Cav's Place

I’m writing this post after participating in the second scheduled protest against ACTA, which was attended by roughly 150 people, though over 3000 said on Facebook that they were going. In itself, the ratio was exactly the expected one, as two weeks ago some 40000 said that they’ll go to the first protest and only about actually 2000 did, but this serves to once more highlight a problem that already was obvious when it comes to protests organized through such social networks, at least over here.
Don’t get me wrong; nobody can deny the benefits of on-line social networking when it comes to protests, especially considering the key role such sites have played, and may still play, in the movements that took over the Arab world. However, while they do a wonderful job of spreading the word and facilitating communication, they also offer a way for people to express their grievances and vent that can replace actual protests in the eyes of those who aren’t exactly dedicated to the cause and are looking for the easiest way to apparently participate. As a result, a number of people who may otherwise have taken part in street protests will no longer do so and the discrepancy between the apparent number of participants on-line and the reality on the street is likely to discourage even more, plus that it will give the protests a bad image that will readily be exploited by opponents.

When you try to organize a protest by creating an event on Facebook or in any other similar manner, particularly when it will take place in an area that’s hardly known for the locals’ willingness to take part in such actions, you should know that you’re leaving the door wide open for a huge number of people who are unable or, more often than not, unwilling to understand how something like this is supposed to work. As such, they’ll either treat the event itself as something very similar to a petition or think that by selecting “going” they’re essentially just giving a “like”, either way considering that clicking to say that they’ll be going while sitting comfortably in front of their computers is a sufficient action to take. As I already said, some of those who are looking for the easiest way out may even consider this to replace actually participating in the protest, so they won’t go anymore even if they might have at least showed up for a few minutes if this option wouldn’t have been available.
What this does is artificially inflate the apparent number of participants and generate expectations that could never be matched by reality. On the one hand, this disheartens those who do end up going to the specified location, making some turn back, causing many others to manifest themselves in a significantly more subdued manner than what they would otherwise have been capable of, and almost certainly reducing the potential number of participants for the next protest on the same issue. On the other, in addition to making the media lose interest and give less or even no attention to any future protests on the same theme, it also allows opponents to easily say that the protest lacks real support and the entire movement behind it, if there is one, is based more on the “cool” factor than on real grievances.

Of course, seeing as people first need to know about a protest before they can attend it and on-line social networking is usually way better than anything else at spreading the word about such events, not to mention that such pages also allow people to quickly and easily exchange ideas and opinions, it’s quite true that the pros still far outweigh the cons. However, we need to keep in mind that there are some inherent problems with this approach and take measures in order to mitigate them as much as possible, and those measures may well include working with the sites that offer such services in order to make some changes aimed at reducing this discrepancy.
It shouldn’t take long to clearly spell out even before providing any further information that the event in question is not a petition or a call for virtual support, but is in fact created for an actual protest and only those who know that they will actually take part in it, in the specified location and at the specified time, should pick the option saying that they’re going. And it also shouldn’t be much of a problem for the sites that allow such events to be created, and of course I’m mainly referring to Facebook now, to add some options for those who want to express support despite knowing that they won’t actually attend, and preferably also give event creators the option of stating very clearly and visibly whether their event takes place on-line or off-line and possibly also include an optional warning for those who say that they’re going to off-line events.

The above are only some simple observations and suggestions, of course, and I’m sure that, on the one hand, other ideas could perhaps be even more useful and, on the other, most of the problem has to do strictly with the people who say that they’ll attend and then fail to show up and not with the organizers or the sites used. However, we need to do something to mitigate these issues as soon as possible and I’m quite sure that these simple measures would be a very good place to start. After we’ll implement them, we’ll be able to observe their effects and determine what, if anything, should be done next.
True, we’ll never be able to completely eliminate this discrepancy or its disheartening effect, but it’s simply a question of figuring out how to maximize the benefits and minimize the drawbacks of what is quite clearly a very good method of spreading the word about and even organizing such events. It’d certainly be a bad idea to start shunning such sites due to these inherent issues, but we need to keep them in mind and act accordingly… And hope that, in time, people will learn to lie just a little less…

