Reddit
Sugar, meat, 40-hour week: these everyday things of today could soon seem absurd
Today’s sugar consumption could shake heads for future generations
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Later generations often know better. But it is already becoming apparent that some of our current behaviors may no longer be comprehensible in a few years or decades.
Many things used to be different – and not necessarily better. Sometimes even on the contrary: Some things that used to be normal are hard to imagine today: For example, smokers almost everywhere or jokes about skin colors and genders, for which one would now be looked at more than crookedly – quite rightly.
That is easy to say a few decades away. But the likelihood that one will look at our generation with astonishment at some point is not that small. On the contrary: it is very possible that some things that seem quite normal to us today will be frowned upon in some time – and who knows: maybe even forbidden. Users on the social media platform Reddit have thought about it and collected examples.
Meat consumption, environmental protection and health are the issues of the future
Many of them first thought of topics related to animal, environmental and climate protection. The world will be “frightened” in 20 years’ time by the meat consumption of today and in the past decades, says one user: “People decide to ignore the horror of industrial animal husbandry.” Even single-use plastic could soon be a part of a darker past, say some users. “It’s terrible for the environment and it’s just everywhere,” writes one. The same applies to other products that are destroying the planet. “I believe that in a few centuries people will shake their heads at how we deliberately destroyed the earth,” someone writes.
Of course, science and research are also making progress and are likely to change some behaviors. Like in the example with cigarettes, the harmful effects of which were not known for a long time or were simply ignored. This could continue with other harmful substances, say some Reddit users – for example with sugar. “This stuff kills us,” says one user with reference to soft drinks. Some suspect that the use of e-cigarettes could soon be viewed much more critically.
Will everything really get better in the future?
Many changes are already on the way in the world of work: partly due to the corona pandemic, but even before that, the general attitude shifted to more closely follow personal concerns and not just live for the job. That is why some users cannot imagine that a 40-hour week will still be the rule in the future – just as little as the constant work in the office. “People will be amazed that every day we put on clothes that we would otherwise never wear and that we all gathered in the same building to work on the computer all day at the same time,” predicts one user .
The awareness that some of our daily behaviors are illogical or even harmful is there at least in some. The only thing left to do now is to implement this knowledge. However, one user doubts that this will really happen and make the world a better place: He points out that in the past, unhealthy behavior has always been replaced by at least as harmful habits – sometimes things even got worse. One of his examples: While a few decades ago there were warnings about the negative influence of television, today almost everyone carries a screen in their pocket all day long.
Source: Reddit