Summary
Elon Musk has emerged as a key enforcer of Donald Trump’s agenda, warning Republicans against opposing Trump’s policies and Cabinet picks.
Musk’s political action committee, America PAC, played a significant role in Trump’s election victory, spending heavily in swing states and funding groups like RBG PAC to broaden voter appeal.
Musk has hinted at funding primary challenges against GOP lawmakers who resist Trump, creating a “naughty and nice list” with ally Vivek Ramaswamy.
With allies in Trump’s administration and influence through his platform X, Musk’s political clout is growing rapidly.
Humanity is at a crossroads.
Either we’re going to solve the problem of psychopaths with power and wealth warping societies to accommodate their psychopathy, or, at the very least, modern civilization is going to collapse.
I see no third alternative. The Musks and Trumps and Putins and Netanyahus (and so on and on) of the world will, if allowed, destroy us all, because they’re quite literally too mentally ill to restrain themselves.
I fear you are right. I’m hopeful you are wrong but the same world is doing everything it can to beat the hope out of me.
If it helps, history runs in cycles. We used to have kings, we got rid of the kings, then we welcomed the kings back with open arms. But the reign of kings doesn’t last forever.
Human history broadly runs in cycles, yes.
But the history of a particular civilization is strictly linear, with a beginning, a middle and an end.
True, the Roman Empire fell and the United States could fall too. Humanity didn’t end though, it went through periods of enlightenment and darkness and kept marching forward.
I’m not saying the end of humanity is impossible, just that at many points in history it seemed like society was on the brink of total annihilation but yet here we still are.
I think you’re forgetting the nukes.
When the Roman Empire fell, they didn’t turn half the population of the planet into dust along with them.
Today, through the power of technology and psychopaths, there’s actually a chance to undo thousands of years of technological progress in an afternoon.
Very true, but kind of glosses over the gigantic accumulated suffering felt by those experiencing a civilizational / societal collapse.
I will point out as well that civilization rarely goes into total collapse. The Romans kept on going in the east for another millennium, Egypt and the Assyrians survived the Bronze Age collapse, China shouldve died five times over by now. Even if the US collapses its pretty likely it will have surviving elements in the West based here in California and East probably based around New England.
History didn’t have the internet to keep the masses brainwashed. We’re looking at 1984 levels of control here.
1984 is tame compared to what we have now.
The current situation with automated systems learning every little secret about pur lives, sometimes even before we know it ourselves, based on the trends on our searches, our messages, hell even just the shift in tone of our messages, our location history and more.
1984 is no longer the horrible future, it is the good old days when surveilence didn’t go as far.
No they had the Vatican instead amongst others. The idea of seperation of church and state didn’t come from nowhere.
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition
The oligarchs sure are trying to live forever though. Life extension, mind uploading, etc. They say that mouse lifespans can already be nearly doubled.
Funny thing about that though. Human lifespans already doubled over the previous century, thanks to medical advances and resource abundance. There’s no reason to think it can extend much further, aside from the peddling of grifters. The brain is far, far too complex to emulate without destroying it in the process, so I encourage Elon to go for it.
That’s a true nightmare, when the oligarchs finally don’t have to suffer the indignity of death like the common rabble. It’s the only great equalizer we have left.
Eh I dunno. I like to imagine some hackers could find a way to pull a “Black Mirror” and trap their consciousness in a virtual prison for all eternity.
Their lives sure must be fantastic for them to want to live that way for eternity.
On a physical level they sure are. Having obscene wealth means you want for nothing in that regard. Mentally it’s another matter. Money only buys happiness to a certain point - you don’t even need a million a year to reach maximum happiness. Anything over that doesn’t make things any better.
It’ll last for centuries if we’re collectively reduced back to feudalism.
Biggest joke ever is that stupid fucking phrase “learn history or you’re doomed to repeat it.”
A full third of us baseline will always learn that history and try to repeat it but more effectively. The lessons they learn is how to be better and longer lasting monsters.
All empires collapse, except ours is somehow immortal and humans evolved overnight into a less shitty species?
I mean, 80% of humans think various contradictory deities actually exist with zero evidence. Self described intelligent species still thinks magic and authoritarian abusive sky step-dads exist.
Joke’s on us all, that implies people even learn accurate unbiased history, or learn history at all.
I’ve spent a lot of my life trying to learn all I can, but since I’m not in any position of power, my knowledge only lets me know just how hard and fast we’re all screwed without really being able to do anything on a grand level. (Not meant to sound defeatist, just realist, and the knowledge was still all worth the learn.)
This is a really bad take.
Clearly, people have learned from history. Unfortunately for us, its our oppressors, and they’ve learned how to avoid the same errors that got them deposed in the past.
You are a fool to disregard the phrase, “learn history or you’re doomed to repeat it.” An absolute fool.
You literally just rephrased exactly what they just said. Who do you think the ‘third of us who learn and try to repeat it but better’ was talking about?
That phrase is valid and apropos for the millions of voters, and apathetic non-voters, which it describes.
I’m going with fall of modern civilization.
Our modern day kings have immensely more power than the kings of the past and the power imbalance of the methods of force have only increased as the literal distance between King and peasant has increased. There will be no guillotines, our modern day kings live in castles hundreds and hundreds of miles from the majority of us. Yeah we can pick off the occasional CEO, but I don’t see us winning any kind of “revolution.”
I think the ownership class know this is an absolutely crucial time as they need to solidify their positions of control for when global society turns to chaos as climate change completely upends how societies function. Food and water acquisition, energy production and distribution, employment and income. They will drive people to violence and the ownership class needs to maintain ownership of the means of violence to keep us suppressed for when that time comes.
I have very very very little hope for the future. I think unchecked greed will be our “great filter.” :/
It’s not an accident that the US has militarized police granted essentially free reign, the largest prison system in the world and plans in the works for internment camps.
We celebrate these strong men and sociopaths that hoard money at the expense of everybody else. I don’t think we’ll make it through before we crash hard enough to bounce back.
if there’s a bounce it will be like a bouncy ball goig all over the place then down the storm drain that reeks of dog only knows what
Humanity sure is but the responsibility unfortunately is on Americans.
The rest of us have to start a war to change things and that’s gonna suck maybe just as bad as what would happen if we don’t… But that limit is slowly approaching.