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Comment by davidw | Hacker News Reader

> Humans are built to thrive in danger, chaos and instability. I think a good chunk of humans go insane in a safe and stable environment and resent the things that allow them to live mundane, safe lives -- technology, medicine and rational thinking.

That's part of what Tom Nichols has been saying: https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2021/09/10/democracy-di...

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> Our politics has become all about hurting other people, instead of trying to create something positive. We used to go to the polls and say, here’s what I’m voting for. Now we go to the polls to vote against something and we hope it makes others really mad.

This feels like a really uncharitable interpretation on what is going on.

To me it feels more like you have two sides, the two sides have viewpoints that feel very alien to the other side, so extreme that they feel like attacks but actually it's just a clash of worldview.

When one side has a repeatedly-stated policy goal like sending the military against "the enemy within" while specifically calling-out political opponents as belonging to said group, it's difficult to interpret that as a mere clash of worldview, even when assuming it's mere bluster to gin up engagement at rallies.

Right, I don't doubt that, but it's clear to me that this isn't the nexus of all of this.

What you're looking at is the later stages of a disagreement. It didn't start out that way, it started as something like, hey can we put the ketchup in the fridge, nah I'd rather leave it out, I prefer it warm. (I'm obviously deliberately being silly here).

You move on in time and suddenly blows are being exchanged because everyone loses patience.

hard to tell which side you are talking about here TBH, because while one side has talked up a big game about what they may or may not do, the other side has been actively weaponizing our institutions against aforementioned side.

Also, the loudest voices being amplified online today, along with a political strategy to pursue divisiveness, because it motivates the base to vote, while making unreliable independent votes less likely to vote.

I wonder if that's the real reason he wanted the US to start a war in Iraq: to alleviate the boredom of modern life.

I have a little theory I like to tell at pubs that all of the intelligence comminities exist just because it attracts people who can't stand being bored. Advancing national security could be a thrilling entertainment.

> I have a little theory I like to tell at pubs that all of the intelligence comminities exist just because it attracts people who can't stand being bored. Advancing national security could be a thrilling entertainment.

That's probably Special Circumstances in the Culture novels, but those novels are just a mashup of Iain Banks's imagination and biases, and I think they're poor approximation of anything resembling reality under any set of conditions.

Personally, I think your theory would be a fun conversation topic, but I doubt it reflects real life.

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