Modern life is so thin and shallow and fake. I look forward to when developers go bankrupt, Japan gets poorer and wild grasses take over.
· Hayao Miyazaki
Dear Jack,
Someday you will wonder why we brought you into this world.
It’s an odd question, really: Why did my parents cause me to be? But it inevitably dawns on us to ask, especially when those parents are educated, nihilist-adjacent environmentalists. After all, from such a perspective, why make more people? Isn’t the ideal human population of Earth actually zero?
In my opinion, the answer to that question is no. But there are a lot of loud, destructive human groups whose membership should be kept as close to zero as possible. N*zis, for one. Adult libertarians. Billionaires. Trolls. Venture capitalists. And when you hear from these a lot, I can understand the sentiment that humanity writ large was a mistake.
One thing you probably know about me is that, as much as I try to be a realist, I am at my core too sentimental and optimistic (and maybe naïve) for cold logic. I believe in the fundamental goodness of people. And it’s not a belief like “faith” is a belief; I actually think it’s true that the vast majority of us are good and decent folks. Given a fair chance, most of us will do the Right Thing most of the time. The problem with us, then, and what we’re doing to each other and to this ecosystem which supports us, is not a problem of corruption or amorality; it’s that most of us simply aren’t given a fair chance at all.
And that’s where you come in. Oh shit! Does that sound like a lot of pressure? Well yes, of course it does. It is. If you feel that pressure, good! That means your mother and I have done something right. But this doesn’t mean you have to “save” humanity / the world / whatever. It means you should make things which are good for people to have. It means sticking around to make your corner of the world a slightly better place. It means tikkun olam.
That’s why you’re here. We created you and raised you to be the necessary foil to the loud, destructive assholes who want to make everyone miserable just because they’re miserable. But don’t get bogged down dreaming up the “best” way to apply yourself to this purpose. You will encounter the best way along the path. (There is no such thing as a bad workout.)
Jack, my advice to you is this: Invest in your curiosity for its own sake. You can find space for this even in the cracks of providing security for those who depend on you. Curiosity will lead to something important for you. Then get to work on it. Remember that you are repairing the world, and let that knowledge guide you.