For the past few years, February used to be the “action month” for the Global Population Speak Out movement. Those who pledged to act were supposed to do something for the cause at some point during the month and then report the action on the site, where it would be posted after being approved. It served to make the movement more visible, by concentrating the actions of the extremely small number of people who think with their brains instead of their gonads when it comes to this issue and are actually willing to do something about it into a relatively small amount of time, so they would be somewhat less likely to be drowned out by the overwhelming opposition.
This year, that all changed, as the organizers decided to spread out the actions over at least half a year. That’s supposed to cover the entire period between two different estimates of the date when the world’s human population will reach seven billion, but all it really does is dillute and dissipate the movement. What’s more, the actions can no longer be reported directly on the site and, while I got something in an e-mail saying that they would now need to be sent to a certain e-mail address, they don’t seem to be displayed anymore either, so activists can no longer see how their effort, be it big or small, is an integral part of a growing movement.
Then again, seeing as the listed number of pledges is lower than last year’s, that part about “a growing movement” doesn’t seem to be true anymore, and that’s hardly surprising, considering both what’s been going on over the past year and the direction the movement is steered into by those who are currently behind it. More than anything else, I’ll say that GPSO had some amount of potential at first just because it welcomed the more radical opinions and therefore also the people truly dedicated to the cause, who weren’t about to back down even when faced with the terrible backlash that is to be expected whenever somebody expresses any rational opinion when it comes to the issue of overpopulation. But since that’s certainly no longer the case, all that potential energy is being dissipated and, at best, the movement loses most of its real strength.

So what’s going on, you ask? Well, since the Population Institute started administering GPSO, all I’m seeing is a push for a politically correct rhetoric that supports projects that probably sound nice and could be appealing to a rather large number of people but are certainly not sufficient and, in completely objective terms, not even necessary to achieve the goal of reducing the world’s human population by drastically lowering the number of births. Not that one could even be certain that they’re aiming for any sort of reduction anymore, as you see them mention an eventual stabilization, but then lose themselves in stressing terms like “voluntary” and “human rights” so much that any further plans become little more than jokes, seeing as the vast majority of people can never be trusted to consider the greater implications of their actions.
The very best that could be said about their behavior is that they’re afraid of the outcome if they’ll mention the measures that would actually need to be taken if we’re to have any chance of reducing the population to sustainable levels in any foreseeable future. The worst would be that they’re doing this on purpose, specifically to waste the efforts of the few who can see what needs to be done and alienate them even more. The most likely explanations, however, are either that they’re wrongly convinced that the measures they support would be sufficient or that they’ve resigned themselves to the idea that nothing more could possibly get done. Which means that, at best, they’re unworthy of spearheading a movement that could possibly have any chance, tiny as it may be, of eventually solving what certainly is the world’s biggest problem.

Now don’t get me wrong; I’m certainly not saying that education and raising the standard of living of the poor are ineffective measures, but merely that they’re far from being sufficiently effective. These are things that should be goals in themselves, simply because people should receive proper information, their reasoning abilities should be developed and those who aren’t guilty of serious crimes should have the right to a decent standard of living. These should be a given and the whole of humanity should work towards these goals, no doubt about it, but to say that they’re the way to solving the overpopulation problem is naive at best.
We’re looking at a population that’s already well over twice the highest sustainable number, which would be around three billion, so any efforts to solve the problem should be focused on the measures that could rapidly reduce the number of births all the way down to the required level and leave the rest to others. Our goal needs to be to reduce the human population by more than four billion by the end of the century, and sooner if at all possible, without increasing the death rate among those who don’t specifically want to die and without otherwise harming any except those who intentionally worsen the problem by specifically choosing to have children without possessing truly extraordinary qualities that would objectively be worthy of being passed on to the next generation. Anything less than that is unacceptable and therefore the only approach we just might still have time for is a “the ends justify the means” one.
With that in mind and seeing that, regardless of the level of education or the standard of living, there is currently no place in the world where the fertility rate is low enough to allow this goal to be reached and, in fact, you can even count the countries where it’s less than twice the required value on your fingers, it’s clear that efforts to promote education and combat poverty are far from the best way for those who focus on solving the overpopulation problem to use their time and resources. We could and most likely should work with those who dedicate their lives to humanitarian causes whenever possible, but our real focus absolutely needs to be on those radical and drastic measures that could actually have a chance of achieving the goals we need to achieve. Yes, the resistance will be tremendous and we may never even get anything going, but trying means that at least we have a chance to do what needs to be done. If we shy away, we have none.

