Short 22: Mr. Question Mark Man

Public Problems

Mr. Question Mark Man "But we hit the crazily futuristic year 1700 AD and most humans were living as a cell inside some human giant where the rules, the rights, and the resources were inflicted by a few people at the top on everyone else below. What that meant for almost everyone was that while your destiny in life would be partially shaped by your biology, upbringing, choices, and luck—it mostly depended on the Mr. Question Mark Man who happened to sit at the top of your giant and whatever Question Mark story happened to rule over its culture. How the Question Mark ruler and Question Mark story felt about things like freedom, fairness, or your particular ethnic group would determine everything about how you were able to live. It was like drawing a card from a deck and hoping it was a high card. If you happened to draw a jack of hearts and be born the child of a noble in one of the dictator’s deemed upper castes, you might live a safe and enjoyable life. But more often, you’d find yourself with the 7 of clubs and spend your one life as an in-the-shit peasant, or you’d draw a 4 of diamonds and spend 40 hard years as a slave, or you’d draw a 2 of spades and be thrust at the age of 13 into the front lines of one of Mr. Question Mark Man’s foreign exploits and that would be that for you. Even if you did draw a decent card, you were always one heart attack or assassination of the leader away from a new queen bee taking control of the giant and reshuffling the deck." Check out the full story here: https://waitbutwhy.com/2019/08/story-of-us.html And a longer discussion of the Mr. Question Mark Man phenomenon and other related ideas here: https://youtu.be/Plgk6eUPnpU For more information on Public Problems with Justin Bullock: Subscribe on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnaam5TsjklCDPxu26L-S4g Like the Facebook Fan Page: https://www.facebook.com/PublicProblemsPodcast Support on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/JustinBullock Personal Website: https://www.justinbullock.org/