Tech fascism: 'What you're dealing with here is a cult'
'Others in San Francisco call it The Nerd Reich'
The Hollywood Reporter just published an excellent story about the rise of Silicon Valley's tech authoritarians.
In a story headlined '"F*** These Trump-Loving Techies': Hollywood Takes on Silicon Valley in an Epic Presidential Brawl," THR goes deep on the bizarre ideologies taking root among influential figures in tech:
The fact is, there are reasons besides lower taxes that might explain why so many in Silicon Valley have gone full MAGA — much, much weirder reasons. “It’s not just about the money,” explains Christopher Wylie, the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower who testified during the 2018 Senate hearings on online disinformation in the 2016 Trump campaign and who knows the northern culture well. “It’s about ideology. What you’re dealing with here is a cult. These tech billionaires are building a religion. They believe they’re creating something with AI that’s going to be the most powerful thing that’s ever existed — this omniscient, all-knowing God-like entity — and they see themselves as the prophets of that future.”
Believe it or not, it gets even creepier.
Read the whole story here, and please share widely:
Benjamin Svetkey
There's even a shout-out to this newsletter: "Others in San Francisco call it The Nerd Reich." (I spoke to the reporter at length to provide crucial background.)
It's great to see other journalists digging into these issues. These tech authoritarians lining up behind Donald Trump are motivated by a disturbing ideology that must be exposed because it poses a threat to democracy, freedom and national security. And Americans need to know about it.
A major milestone
This newsletter now has over 1000 subscribers! Growth has been exponential over the past two weeks, thanks to an increasing national focus on J.D. Vance's ties to Peter Thiel and other extreme figures in tech. I've also benefited from appearing on multiple podcasts and radio shows.
Below you'll find a link to my appearance on the Latino Vote Podcast with Mike Madrid. We discuss my humble roots as the grandson of migrant workers in rural California, my unlikely entry into the world of politics, my time working for Kamala Harris, and how I unexpectedly found myself writing about these scary tech authoritarians. Thanks for reading! More to come...
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