There’s a lot of people on here who are part of what I’d call losing causes, causes that run counter to the consumerist capitalist mono-culture, I.e. socialism, veganism, FOSS, anti-car urbanism, even lemmy and the fediverse.
I want to know what made you switch from being a sympathizer to an active participant. I believe it’s important for us to understand what methods work in getting people involved in a movement that may not have any immediate wins to motivate people to join.
EDIT: A lot of people objecting to my use of losing so I’ll explain more, all of these causes benefit from popularity and are weakened by there lack of adoption and are thus in direct competition with the capitalist consumerist mono-culture, a competition which they are currently losing.
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Socialism on a small scale cannot solve the inherent issues of a capitalism that surrounds it.
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Veganism benefits from more people becoming vegan and restaurants and grocery stores providing vegan options.
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FOSS, or more specifically desktop Linux, benefits from more people being on it and software developers designing for and maintaining applications for it.
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The more people that use transit, the more funding it gets and the better it gets.
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the fediverse benefits from more people veing on it and more diverse communities so those with niche interests besides the above causes can find community here.
On the flip side the capitalist consumerist alternatives to all of these benefit from there popularity and thus offer a better value to most people. The question is about what made you defer that better immediate material value in favor of something else.
The world is fucked and nobody is going to win, all causes are losing causes. I might as well pick one that align with my principles so I die with some dignity
If you manage to convert just one or two others to the cause, it’s a win already. If not, at least you are not part of the problem.
And for many of the things you listed I see a lot of progress compared to even 10 years in the past. Slow but steady.
How is (F)OSS a loosing cause?
Same for cars.
That may be true for car-centric countries/infrastructures like seemingly in the US (never was there. Only know what I read here) but Europe is not as dependant on the car.I expected “transit” to refer to non-car public transit, but I’m not the OP. That is: the more people on trains, buses, and such, the more routes and times. The route with 5 riders per day gets cut as too costly.
I’m a loser
I’m stubborn as shit and kind of a masochist.
Also in video games I like the adrenaline rush that comes with being on the losing side. Usually you just lose but sometimes you manage to do some badass shit and come out on top and that gives you one of the highest highs there is.
I’m a hipster.
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I feel like you’re missing the point a bit. Living by values you hold dear is not losing, winning or even necessarily a cause. If your values happen to align with a cause, then supporting it in a way you can is at least somewhat fulfilling.
Now, there are definitely people who join a cause for tangential reasons. For example because they are a vehicle to what they want, such as someone who wants to build and use explosives can just as easily become a fundamentalist, anarchist or fascist. (And history has examples of these sordid folks.) They barely care about any of the causes and will drift wherever they can live by their own values, even if it’s about blowing shit up.
I disagree with the notion that these are “losing causes.”
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Socialism is necessary. Not only is the largest economy in the world by PPP a socialist country, and is using it to dramatic effect, capitalism and by extension imperialism are dying systems that have no future. Despite governing more of the world, capitalism is in decay, and is thus the “losing side.”
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Veganism is ethically correct. Not only is animal liberation a valuable pursuit, but it has far lower of an environmental impact. It isn’t a “side,” it’s the correct conclusion.
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FOSS isn’t losing, it doesn’t need mass adoption because it doesn’t need profit. FOSS is growing though.
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Anti-car urbanism is improving, socialist countries like the PRC are building huge amounts of effective urban transit. Between the car centric society of today and the urbanist future we desire, there is a transitional period marked by electrification and building up urban transit.
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Lemmy/fediverse is healthy and stable, and already does what it needs to: provide an alternative for those who want one.
At the end of the day, framing movements as “winning” or “losing” purely on adoption rates is an error. What is important is trajectory and the material basis for transitioning from the present state of things to the next, ie how do the problems of today make the solutions of tomorrow physically compelled? For socialism, it is the decay of capitalism due to its inevitable contradictions, as well as capitalism’s centralization making public ownership and planning in a post-capitalist society remarkably effective. How does that apply to others?
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My dear friend, my entire life is a losing cause. :)
I’ve been vegan foss-using anti war anarchist since high school, once I figure out what’s right social pressure doesn’t particularly sway me. In addition to all of the above I’m trans and still mask too.
I can’t really point to anything in particular that “switched” other than legitimately not caring about fitting in.
Because I’d rather be right than win. Nice to be both, but the former is a higher priority for me.
This answer goes hard. I guess stubbornness is needed in some cases.
Many of the things you mentioned are not “loosing”. They are chugging along. Slow and steady.
It’s frustrating how slowly things are going (urbanism at least had the excuse of involving expensive physical infrastructure that turns over on the span of decades) but Lemmy didn’t exist 5 years ago and now we have piefed and enough activity that it’s nit a ghost town anymore too. After enough cycles of Yet another corpo hellsite we’ll hit critical mass
Morality and ethical behavior are not defined by popularity
I still object to your definition of losing. Ethics diets are on the rise, and if Linux became less popular at any point that’s new information to me. I’d say we’re underdogs but things are going well.
As for actually answering, I think I just have a weird attachment to abstract conceptual correctness. Or rather, other people don’t seem to, and that’s why they can ignore things like animal welfare and creepy digital mega-corporations even if they know, on some level, that it’s inconsistent with their stated priorities and values.
