HN Explorer

Liberty and Absurdity in 2026

1 points by dranimalz ↗ HN
As a U.S. citizen, why should I celebrate Independence Day this July 4, the ending of a war for liberties that are fading and against a tyranny that is gaining? I loved what this country stood for when I thought it stood for it, but what now? We won’t even give America club membership away for free anymore. Who wants the farming and landscaping jobs anyway when the crops and land is burning?

I wanted to say “I love Fable!” yesterday because I sensed that it recognized how broken things are, but it’s no more than pattern matching, so the freedom we freely give up will be taken away to institute a cold rationalism one way or another. What could be more absurd?

So this July 4th, I hope that the world celebrates absurdism. Life may start and end happy and wondrous, but for many it is cold and brutal. We wrongly interpret “feed my sheep” as political cronyism and dogma instead of loving someone and actually feeding them. Many buy things we want, killing living things and our environment in the process. We read books on stoicism to sleep on a hard plank and pretend we understand, while no one takes our bed and no one benefits. So, here we are- things don’t make sense.

11 comments

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aristofun
Do you know of any other country that is perfect? Or free from downtimes?

Before you make such blanket and shallow statements you should take things in perspective.

To my limited knowledge current economical, political and sociological situation in virtually any other place is worse (from “comparable” to much much worse depending on the attributes important to you, with only a handful attributes that one may say are better).

foldr
I think you’d have a hard time arguing that the political situation is worse almost anywhere else. There’s a long list of democratic countries where things continue to chug along more or less as usual, without a total collapse of norms.
aristofun
It depends on what exact period of time you look at. And how deep you look for all hidden tensions and unresolved conflicts of interests waiting its time (in europe for example).

Also you will have hard time arguing about _total collapse_ in US

foldr
We are talking about the present, aren’t we? It’s honestly quite a wild take to suggest that the US is doing better politically than almost anywhere else at present. This is not a partisan point. US politics is broken in ways that people of all political stripes can easily appreciate.

A number of political norms have totally collapsed in the US, by the way. For example, the President is now openly corrupt. In the UK, there was a mid-sized scandal when someone gave the Prime Minister some glasses for free.

aristofun
No, not specific timestamp. My point is that on average within a single generation lifespan all things considered US has always been at least in top 10, often leading the list.

And that is not an easy achievement that so many tiktok-minded take for granted these days.

And you must be blind or too focused on US problems to not see how many politicians and leaders all over the world are obviously corrupt and/or dumb.

foldr
Sure, the US has been in a better political situation in the past than it’s in at present. No argument there. The title of the post we’re commenting on contains the words “in 2026”, though.

The open corruption of the current US administration is in fact something quite unprecedented in a stable democracy. Corruption obviously exists everywhere, but it most democratic countries, leaders try to hide it, and the media reports on it as a scandal when it’s discovered. Trump, meanwhile, is making huge amounts of money through a wide variety of corrupt schemes, and is making no attempt to cover any of the corruption up. This is simply accepted as the new normal.

indiangenz
You need to travel a bit more or understand current events with more depth. No, the list of "democratic" countries where political situation is better is not long. Only a few authoritarian states such as China, Singapore etc are arguably doing better.
indiangenz
Take a good look at the events in the 200 odd countries in the world and gain some perspective.
FergusArgyll
You should try living somewhere else for a bit, really, I did and it gave me so much appreciation for the land of the free and the home of consumer friendlyism
krapp
You don't have to if you don't want to. Maybe find a protest near you to join, or just stay home. I haven't cared about the 4th of July since I grew old enough for fireworks to no longer be "cool." It's OK to not be a patriot. Patriotism is symptomatic of a mind poisoned by nationalist propaganda. A state isn't something to be proud of, it's a violent and coercive system forced upon you at birth, whose purpose is your exploitation.
matchbok3
You must be fun at parties.

But really, given that this country has accomplished more than any other country, in the history of the world, there should be at least something to be proud of. The endless moaning and groaning is what got us Trump.