two insights -- each of them true without a doubt on the deepest level of existence -- is a real problem for finite creatures such as human beings, forgetful of their true nature, locked into the separation illusion.

>>14949539
*I don't think one's interpretation of whether or not "a man beating and fucking a woman against her will" is rape has anything to do with the discussion at hand.

>>14941510
>>14941363

I know that feel anons

>Try to explain this to people I know
>Get called edgy, crazy, teenage opinions etc
>Other people just flat out don't care
>Mfw I'm the only sane person in a world filled with the insane

>>14934944

Recommended watching

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzPT4GFA2YY

People are just manufactured to continue the existence of society so that it can manufacture more people to continue it's existence

Even the elite (politicians, the wealthy etc) where manufactured so in reality even the people are the top are products of the same social conditioning you and I were put through so that we could all maintain society and believe in the same morals and ideals and opinions. So we could all want and pursue the same things.

And all this was started hundreds of years ago by people who are long since dead and forgotten

And that's the scariest thing of all, we're on a boat without a captain anymore.

>>14949623
Don't worry. As soon as I debug my system, remove the infection from my mushroom and resurrect my head, I will captain the ship and go down with it if need by while rescuing everybody else. I have faith that the mermaid dolphins will return me to shore. It might sound silly but it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make. I can't really see too well but I'll play it by ear.

>>14950959
I actually have maps somewhere upstairs. I just need a light or something to look for them. If I recall correctly, we're not technically off course even if it says here be dragons. We just need to perform an information dump where no one will think to look.

>>14934944
Yes. Society is a concept, laws are a concept, money is a concept. They are structures that man built up in their minds in order to establish unwritten social contracts to dictate conduct and how people ought to live. Whether or not the reinventions of these things are effective or good for people is a a large portion of what makes up Philosophy as a whole. Good job, you've seen through the imaginary conventions that outline how we live and why we live the way we do. Now ask what you will do with your awareness and have fun.

>>14934944
While I don't deny the thought, it does make it an interesting idea that the people who least fit into this society are the truest people to themselves. Those with mental illnesses that cause them to withdraw from society and become part of a different reality are truer to their own bodily functions. Serial murderers and criminals are acting out their own actual thoughts and emotions when they commit their deeds, which could mean they too are just acting as they would without restraint for concerns of societal roles.

Take it as you will, but it would seem that although it is not the most ideal way to interact with each other, it is the one I prefer over would could be.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d39IDEw6lu0