I feel like life is an ultra competition, but I wish it were not, and I don't think it should still have to be that way, or that it necessarily has to be that way. I feel like all the advancements we've had in science and technology, as well as becoming more civilized and less violent (on average) and more compassionate/understanding in how we treat each other, should result in a LESS competitive world.
Some people say competition is human nature, I say there is no "human nature" because we're sentient beings, we're not machines operating on base instinct, we can choose a higher road than "kill or be killed". We can make our nature as a species, and as individuals, whatever we choose it to be. We were the way we were before because of a lack of science and technology, and because we were ignorant, we didn't know better. But now we do, so life doesn't have to be as cold, uncaring, cruel, and unpleasant anymore.
And that's why I really don't like people that want to turn back the clock and go back to even MORE survival of the fittest. That's devolving, if you ask me. Except for the few people that benefit from it, it makes everything else worse for everyone. It's disappointing and disillusioning, that we seem to be regressing back towards Darwinian competition after we'd been softening it for a while. I wish society focused on supporting people's self-actualization instead. Then I think we'd have less mental health problems, less crime and violence, and so on. I don't think we could eliminate these things entirely, at least not this way alone. But I do think that scarcity (not money, that's just on the surface) is the root of a lot of evil and dysfunction in the world. Money is just Freedom Units (instead of dollars, maybe they should call them Freedoms? it's a little on-the-nose, but accurate). Why do people want money though? Because of scarcity. I think there's a direct correlation between scarcity and a lot of these problems we keep hearing about on the news that no one seems to have an answer for, or want to answer. Get rid of, or at least significantly reduce scarcity, and I think a lot of societal ills would disappear with it, or at least be greatly diminished.
We could start by subsidizing education more, because as technology changes at an increasingly faster pace, people are going to have to keep getting re-educated, more often.
“It is now highly feasible to take care of everybody on Earth at a higher standard of living than any have ever known. It no longer has to be you or me. Selfishness is unnecessary and henceforth unrationalizable as mandated by survival.”
- Buckminster Fuller
. Everyone thinks differently and it's what makes us unique, so forcing someone to be like you isn't right
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