I know, I’m writing two personal posts in one week once again, but now I actually found myself working on something for a change, so the site is being updated. You can’t see it at the moment and it may be a while until I’ll link to it, because I’m just learning as I go along and there are still things to figure out, but I’m actually making that new index page and the author pages for my little fantasy art gallery and it’s going pretty well, seeing as I just started playing with it last night and I basically already have the scripts themselves.
The first problem that I still have to deal with is the fact that, seeing as I’m just using PHP to determine which bit of JavaScript to put on the page and to pass the variables to said script, I have both PHP and JavaScript handling errors, which currently results in different outcomes when in fact the issues are similar. Of course, there would be no errors if people’d just click on links, but I want to make sure that my scripts can handle being messed with as well, so I first struggled to implement error handling and now I want to have the same result regardless of which scripting language catches the problem.
Still, I should be figuring out how to do that today, leaving me with just some content and design issues to deal with, such as whether or not to add a short description on the author pages or whether to even keep a separate “picture” script or simply display the selected image before the full list of thumbnails on the author page. But there’s certainly no rush, so I’ll probably be trying a few different options to see how they look and then decide which one to keep, though I’m also considering allowing the user to choose, which should be easy enough to do.

What this means for the blog is that I’ll once again need to write two non-personal posts next week, but at least it’s quite clear what one of them will be about, so I hope I’ll have it by Wednesday. The other will be more of an issue, as I don’t currently have a clear idea for it, but it may be something about “piracy” again, seeing as I’ll be going to the next protest against ACTA on Saturday. Then again, for the same reason, it may be about the fact that, whether we’re talking about terrorism or copyright infringement, we’re all now considered to be guilty until proven innocent.
But I’m not exactly known for managing to do what I set out to do, especially when I’m in such a mood, and the blog isn’t exactly a priority, so let’s see what happens. If I’ll manage to write those posts, great, but it won’t be that much of an issue if I won’t either. I still have two “slots” for personal posts and have been right at the limit in the past, after all, so it can be worse.

Yes, I actually went to the protest against ACTA on Saturday and stayed there until around 8:15 PM, when it was announced that the “regular schedule” of protests will begin, as the chosen location was the one where protesters have been gathering every evening for a month straight. This means that I can finally say that I took part in a protest, seeing as there was only one other that I actually went to and then only sort of wandered around the protesters, pulling away when asked by one of the organizers if I wanted to take part and then leaving shortly after that.
I got there around 3:20 PM and ended up in the wrong place, since nobody bothered to specify the exact location and the few others who were already there had chosen to gather in that spot, next to another group of protesters who have been gathering for a month straight and who were also there at the time. I didn’t stay, however, instead getting back into the underground passage to wait for a few more people to gather, coming back out around 3:45 to more or less hide behind the small group that was forming and dodge cameras.
Shortly afterwards, a guy came and told two of the ones who were holding banners that the protest was actually supposed to take place on the other side of the road, convincing them to go there with him after a brief discussion. The rest of us stared in confusion, but a couple of others, who had been there even at 3:20, decided to go after them a few minutes later, and then so did I. That meant that I was in the proper location around 4 PM, trying to find my place among what was starting to become a small crowd, aided by the fact that the others who were still on the wrong side of the road after I left also decided to move over the next few minutes.
While people kept gathering, the vast majority didn’t seem to know what they were supposed to be doing any more than I did, so we were mostly wandering around and occasionally looking at those who seemed more prepared, waiting for some sort of signal, which probably came around 5 PM. By then, a few hundred people had gathered and the few reporters who had been sent there were also trying to catch a few shots and take a few interviews, unfortunately leaving soon afterwards and broadcasting or publishing small pieces that only mentioned what they could see at that time, few bothering to take shots and make estimates later, though the peak was around 7 PM, when the protesters numbered around two thousand.
For my part, I tried to stay close to a tree, for what little protection it could offer, and that made me end up quite in the middle of it all, having to step back a couple of times to avoid ending up right in front of the reporters while they were still there. That also meant that I was only a few people away from Claudiu Craciun, who tends to lead the protests that take place in that location every evening, when he came to help put some order into this one as well. As a result, I was in a group of people who were probably quite used to protesting and were therefore more likely to shout and jump, meaning that I could get carried away with them and actually take part in the protest instead of simply sitting around, as I’m sure I would have done if I’d have been closer to the outer edge of the crowd.
In the end, what I can say is that it certainly went better than I thought it would, the crowd was quite nice and I also managed to withstand the cold reasonably well. Seeing as it snowed constantly and the reported maximum temperature was -12°C that day, obviously only getting colder as the evening fell, that latter part was largely thanks to all the clothes I had on me, among which I could mention two sweaters, two pairs of pants and three of socks, but all’s well that ends well and I’m planning to take part in the next protests as well, on the 25th.

