And I’ll add a semi-related fable.

There were a group of 5 monkeys that all lived on a tropical island; they survived by climbing trees to get bananas.

One day, the monkeys are taken to a lab and placed in an enclosure that somewhat captured the original environment. The only difference was that if any monkey climbed the tree, they’d all get soaked with freezing cold water from a sprinkler system. The monkeys were forced to eat simulated banana paste from a stainless steel bowl on the ground.

Every day for the first few months, at least one monkey would try to climb the tree - either to forage or just for fun, it’s irrelevant - and all the monkeys would end up soaking wet and freezing. It got to the point where if any monkey even went towards the tree, the rest would attack it. Eventually, the monkeys left the tree alone.

So the scientists removed 2 of the monkeys, and added 3 more that were freshly captured. These monkeys had no idea about the cold water, so would inevitably try to climb the tree - resulting in them being savagely attacked by the remaining original 3 monkeys.

Eventually, without even knowing why, the new monkeys left the tree alone.

The scientists then removed the 3 original monkeys, and replaced them with 3 more fresh monkeys, who were of course attacked when they tried to climb the tree.

Soon, though no monkey had ever been wet or cold in its entire existence (within this enclosure), they’d all avoid the tree that they’d depended on their entire life “because that’s how it goes.”

It’s time to stop attacking our fellow monkeys, and break out of this lab. I want some god-damn bananas.

  • state_electrician@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    20·
    14 days ago

    I mean, it is true that a single person very, very rarely causes significant change. There truly is very little a single person can do. But… that should be motivation to find others and to organize. Not to do nothing at all.

  • coffee_whatever@lemmy.world
    36·
    14 days ago

    I fucking hate the “you’re just one man, what can you do? Stop complaining” crap. It’s as if this is how we have always lived, as if no big changes were ever made.

    Did you forget your countries own past? Pretty sure most of them had a revolution, a protest or some other kind of push for change at a point in time.

    There was a time where women were nothing more than mothers, cooks and maids. They pushed for that to change and now they are equal to men. We changed our world before, can we please not give up on that now?

    More than ever do single people have a voice, never before you could get in touch with so many people at once over so much distance. You would think that pushing for change, organising protests and gatherings would be easier than ever, and yet we are told “what can you do?” by the very people who see a problem.