The solutions to many of the challenges of our time are the same solutions to challenges in the past: slow down, find allies, put in the hard work, focus on fundamentals. Make the tent big but keep your circle of trust small. Diffuse leadership. Encourage initiative.
We're facing multiple crisises that cut across society in different ways. The pace of change is accelerating and people are desperate in a lot of different ways.
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Which is why it's so important slow down and create a stable place from which to engage with the future. We need to be certain of ourselves and our values so we can triage what pressures we can ignore, and which we need to attend to.
Example: A FOSS project is being overwhelmed with AI submissions. 1. slow down. Stop accepting submissions from untrusted contributors. 2. Reaffirm fundamentals: quality and maintainability.
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3. Build new community infrastructure for vetting and bringing in new contributors. The new system will look different and that's ok.
4. Resist pressure to "keep up". The core of the mission hasn't changed. Much of that pressure is coming from bad actors.
Other examples could be political action, mutual aid networks, climate action, or dozens of others. Lean into the fundamentals, human centric processes, and big tent, small circle, diffuse leadership organization.
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A big force here is a breakdown in trust. We don't rebuild trust with laws, covenants, or tech. We rebuild it with human interactions. More face to face, skin in the game, talking to, and helping each other. We need to do more of that in every arena.
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Another smaller example: I run a small website, how do I deal with the increasingly hostile threat space that is the Internet?
Radically reduce the attack surface. Static site only. Key only login. Automatic security updates. I preserve core features while sidestepping the mounting pressures.
I'm seeing my little circle of friends deal with inflation the same way. Focusing on priorities and leaning on each other. This is how humans have dealt with crisis since time out of mind.
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In our hyper individualistic society, it's tempting to look for saviors in our politicians or influencers. Or to give into despair. But there IS a path forward that makes the world better and it is composed of mundane, little actions, by ordinary people, and a whole heaping mound of hard work.
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In tech we're constantly being sold the next Big Thing as the solution. But the hype machine went off the rails a long time ago. It's not Web 3.0, it's not Blockchain, it's not AI.
human problems have human solutions.
You don't know who to trust in the era of AI scams? You shrink your circle of trust. Shut down the attack surfaces you can't defend and pivot to the ones you can. Many of us have stopped answering the phone when it rings or have started asking callers to ID themselves.
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In politics we're being told, this party or that ideology or that candidate will solve our problems. Nope.
Small town politics are where we change minds by meeting our neighbors and talking to them. Ideology is mostly shit. Let's hammer out details.
human problems will be solved by humans collaborating. Fascists took power by claiming to have the answers but the cards are down and they're a bust.
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Climate change is going to keep ramping up the pressure. Where people put their trust in a "great man" savior there will be more suffering as the top class try to burn it all down. The groups that come through this with the least suffering will by those that learn to rebuild themselves in trust and collaboration. Not so much trust in their government, but in each other.
Am I done yet? I dunno. Just wanted to write down what's been rattling around in my brain.
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@lloydlemons I think a lot of this work is just talking to people. Having civil conversations with people who disagree. Figuring out how to help our neighbors and letting them know they are cared about. Old fashioned building credibility and political capital.
There's almost certainly organizations in your town doing this work now that would love your help.
Tyson, Chicken Rancher 🐓
Brian Davis
Lloyd Lemons
Ricardo GTS