EdricApr 5
Leaning heavily on @pluralistic I wrote a thing about how the intertwined enshittification of our public and private sectors requires us to think hard about what we mean by ‘progress’.
https://savemefromwhatiwant.blogspot.com/2026/03/progression.html
Progression

What does the word ‘progress’ mean to you? What do you think of when you hear that word? Does it conjure up a relentless march of technology...

Show threadHexApr 6
@edric @pluralistic Progress is the realisation of Utopias.
-- Oscar Wilde, 1891
Show threadGeofCoxApr 6

@hexmasteen @edric @pluralistic

I don't think there has been much 'progress' at all in the 'western world' over the last 40 years.

My grandfather lived from a time you never saw a car or an aeroplane - indeed a world in which there were no aeroplanes - to see men walk on the moon. In Europe, at least, the big advances - pretty universal utility connections, radio and television, public health and care services, understanding disease transmission - you know, all the things that really make people safe and happy - were made in my grandfather's lifetime.

My life, by comparison, has seen relatively little 'progress'. Different screens in people's homes, some medical advances - but nothing on the scale of public water supply or sewer installation, or state healthcare, to really impact the health of millions; indeed, I have even lived to see the start of decline in life expectancy, and return of diseases we thought had gone.

The only big area of progress I see now is green technology - mainly imported from China.

Show threadMidgePhoto

@GeofCox
#Green tech is as big as any of those earlier advances.
The steady decline in #religion mediated partly through those earlier communications advances is possibly another. (The concentration of nasty weird grifting in the religious #rump* is a downside, probably temporary.)

* They might claim Right

Apr 7 at 7:06amMastodon for Android
Show threadGeofCoxApr 7

@Photo55

Yes - I too see the current developed world extreme right/religious shenanigans not as permanent reverse, but as desperate last-ditch reaction to the increasing acceptance by most people of social equality and justice, and the need to protect our environment.