The Swedish society is secularised. Religion is not such a large part of most people’s lives anymore. The presence of religious symbols are usually not a problem. It is only certain individuals being troubled by certain symbols. Same at least applies in Denmark. I am not sure how it is in Finland and Norway. But I think they are neither told ad nauseam that there is an intention behind everything.
I have to a high degree grown up as part of this society. We all have to learn to live as part of a society and I am not exception. Add my impaired theory of mind an me being a non-believer. Consequentially I think in terms of process rather than intention. Things happen all the time without anyone wanting it. In the same way there is no reason for the world to be in a certain way. It just is!
Neither are processes as simple as many imagine them. Things like the weather and the human mind are considerably influenced by loads of different factors. It is impossible to map out them all, much less control them. Same applies to the geology. Not to talk about the energies which natural disasters involve. Our current civilisation can’t concentrate such.
For sure man-made disasters occur. But these are not a matter of controlling weather or geology. Man-made disasters are of an entirely different kind. Too much of a country’s economic resources have been confiscated by its government. Then they have been exported (British-controlled India, Soviet Union) or not used at all (China, Ethiopia). A non-negligible part of the population in the affected areas have then been deprived the necessaries of life. This has in turn caused loads of people’s death.
Some seem to have hard to trust something really bad can happen without anyone wanting it. How big does something have to be for intention to be taken for granted? Are all accidents caused by deliberate sabotage? I don’t think so. To the opposite there are always factors outside human control. Things don’t always go as intended, this is a fact of life. The rich and powerful don’t differ from others in this respect.
Of cause it is possible to manipulate single individuals. However, it is far from certain attempts to this works. Moreover, it has to be adapted to every specific individual. This set an upper limit to how many a person could theoretically manipulate. I think this limit goes at 140 – 150. So many one can keep track of how they are as individuals.
The large developments of societies neither let themselves be controlled. Social development is mainly caused by the combined actions of all its members. There could be key individuals (not necessarily celebrities) with the opportunity to drive social development in one direction or another. But the result is often entirely different than he or she imagined. The result is not the intention as some take it for granted.
There are people frightened by the thought of something being out of control. To me it is to the opposite a security. If no-one controls something one does not have to worry about what someone would do with that control. At the same time it gives an opportunity for everyone to influence the development. If it is the result of everyone’s actions every single person could matter. As such we can ourselves do something to influence society.
However, one then has to know what one does. I have read of people believing citizenship in the country they were born is optional. They believe they could decline it and then be saved from having to follow laws. What these laws are for they never ask themselves. I don’t think they understand what risks they then expose themselves and others to. Neither do they understand the point of many of the government’s functions. Which suggests an unawareness on the limitations of oneself and others.
Uploaded on the 8th of July 2026.
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