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User1  3yr ago (text post)   3647 thread views

Why Read?

I have never read a book in my life. I might as well be illiterate, and most people around me might as well be too. Most libraries are vacant, and bookstores are gone. But all these people are doing fine - we put anything down on paper, and despite its incoherence it seems fine by standards that have stooped for reasons I do not know. I can turn in something that makes absolutely no sense, and an instructor from a decent school will tell me that he enjoyed it. Or an instructor won’t enjoy it, but since most people don’t write anything comprehensible anymore I’ll still be fine. I can cruise through my education and get a job while barely having read much at all. Everyone frequents some variant of flimsy entertainment - cable news, cartoons, social media - so why bother trying to read anything worthwhile anyways if nobody else is? Does reading actually make you more curious, more intelligent, more human?

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Please don't tell the troll why he's a troll. He already knows. Telling him only makes sense from a mistake theory point of view. Trolls are not mistake theory.

For every troll there's also someone who would do the same thing but be completely genuine. I don't think it's obvious that this is a troll, in fact I'd lean hevily towards it not being at the moment.

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