The few days that followed the protest were hard for me, though for different reasons. At first I was worried that I might have gotten another cold, seeing as my throat was slightly sore once again, but that seems to have passed since then and there don’t seem to be any other issues. However, a far bigger reason to feel like shit was Andra’s birthday, when being ignored meant that I probably couldn’t even send her a message despite making two attempts, followed by that annoying and overcommercialized day when everybody gets bombarded with images of happy couples.
Still, something good came out of those days, as looking for something that would keep me busy without really requiring me to focus meant that I ended up making new thumbnails for my little fantasy art gallery, cropping them to fixed sizes instead of simply having the full images resized to a certain width. This will be very useful if I’m to add more artists, because that will require me to make separate pages for each of them instead of displaying all the thumbnails on a single page, in which case I want the script for the new index page to randomly select two thumbnails for each artist, which would look very weird if they’d be of very different sizes. But don’t hold your breath for that, because adding new artists means going through all their works, looking for the best quality versions I can find and then selecting just a few to add to the gallery, which is a process that I’m not keen on starting and, as you can see from the very small number of artists currently included, very unlikely to finish.

Otherwise, still playing Battle for Wesnoth and still struggling with my story. Since I still don’t know how to get from the current situation to the two events that must happen during this part of it, I keep wasting time and space by writing more or less random things while waiting for something to click into place and hoping that someday I’ll get to the next interesting parts that I have in mind. At this point, I’m not sure that I’ll make it that far, but I’ve been struggling with it for too long to give up now, so you can say that I’m currently pushing forward out of sheer stubbornness, even though I need to write about things that my brain’s simply not wired for.

The concept of a resource-based economy has been most notably promoted over the past few years by the Zeitgeist Movement and I find myself largely agreeing with it despite having issues, occasionally big ones, with the other concepts they promote. However, while the Zeitgeist movies helped me iron out some details, I have been thinking about something like this, in a few different forms, for the past decade. As such, this is something that I have been meaning to write about for a very long time, but so far never got around to it.

To quickly describe how I understand the concept promoted by the Zeitgeist Movement, I will say that it involves an extremely high degree of automatization, with machines producing absolutely everything that can possibly be produced without direct human intervention, which would include producing and maintaining each other. This would be aided by a very accurate system that would know what resources can be sustainably exploited and where at any one time. Then, after inputting the population’s needs and wants into this system, it would distribute said resources and the goods produced from them as fairly and efficiently as possible, in order to first meet everyone’s needs and then also provide people with as many of the things they simply want as possible.
For economy and efficiency, products meant to be used for a long time without changes, such as furniture, would be produced using methods and materials that would make them as durable as possible, so they won’t need to be replaced for a very long time, as opposed to the current trend of making them cheap but far less durable. At the same time, products that evolve rapidly, such as electronics, would be produced in a way that’d allow their components to be easily and efficiently repaired or upgraded one by one, which means using standard connectors, making as many parts easy to remove and replace, using recyclable materials in order to avoid wasting resources after replacement and so on. Last but not least, goods that most people rarely use, such as DIY tools, would not be distributed directly to people, but kept in some kind of rental centers that would function like public libraries, allowing people to take what they need, when they need it, and return the items in question once they’re done with them.

