There’s no doubt society has transformed after the coroni-rona virus.
The world will never be the same again. There are good and bad parts to the transformation that’s happened to society. Understanding the differences can help you get ahead of the average person.
Here are 5 ways society has transformed.
1. Wokeism has taken on new meaning
In some ways, the word “woke” is incredibly offensive.
Racial prejudice, equality, and the massive changes in sexuality amongst humans are bigger than ever. Those who are sensitive to these issues are called woke.
You could say what they are is compassionate humans.
Where things changed is when virtue-signaling about these topics became a status symbol. Where society didn’t care about equality but pretended to because it helped individuals get ahead.
It’s become popular, too, to let sensitivity to these issues turn into victimhood. Because victimhood is a way to gain attention and power. Now we’re seeing a backlash to the woke movement.
Those who work in tech found a way to get revenge on society. Some say many of them are bullied nerds just looking to get their pound of flesh.
I don’t think the topic of wokeism is as simplistic as some make out. But it’s clear since all the events of 2020 that pretending to care about minorities and equality while doing jack sh*t about it won’t get you far anymore.
Action speaks louder than nice equality words.
2. Free speech isn’t what it was
We never spoke about free speech much.
It was a basic human right that was a given. Of course you could speak freely. Then 2020 happened and the tech bros found a way to censor and label people’s speech as misinformation.
They got to choose who could and couldn’t speak through algorithms and silent shadow banning.
Now free speech is top of mind. We’re not far from a world where the current social media platforms will be torn down and replaced with a new model.
I predict we will have more democratic tech in the future, where both employees and users will vote on platform changes and set the rules.
Where social media will have common governance set by legislators, and where the process of banning people will happen in a court-like environment.
Lots of people say things we dislike. There are without a doubt bad actors. But if we can’t hear people speak then we can’t expose their lies and pick apart their ideas. That’s how we truly police what is right and wrong.
Silence forces conversations to go underground. They end up turning into mobs and all sorts of crazy movements.
3. People are conflicted about capitalism
I was a capitalist baby. Then a capitalist kid. Then a capitalist teenager.
Before and after school I went around with my dad to visit his customers. I got rewarded for selling more products with jam doughnuts and Coca-Cola.
Being good at capitalism is how you help your family eat and get a home.
I used to love capitalism. But society has changed. We’re starting to question capitalism. Some parts work — such as getting paid for the value you bring and how hard you work.
But other parts don’t work — like rich people paying almost no tax and housing inequality.
I’m quite good at capitalism. On the one hand people respect you when you’re good at making money. On the other hand being good at capitalism can force people to see you as a monster.
They may want what you have, so they become mad as hell at you. Your success reflects all their flaws.
The models of capitalism and communism are at opposite extremes. Neither quite works but you could argue both have good traits.
I predict there will be a Version 2.0 of capitalism. A model where the majority are taken care of financially, but where hard work and value creation are still rewarded.
4. “Fitting in” no longer carries the same rewards
It used to be that if you followed the rules, studied hard, went to university, got a good job, and bought a nice house you were successful.
This is the definition of fitting in.
Society has changed though. Now we appreciate weird people more. Fitting in is boring. Fitting in leads to regrets later in life.
The world has urgent issues that need to be solved and fitting in forces society to go at a snail’s pace.
If you fit in nowadays your job will likely be replaced with a robot or AI.
If you worship memorization or access to information then Google Search and ChatGPT have already made you redundant, you just may not have realized — or likely your employer is still playing catch up.
Screw being normal.
5. The Kardashian Rule has skewed what’s important
Algorithms run the internet.
In a weird way they’ve forced us to become too focused on current events. How much of social media talks about history or past events? Very little.
Author Mark Manson came up with The Kardashian Rule. It says the more popular a person is online, the more society will overestimate them and the significance of their actions.
It’s why you might have Elon Musk syndrome. He’s everywhere. It feels like everything he does is so important when it probably isn’t.
The solution is to read more books from the past. Escape the recency bias. Try not to chase viral. Instead, chase “interesting.”
