I used to think back in the day that authoritarians couldn't take over in the modern world because everyone knew better, especially in some western countries where they broke away from it and built entire countries based on rights and freedoms. I know it's coming from a place of privilege and I always thought I took that into account when thinking about these kinds of situations, but I didn't realize I could be that fucking wrong and in so many different ways. I didn't realize that the reason why it's able to happen was because every single company and institution, especially the ones that the people rely on, will literally do whatever the government wants without even second guessing it all in an effort to save their own ass. I didn't realize it was naive to think people could be better than they used to be. I'd see things like the Civil Rights Movement in the US and women getting the right to vote as prime examples of how good people can be when they get together and that we we're "growing up" as a global society despite its flaws and outliers.
This all disappoints me in a way that I have never been disappointed before and it genuinely makes me lose my faith in humanity in its entirety. And the fact that it's all coming from the oldest generations in the world is so infuriating. They took their biases into the future and instead of learning from it they decided to teach the next generations to be shitty to each other all over again. The fact that we live in the information age apparently makes no fucking difference when people just ignore the information. Literally feels like there is a perpetual feeling of disappointment and anger that I feel with every fiber of my being and I don't like that feeling. Sure, there are good people in the world and I love people and will always continue to do my best to make the world a better place, but I have absolutely no faith in humanity as a concept at this point. I feel like a tired old man at the age of 30.