4 Comments
Oct 8, 2021Liked by David Shane

Great quotes, and Ame's ties in with a quote I have for technocracy.

"In a country where the sole employer is the State, opposition means death by slow starvation. The old principle:who does not work shall not eat, has been replaced by a new one: who does not obey shall not eat."

So modern, really makes one wonder who said it. Maybe the Australian health director? No, he said we are locking out the unvaxxed from our economy so we can stop the lockdown. The above quote is from Leon Trotsky.

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Oct 8, 2021Liked by David Shane

I want to believe in the semi-optimistic conclusion here ("nothing new under the sun") as a reminder that history has cyclical elements and the things that really matter (literature and arts, scientific progress, theological insight) are the things that survive through multiple cycles. That's a good reminder to invest in those things, rather than the ones that will pass away and be of no benefit to future generations (let alone to eternity!)

At the same time, I sense that there is "something new" about the toolkit that technocracy has available now. The quality of information is much higher due to consumer analytics in digital media, and the ability to parse that information with automation has basically tracked with Moore's Law. This has created the possibility of "nudge totalitarianism" or even "carrot totalitarianism" in a way that didn't exist before. Indeed, a number of recent political controversies have basically been screens for the implementation of the infrastructure required for social credit and constant consumer monitoring. In 1984, Big Brother still depends on normal informants that need to deceive you into revealing your noncooperation with the state. Today, our browser history lets us do that to ourselves. (I mean, I'm sure *you* have good opsec, but that's not standard for more trusting people with less education/paranoia. And even then -- here we are, posting on Substack under our own names!)

I really want to believe this collapse cycle can still complete normally in the historical way so we can reboot on the other side of it. I feel a much stronger identification now with the imprecatory prophets who call out for humbling of mighty empires, the stuff in the final chapters of Jeremiah. I understand that this is promised in some sense (we see enough of the end of the story to know that), but the usual paradox of any category of prayer is that everyone still cries out earnestly for the purposes of God to be accomplished, even despite knowing this is inevitable in a cosmological sense.

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Oct 7, 2021Liked by David Shane

It's bad that the Bolsheviks keep coming to mind, and let's not say things are that terrible now. But, the Bolsheviks did know what they were doing, in terms of liquidating the opposition (kulaks, rights, Mensheviks, etc.). Those weren't bureaucratic mishaps or a few rogue operators in the provinces. The killing of many of the opponents wasn't particularly disturbing, because it was necessary to achieve the end goal of complete control of society.

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