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rynlingThe rise of end times fascism
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2025/apr/13/end-times-fascism-far-right-trump-musk
To put it bluntly, the most powerful people in the world are preparing for the end of the world, an end they themselves are frenetically accelerating. That is not so far away from the more mass-market vision of fortressed nations that has gripped the hard right globally: in a time of ceaseless peril, openly supremacist movements in these countries are positioning their relatively wealthy states as armed bunkers. These bunkers are brutal in their determination to expel and imprison unwanted humans and equally ruthless in their willingness to violently claim the land and resources they deem necessary to weather the coming shocks.
Apparently the two authors, Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor, just published their research as a book (here's its website) that I'm not looking forward to reading. But I will. Because this is the world we live in now, I guess.
ETA: I do want to say, though, that I find Naomi Klein's particular brand of hyperbole to be aggravating. Klein has a habit of acting like every stupid cultural trend is the end of the world, which I'm not sure is accurate or meaningful. I know the sort of writing on the book's website is just marketing copy, but still. In any case, while I don't think the silly sci-fi fantasies of oligarchs are necessarily going to result in an actual apocalypse, I also don't think Klein is wrong to argue that it's important to pay attention.
As an aside, getting really deep into a study of the climate change accelerationism and eco-fascism advocated by loathsome men like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk as a logical endpoint for the (pseudo-)philosophy of "effective altruism" is what caused me to abandon my Tears of the Kingdom Modern AU story The Archives of Hyrule earlier this year. It took less than a week of reading and listening to podcasts for me to go from "Ganon is 2 sexy 2 be evil" to "I think we're gonna have to kill this guy Steven." I'm joking, obviously, but what I mean is that the contradictions and conflicts represented by the character stopped being something I found enjoyable to write about. I want to say that there's a genuinely utopian potential in the techno-magical dreams of ambitious men, but I'm not feeling it at the moment.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/ng-interactive/2025/apr/13/end-times-fascism-far-right-trump-musk
To put it bluntly, the most powerful people in the world are preparing for the end of the world, an end they themselves are frenetically accelerating. That is not so far away from the more mass-market vision of fortressed nations that has gripped the hard right globally: in a time of ceaseless peril, openly supremacist movements in these countries are positioning their relatively wealthy states as armed bunkers. These bunkers are brutal in their determination to expel and imprison unwanted humans and equally ruthless in their willingness to violently claim the land and resources they deem necessary to weather the coming shocks.
Apparently the two authors, Naomi Klein and Astra Taylor, just published their research as a book (here's its website) that I'm not looking forward to reading. But I will. Because this is the world we live in now, I guess.
ETA: I do want to say, though, that I find Naomi Klein's particular brand of hyperbole to be aggravating. Klein has a habit of acting like every stupid cultural trend is the end of the world, which I'm not sure is accurate or meaningful. I know the sort of writing on the book's website is just marketing copy, but still. In any case, while I don't think the silly sci-fi fantasies of oligarchs are necessarily going to result in an actual apocalypse, I also don't think Klein is wrong to argue that it's important to pay attention.
As an aside, getting really deep into a study of the climate change accelerationism and eco-fascism advocated by loathsome men like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk as a logical endpoint for the (pseudo-)philosophy of "effective altruism" is what caused me to abandon my Tears of the Kingdom Modern AU story The Archives of Hyrule earlier this year. It took less than a week of reading and listening to podcasts for me to go from "Ganon is 2 sexy 2 be evil" to "I think we're gonna have to kill this guy Steven." I'm joking, obviously, but what I mean is that the contradictions and conflicts represented by the character stopped being something I found enjoyable to write about. I want to say that there's a genuinely utopian potential in the techno-magical dreams of ambitious men, but I'm not feeling it at the moment.
