this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2025
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Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted clever little truths, hidden in daily life.

Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts:

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We have so many houses going unused. We have food and resources for everybody, but we've set up a system that arbitrarily concentrates most of it on a few people! Young children, with no understanding why society is this way, are suffering and dying because they live in a world that collectively agrees to let this happen unnecessarily

Fuck, I'm stoned but you know I'm right

Edit: and the sad thought hits me: the first step is realizing the system doesn't have to be this way, the second step is realizing it isn't going to change, at least not any time soon

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[–] BotsRuinedEverything@lemmy.world -2 points 6 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (2 children)

The dark secret about money is that it only works when there isn't enough for everyone. An indigent population is built in to capitalism. If you gave everyone $1,000,000 the value of a million dollars willing crash. If everyone owned a house real estate values would plummet.

[–] Allero@lemmy.today 5 points 6 days ago

Absolutely. Most people being low on money is essential to making the system work.

Otherwise, no one would take terrible low-paying jobs that pay for billionaires' lavish lifestyles.

And so is the real estate market. Any excess of money you get sinks into having a place to live. Once population overall earns more, housing prices skyrocket. It's an ingenious trap to keep us eternally broke and powerless, while feeding the rich.

There's no market-based solution for this. We need a serious intervention. As long as we don't put the working majority first, unsurprisingly, the world is gonna suck.

[–] M1ch431@slrpnk.net 3 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (2 children)

If everyone owned a house real estate values would plummet.

If e.g. macroeconomics are working against human interest, it can fuck off. Real estate does not have to be something speculative – dominated by forces such as private equity and landlords.

Housing and property are a right and it would serve us to act like it. Houses are for people, not for banks and other faceless entities to hoard and restrict.

If you gave everyone $1,000,000 the value of a million dollars willing crash.

If you gave everybody a million dollars to be used to better their lives, their community, and society at large - let the value of the dollar crash in the lens of the old ways.

Incentivizing positive action is beneficial for everyone, as long as we don't build a house of cards and we consider those around us, as well as the planet.

Incentivizing wealth hoarding, ruthlessness, systemic exploitation, infinite growth, unlimited greed, the monopolization of resources, and the consolidation of power is only beneficial for those at the top of the food chain – it creates vast, untold amounts of suffering and is destroying the planet.

The dark secret about money is that it only works when there have enough for everyone.

Money is a distortion of value. People don't need to be valuable to the most greedy of us to deserve to live and be provided what they need to live.

Monopolization, market dominance, and governments that don't represent the people have gotten us to where we are: individuals, communities, and societies of people powerless to affect society or the world in any meaningful way, because of "the economy" and "the cost" – it's all bullshit.

[–] Allero@lemmy.today 3 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

I think you two are actually on the same page, in that capitalism strives on inequality and dependence

The original comment was not advocating for capitalism and the old ways, it was just saying that making us poor is essential to keep capitalism running.

[–] M1ch431@slrpnk.net 3 points 6 days ago

Yeah, I know they weren't. Regardless, I apologize for my bluntness. Everything they said is true if we don't change and evolve.

[–] squaresinger@lemmy.world 3 points 6 days ago (1 children)

In a way the guy before you is right: Some things would crash. For example, if everyone has a million, people wouldn't be forced to do horrendous things for no pay. For example, nobody would work at a brothel, sell drugs or work as a modern slave picking fruit on a field. If people would do these jobs, they'd only do that for much, much more money.

But these things are things that only exist (at that price point) because enough people are currently desperate enough to be exploitable. In a somewhat just system, these kinds of exploitation shouldn't be possible.

[–] M1ch431@slrpnk.net 4 points 6 days ago

It's absolutely heart-wrenching to see human potential being snuffed out, to see this level of suffering.

Truly, the only things we stand to lose by incentivizing positive action is our dysfunction. Good riddance.