I saw in the latest movie an estimate according to which, in the conditions described above, only three percent of the population would still need to have what we’d now consider to be regular jobs, supervising the machines, intervening to solve major problems that couldn’t be solved otherwise and, of course, covering the few fields where machines won’t be able to replace people. Though I find this somewhat naive, they also claim that volunteers would easily make up the three percent, so there won’t be any need to offer them anything more than everyone else is offered.
The basic idea behind it all is that this way resources would be distributed fairly, we’d live within the planet’s limits, without causing any further destruction, and all people would have the same rights and the same chances. Also, and very importantly, by knowing that they’d no longer need to worry about earning enough to survive, all those who want to do something for others or for the world, such as inventors, artists and other such people who advance and entertain the world but who, unless they’re among the few who truly make it big, would currently starve to death unless they also have other sources of income, would be able to dedicate themselves to this, so we’d advance faster and be happier. Which makes perfect sense and, with the possible exception of having all workers be volunteers, is perfectly achievable if only we’d set our minds to it.

Now that I finished briefly explaining how I understand their proposed concept, let me start pointing out some of the differences between my ideas and theirs by saying that in some areas I’m aiming for somewhat less automatization. The basic idea would still be not to require anyone to interact with another person unless they’d actually desire to do so, but I’d like people to still have this option under some circumstances. As a result, though I’m not basing this figure on any clear estimates, I’m not aiming to reduce the number of people having what we’d now consider to be regular jobs all the way down to three percent, but only to make sure that it won’t exceed ten percent.
In addition to this, I’d also leave some traces of a monetary system. This won’t be a direct system, such as the one that currently exists, but would simply mean that each product would have an associated value, determined automatically according to the resources required and any pollution generated or harm caused in order to produce it. This would allow the system to know the total value of the available products and services, set aside what’d be stored in case of emergencies and what’d be used for the services that must be freely available to all, such as healthcare and education, and distribute a fair portion of what’s left to each person, who’d then be able to choose how to “spend” their share, so you won’t have everyone automatically getting more or less the same things, as I understand would result from the “needs” part of the Zeitgeist Movement’s concept.
Granted that allowing people to choose what they want would undoubtedly result in the demand exceeding the supply for certain products, in which case the system would first ensure that all those who truly need the product or service in question would get it, followed by those worthy of preferential treatment as a result of their extraordinary achievements. Whatever’s left, if anything, would be distributed to those who have asked for rare items the least in the past, and particularly to those who tend to not even “spend” their entire share all the time, instead choosing to save for later.

You may have noticed that I mentioned something about certain people being worthy of preferential treatment as a result of their extraordinary achievements, which means that I’m also adding a fair amount of meritocratic principles into my concept for a new economy instead of treating everyone equally. In fact, I’m splitting people into four categories, according to their actions and accomplishments, and using this to determine the exact share of the total production that each should receive.
The first category would be made up of those who have caused much suffering, are guilty of violent crimes, crimes against the environment or other such major crimes. As harsh as it may sound, I say that these people should lose their right to a decent standard of living and consider it fair to remove them from the system and imprison them in places where they’d have to somehow sustain themselves until they’d somehow prove to have changed their ways.
The second category would contain the large majority of people, who have the right to a decent standard of living simply because they were born and haven’t seriously harmed others or the environment. As a result, none of these people would be required to “earn a living” in any way, as they are today, instead being allotted an equal share of the available production to “spend” as they wish.
The third category would comprise those who’d have what we’d now consider to be jobs and perform well, who’d be rewarded with an additional share of the production, receiving up to one and a half times as much as those in the second category. Those who’d work but not perform particularly well would be put into the second category, however, as it’d be considered that they’re choosing to work simply because it brings them enjoyment and therefore that’s enough of a reward in itself.
Last but definitely not least, those who have accomplished extraordinary things would make up the fourth category. These would be the people who have prevented or solved crises or disasters or, more importantly, invented, produced or otherwise created things that have positively affected a large number of people or other animals or large parts of the planet. As a reward, on top of receiving preferential treatment when it comes to the products and services for which the demand exceeds the supply, these people would receive a share of the production equal to two to five times what those in the second category receive, for periods ranging from a few years to their entire lives, the specifics being determined according to precisely how significant their accomplishments were.

While there are a lot more details that I should mention and truly hope that I’ll get around to doing so soon enough, I think this is enough for the moment. I also think that what I wrote in this post should be enough to show that the system I have in mind would truly be fair while also preserving a large degree of individual freedom and solving some of the issues that, in my opinion, plague the concept promoted by the Zeitgeist Movement. Still, if you happen to stumble upon this post and have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask them.