To achieve a beautiful future, we must always imagine

If you’re like most people who pay attention to the news, you’ve probably felt it. We are living in a transitional moment, a time of great uncertainty as old realities are giving way to new ones. Right now, the future looks fuzzy and it’s hard to deny that humanity’s collective vision of the future is in a crisis of its own. Everywhere you look in film, television, novels, and social media, the future that everyone’s talking about is a dark one. Dystopia is the default. That’s a big problem because the future hasn’t happened yet, which means that if we want a better one, we have to start thinking about what that would look like. We deserve great things, but we can only have them if we can envision them first. The future isn’t fixed. It’s what we make of it, and that’s something that my guest on today’s episode, Monika Bielskyte knows firsthand from direct, personal experience. She grew up in the Soviet Union, a country that seemed like it would last forever until one day it didn’t.She’s done a lot since then, but today Monika is working as a futurist and media consultant for nonprofit organizations, businesses like Nike, and films like Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. In all of her work, she’s focused on building a vision of a beautiful possible to counter the doom and gloom of the future dystopias that are all too common in our present-day media.The video of our conversation is available. Access the episode page to get the full text. You can subscribe to Theory of Change and other Flux podcasts on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Podcasts, YouTube, Patreon, Substack, and elsewhere.Related Content--Why reactionary billionaires are so obsessed with 20th century sci-fi authors--To make a better technology future, we must first realize why we didn’t get the one we were promised--In Silicon Valley, creationists and atheist post-libertarians have a lot in common--What is ‘neo-reactionism’ and why is it so powerful within Trump 2.0?--How banks and corporate monopolies ruined the internet--The political history of Bitcoin and crypto is one of paranoia and political extremism--Billionaires know that they’ve destabilized the world, it’s why they’re obsessed with fallout shelters and MarsAudio Chapters00:00 — Introduction09:07 — Hope and the power of fiction16:27 — Humanity’s progress and the stakes25:00 — Most superhero movies emphasize human dis-empowerment33:04 — Reactionary oligarchs’ urge to disclaim their own humanity42:41 — The future as the imagined past within reactionary futurism49:34 — Why reactionary futurism redirects public focus from present injustice53:04 — Toward a vision of regenerative futures that are self-sustaining01:07:33 — Why hopeful futures avoid false binaries01:15:26 — No human is ‘typical,’ so inclusion must apply to everyone01:22:48 — What many left-of-center people miss about generative AI01:31:59 — Embodiment in AI and machine learning01:36:39 — Radical tenderness  and the beautiful possible This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit plus.flux.community/subscribe