https://youtu.be/JGIzAWcIYI0

I respond to a story Called Luci's Lament, as read by one of my favorite channels, The Dark Somnium, published 2018-04-27.

Original comment
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The devil, or anyone who was alive for thousands of years, for that matter, would not be as cynical as she was in this story. Her Cynicism is laid bare by the assumption that all those with fortune and power universally got it through unjust means, by stealing from others. She also assumes that all suffering is the collective responsibility of humanity, and she refuses to put it in individual terms, yet still blames the drunken humans for rejecting her. We are all individuals first, whether we like it or not, and you're not going to convince anyone towards anything but discontent for you if you lay the sins of others at their feet. Responsibility that is everyone's, quickly becomes noone's, then they become forgotten and waved away. No, the collective is not responsible for the moral failures of others. We are each responsible for the moral failures of only ourselves.

No, nobody who lived that long would still be so cynical. Cynicism is the adaptive mechanism of those who were traumatized by malevolence. It takes a lot of time to progress past that attitude, but it's possible, worth it, and perhaps inevitable, especially if you live for eternity. Nobody is capable of creating utopia. Utopia is a conceptual dream- the archetypical heaven where there is no suffering and all is perfect. There is no such thing in material reality, and we are not capable of bringing it about. Whenever we try, we create dystopia. This universe comes with entropy built-in. Every "perfect" thing is flawed, and every "perfect" thing you attempt to create will one day return to the dust from whence it came.

Hell is Chaos, and Heaven is Order. Too much Order for its own sake is Tyranny, too much Chaos for its own sake is Anarchy. Utopian visions such as Luci's in this story, have brought about every genocidal tyranny and corrupt order known to man. Awfully convenient for her and her ilk to blame the failures of Utopians on humanity's selfishness and squandering of their free will. The failures of Utopians are entirely their own, and are caused by their blindness to material reality and to their own ineptitudes. Their devotion to their perfect order creates more suffering than if they had actively tried to cause more suffering. Strive not for perfection, strive for incremental improvement day by day, and you will find yourself in a place of much harmony when you grow old. Strive for perfection first, and harmony will be the same naive, wistful dream as your utopia. The author of this story chose Luci as their avatar by which they could chastise humanity for not realizing their idealistic, utopian vision. So the world is full of suffering. Reality is hell, that much is true. No amount of whining that other people misuse their agency will make that any better. Even if they did everything you believe they ought to, with your perfect moral vision, it would only make things worse than you could ever imagine. Hell is the default state of nature. Any escape from it we get is a damn miracle. If you think the opposite, that Heaven is the default and that we exist outside of it by choice, you will become miserable, you will blame your misery on the agency of others, and you will victimize them all as they continue to frustrate you with their agency. The author of the Social Credit story understood this, the author of this story did not.

Set your own house in order before you criticize the world, much less in such a dismissive manner, and with such unearned moral loftiness.