I’m working on a couple big-ish pieces right now – one on economic sanctions, and one on a video game called The Outer Worlds, and in some ways this is relevant to both. One of the things that came out during the 2008 crash was that a great many people had seen it coming, and had been ignored or even fired for not being optimistic enough. I think there’s a very strong case to be made that a similar kind of reckless optimism is still the default among the ruling class (not surprising – things are great for them), but rather than an economic bubble, we’re facing something much bigger and much worse.
This is a long one, but I think it’s well worth your time. You can listen to it while commuting or doing chores or something, or you can just treat it like a documentary. It digs into the propaganda that’s being used to hide serious problems from those of us at or near the imperial core, and I think we’re still in the early stages of that narrative collapsing. I would expect to be hearing more “things are better than ever” propaganda going forward, and it’s useful to have an understanding of how they use “real” numbers to lie. I haven’t seen a whole lot from Unlearning Economics, but I think I’m going to change that soon.
On the off-chance that you haven’t seen it, no piece on the Outer Worlds would be complete without a reference to Stupendium’s masterpiece.
I had not seen that – it’s fantastic!
And you’re right. It’s a necessary inclusion.
To my great sorrow, in order to do the post properly, I’m just going to HAVE to play through the game again.
And possibly the expansions.
I’ll probably do it on normal or easy mode though >.>