MORONIC INFERNO

Such was how Martin Amis saw the US in a collection of his essays he released in 2009. I have been trying this past year to put the finishing touches to a book about the State and about the efforts made over the past 50 years to “reform” it – both in Europe and the States where Trump, in his latest reincarnation, seems to have gone quite mad in his wanton destruction of state departments – assisted by teenage prodigies under the tutelage of Elon Musk who seems to be operating as a dictator. Indeed some analysts are claiming that what we are seeing in the US is little more than a COUP

Kurt Andersen is one of America’s most insightful analysts of its craziness – first plotting in Fantasy Land – how America went haywire (2017) and following up some three years later with Evil Geniuses – the unmaking of America; a recent history, situating both books thus

Whereas “Fantasyland” concerned Americans’ centuries-old weakness for the untrue and irrational, and its spontaneous and dangerous flowering since the 1960s, “Evil Geniuses” chronicles the quite deliberate reengineering of our economy and society since the 1960s by a highly rational confederacy of the rich, the right, and big business.

I’m surprised that the more people don’t talk about the groupthink which is permeating the US system – so well explained in Gillian Tett’s 2015 The Silo Effect and Matthew Syd’s Rebel Ideas – the power of diverse thinking (2019)

Further Reading

The Moronic Inferno and other visits to America Martin Amis

Discussion with Kurt Andersen https://www.globalplayer.com/podcasts/episodes/7DrpDUr/

What is Techno-Feudalism?

Yanis Varoufakis is not only a political activist I greatly admire – he has also a superb command of the English language to which he owes not so much his time in the UK (and US) but rather to his Greek upbringing which taught him the use of myths to help the narrative along. Most of his books – even his textbooks – are a delight to read. But I struggled with his latest book “Techno-Feudalism – what killed capitalism?” (2023) and have gone back to it thanks only to the discussion Chris Hedges had with Varoufakis on Youtube recently. Efgeny Morozov has been a critic of the internet’s effect on society for more than a decade, with his most famous book being To Save Everything, click here – the folly of technological solutionism which appeared in 2013 but if you want to get a sense of what lies behind the talk of “techno-feudalism” I strongly advise you to read Morozov’s amazing overview of the subject in a recent issue of New Left Review viz Critique of Techno-feudal Reason – an extensive article which put the use of the term in an historical context.

The French writer, Cedric Durand, published How Silican Valley unleashed Techno-feudalism in 2020 although it appeared in English only in 2024 and had this reply to Morozov’s article.

Other Reading/Viewing

The Digital Citizen L Ceccarini (2021)

The Rise of Technosocialism brett king and richard perry (2021)

The Coming of Neo-Feudalism – a warning to the middle class Joel Kotkin (2020)

Varoufakis - overthrow the tech tyrants! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8xSGzqdKC8