Free Media beat The Holodeck

Several times on Twitter/X this election season I have described this as the Free Media v. The Holodeck election. If you aren’t a Star Trek fan, the holodeck is a simulated reality environment on the show. At least one episode talks about the problem of “holodeck psychosis”, where someone lives in the simulated environment for so long, they forget it isn’t the real world.

Old corporate media (CNN, the NYTimes, etc.) is the holodeck. They present, constantly, a fake version of the world to viewers and readers, telling them it is reality. Many of those same people are so locked in to the glowing screens in their life now that they can’t tell anymore that it’s all fake - the screen in their hand is more real than what they see out their home window.

And the Holodeck, realizing that their influence would continue to decline if Harris lost, did everything they could to support her. I said at one point that about 95% of the “Trump will do X if elected!” stuff I was hearing just wasn’t true. “Trump’s Project 2025” was a Heritage Foundation effort he had nothing to do with (one funny, but very much not-kid-appropriate, ReasonTV video described it as erotic fan fiction). Although it might be great, Trump has not the slightest interest in passing a national abortion ban. Every “this person died because of a Trump abortion ban” story was a lie taking advantage of a person who had died for some other reason (like medical malpractice). “Trump threatened to kill Liz Cheney!” was produced from a comment in which Trump made what used to be a liberal point, that politicians wouldn’t be so keen to send men away to war if they had to fight themselves.

So it was all fake. We all knew it was fake because of Free Media - Twitter/X, Substack, and a thousand independent operators who would actually tell you the truth. The Holodeck didn’t try to hide the fact that, if they won, they would take action to silence Free Media through claims of misinformation, disinformation, and hate speech.

I didn’t know who would win this fight. Free Media won the fight. The next four years should see the continued growth of its influence, while the influence of the Holodeck continues to wane. You are the media now.

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