The World Is Getting Better by Every Measure. So Why Do We All Feel Like This?

Shane Hewitt and The Nightshift · Apr 9, 2026 · 19m

Conspiracy theories don't start with a villain. They start with a feeling, the specific uncomfortable feeling that somebody must be in charge of how bad this all looks, because the alternative is that nobody is.

Lee Kuhnle has spent over a decade on this and came in without an answer for once. Just a question. Violent crime is lower than it was in the 90s. Life expectancy is up. Infant mortality has been falling for decades. The stats say we're doing well. Lee still feels dread, and so does everyone around him. In 1983, three separate incidents nearly ended the world in four months. A Soviet…