The Great Disillusionment and the Great Betrayal (Revised)

No, science and technology won’t magically transform us — or save us. We have to do that ourselves

First came the Industrial Revolution. Then came the automobile and the transportation revolution, followed by the plastics revolution and the ‘better living through chemistry’ revolution in the 1950–60s. In the 1960s-70s the Western world experienced the revolutionary ascent of the ’consumer society,’ while the so-called Third World experienced the ‘Green revolution’ in agriculture.

Then, in rapid waves of innovation, in the 1980s-90s we had the computer revolution, followed in the 1990s and 2000s by the ‘communication revolution,’ and then the smartphone and social media ‘revolutions’ in the 2010s.

That’s a lot of major scientific, technological, and cultural revolutions to go through — most of them in the past 60 years. You’d think, after all of these amazing revolutions, that human life would be vastly improved — literally ‘revolutionized’ — but it wasn’t and ISN’T.

Sure, there have been tremendous changes and lots and lots of superficial improvements. Overall, our lives are more outwardly comfortable — but that hasn’t translated into greater and deeper happiness or satisfaction. It just … hasn’t.

Somehow, the great promise of progress fell flat, and despite all these ‘revolutions’ and all this supposed ‘progress’ we’re usually still not really satisfied or happy.

Some people say it’s just human nature to be dissatisfied and unhappy. I personally think that’s a crock, and a huge cop-out. My thesis here — which I want to explore and dig into — is the probability that humanity as a whole has bought into a vast societal con game and has allowed itself to be persistently led astray and swindled.

Thus … the great disillusionment. Thus … the great disappointment. Thus the great … betrayal.

Whatever happened to the ‘communication revolution’?

I distinctly remember, back in the 90s and early 2000s, how our society was inundated with lots of happy-face talk about the fast-emerging ‘communication revolution,’ which supposedly would utterly transform — and of course vastly improve — our modes of communicating.

It all sounded tremendously exciting and hopeful. This time, finally, technology and scientific advances really would save us, and our lives really would be magically transformed.

So how did it play out? We experienced, in rapid succession, the email revolution, the cell phone revolution, the iPod/digital music revolution, and the smartphone revolution. Suddenly, our communication options were greatly expanded, and the average person could now hold in his/her hand tremendous computing power that formerly took up an entire large room.

It was all so wonderful, so amazing, and the possibilities seemed endless. We were ushering in a wondrous ‘brave new world.’

But then, just like every other so-called ‘revolution’ in our past, it failed to deliver. It just never worked out, in practice, the way we imagined or wanted it to.

And there’s the rub: ‘in practice.’ As in: in our actual, ongoing daily lives. All of our (deluded) dreams of technological salvation depend on caring human beings learning and fully carrying them out — and clearly, what’s happening all across the globe is that WE are failing.

Most of humanity refuses to learn and grow

Take that partial sentence from a few paragraphs back: “Suddenly, our communication options were greatly expanded …”

Initially I wrote that our communication abilities were greatly expanded — but I recognized immediately that this isn’t true. The fact that I initially wrote and believed that shows how deep and pervasive the cultural brainwashing is, that constantly confuses newer, better communication devices with improved human communication.

Our communication methods and devices — our technological options — have expanded fast, certainly, but our actual communication skills and abilities did not improve much, if at all (since we don’t teach, or bother with learning, effective communication skills). Thus, we all still communicate terribly and very ineffectively — but at a much, much faster, dizzying rate.

To me, this is a glaring example of humanity’s overall, abject refusal to learn, grow, and evolve. Like petulant, spoiled children, we demand that science and technology do it all for us — everything — and simply remove the necessity for us to grow up and take responsibility for our lives, our societies, and our planet.

That’s the great world-wide con game we’ve bought into. As far as I can tell, there’s never been any scientific or technological ‘revolution’ that has truly revolutionized human attitudes, emotions, and behavior. What these ‘revolutions’ seem to do instead is provide a comforting, deceptive illusion of progress — while diverting or deflecting us from doing the crucial inner and societal work needed for real, meaningful progress to occur.

When the ‘communication revolution’ was first accelerating, back in the 90s, I was quite skeptical that it would really improve human communication. Now, 30 years later, it’s become very obvious that my fears were well-founded. My assessment was correct — since what we’ve got today is way, way too much unproductive, crappy, poorly informed, or downright deceptive/manipulative ‘communication.’

It turns out, our longed-for, long-promised — and heavily promoted — ‘communication revolution’ is … a total bust. Even further, it’s morphed into a burgeoning and disastrous (anti)social nightmare.

Progress via technological advancement is a dangerous illusion

My overriding concern is with the fantastical notion of ‘progress through technology’ itself — because it’s an illusory, semi-delusional, growth-avoidant shortcut, and simply isn’t helpful. At all.

If we want real, significant human progress, then we have to do the sometimes-challenging work to get there.

It really is that simple (though often not easy).

And by ‘work,’ I mean embarking on a journey of learning and growth that includes both inner work and healing, and also learning good, positive communication and relating skills. (Non-violent communication or NVC is a very helpful resource for transformative communication skills.)

Sadly, it seems that most people simply don’t want to do this work and would much rather sit back and believe (falsely) that science and technology will do it all for us.

But clearly … it won’t. When we’re talking about human social evolution, the only thing that will work is actually doing the inner and cultural work necessary for our growth and evolution.

Even sadder, humanity has so completely bought into this technology-centered illusion of progress that we’ve ended up even more confused and frustrated. Here’s why, in a nutshell: our grand plan for technological salvation isn’t working out as promised; we know it’s not really working; and our lives have not been totally and wonderfully transformed.

And then … crash. Our most fervent hopes and dreams crash and burn. When all the promised wondrous results don’t show up, we’re left stranded and ‘stuck’ in a foul miasma of frustration, disappointment, and anger.

We’ve been conned and swindled — and now it’s time to fully ‘get it’ and move on

We truly have been conned and swindled — and we did it to ourselves when we bought into the illusion of easy, effortless progress. Then we did it to ourselves again when we bought into the false promises of capitalism, amid its relentless, endless push to use technological advances to maximize corporate profits.

Neither one has delivered what we most deeply need and want: better, more fulfilling relationships and communication, and a better, more fulfilling society.

Thus, we’re left in the lurch, again and again … and again. More disappointment. More disillusionment. More betrayal.

Enough already!

Enough of this absurd, avoidable human tragedy. It’s time to move on from this pitiless, endless hamster wheel of techno-disappointment and betrayal. We need to stop disappointing and betraying ourselves — by always fleeing into a deluded realm of false techno-promises and manic escapism.

If we truly want better, more fulfilling lives, we need to do the crucial inner and societal work to get there. It really is that simple. Shunting our personal responsibility off onto our leaders, science, ‘the market,’ technology, or the latest devices just doesn’t cut it anymore.

It’s time for humanity to choose to learn, evolve, and grow up. Whether we will or not is, of course, up to us.