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Notes -
The new book The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism And The War On Democracy has been making the rounds. In lieu of reading it, here's an NPR interview.
At the core of this is a middle-school-cafeteria psychodrama that remains unresolved. The lived-experience of "computer nerds" is that of being instrumentally valuable to many, terminally valuable to none. As a result, anti-capitalist rhetoric that disparages money as a source of moral value is received by them as a personal attack. The computer nerd feels deep down that his earning-potential is the only thing he brings to the table in the status game; as far as he's concerned, his value on all other axes might as well be rounded off to zero.
Therefore, the computer nerds wants nothing more than to get away from all those teeming masses with their grabby hands who want to take all his stuff and leave him with nothing. If it takes moving to one of Balaji Srinivasan's seasteads, or to Elon Musk's space colony, then so be it.
Huh? Is it a zone, or the whole world? There's a big difference - but hold on. That comic is the story of nerds simpliciter, not just computer nerds. And the people most outspoken against "The Nerd Reich" are also nerds - "theater nerds" to be precise. To continue the cafeteria picture, the theater nerds are (if anything) even more autistic, more put-upon, and more bullyable than the computer nerds, while the bullies themselves (the "jocks" and "popular kids") don't even figure in to the dialectic at all. So what's going on?
I guess it comes down to the different coping mechanisms each group employs. The theater nerds find solidarity with each other at least, whereas the computer nerds have no need for each other because they have their toys to play with, which can incidentally eke them out a living independent of anyone else. But the theater nerds have no such refuge, and so, being poor in both financial and social capital, have been forced over generations to build up an elaborate alternative system of social capital which is a lot more off-putting to outsiders but seems to form much deeper personal relationships within itself than any within the computer club. This, at least, levels the playing field between the two nerd factions somewhat.
But then, if some computer nerds start getting uppity and decide to form alternative solidarity groups of their own, now this upsets the balance. I suppose the theater nerds believe there's only so much space for nerds in this world, and so any ascendancy of computer nerds will leave less for them.
Honestly, I'm really just spinning a yarn at this point. There are a lot of holes in this story that I don't know how to patch up. In particular:
But I can't shake the feeling that all of this debate about "techno-fascism" (or whatever) is operating at a high simulacrum level, concealing the true reasons why people get so animated about this and why they choose the sides that they do. But what are those true reasons?
The idea I hear is clear and simple: the techno-fascist billionaires will use AI, Palantir, drones, Flock, … to turn the world into 1984. It will be racist and sexist to show off power and control, and because the dictators are “right wing” so they have to do everything the “left wing” hates. Ordinary tech employees don’t want this and wouldn’t benefit from it, but they don’t think about it, trudging along on isolated tasks to collect a decent paycheck (The Banality of Evil).
If they limited their ideas to Mars or some bought-out city, maybe the author is motte-and-baileying, but I see no issue. Voluntary experimentation is good, maybe they do have some improved ways of running things.
There’s something to be said about how libertarians become fascists, and cyberlibertarians become cyber-fascists. I don’t think it’s a solution: tyranny collapses on itself, as the “victors” fight and die out, and doesn’t seem interesting (of course, also the ethical issues).
Socialists demand universal control, not a plurality of ideas. The idea that a colony of Randists could happily exist in a remote mountain canyon or even on Mars is deeply offensive. All must conform.
"Socialists" tend to stop at their own borders, and I'm rolling my eyes that the Democrats who control the two most powerful centers of capitalism that have ever existed are some kind of Commie.
But there are plenty of bolt holes for Randian supermen and there will remain so. Dubai and Singapore exist as well as special economic zones in places like Cambodia and Laos where anyone can do anything if they have the cash. Would be Randians tend to stay in the US though because America provides certain freedoms and protections that strong mercantile city states and free wheeling gangster zones lack. Plus it's cool. Besides Libertarians have the same problem Communists do no one wants to vote for them so despite wanting no state they end up with one to control the enlightened peasants.
Ask Finland about how the USSR stopped at its own borders. Or eastern Poland.
And even when they do stop at borders, they do things like build "anti-fascist" walls to keep their
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