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'How does a grand duke interact with elected heads of state who offend him?' Chesnot/Getty Images
In a surreal cascade of events, the internet personality Andrew Tate has launched a political party. He has done this seemingly in response to a resurgence of interest in the scandal of Britain’s predominantly Pakistani Muslim “grooming gangs”, as these are euphemistically known; a fact made somewhat ironic because Tate himself, a self-declared Muslim convert, is alleged by Romanian authorities to have himself used the “loverboy” method to recruit young women into sexual exploitation.
I’ll spare you further analysis of his proposed programme for the “BRUV Party”, aka Britain Restoring Underlying Values, save to say that “BBC Punishment” merits an essay on its own. But his foray into politics is perhaps less a serious proposal than a symptom of the accelerating collapse of legitimacy across almost all of mainstream British institutional politics. More profoundly still, the shake-up now underway isn’t just of political parties or ideologies, but of the mechanisms themselves: a tectonic shift, in which ancient forms of power are re-emerging, and the terms of political engagement are suddenly radically up for grabs.
The backdrop to this is the decisive Covid-era shift, across the West, to a digital-first culture: a transformation has proved two-edged for the very elites who promoted it hardest. Our newly digitised world looked, at first blush, like a final consolidation of wealth and power for globalising, post-national and monolithically liberal oligarchy of “knowledge workers” or as NS Lyons put it, “Virtuals”, over those reactionary “Physicals”, the peons doomed to mere real-world toil. This is all true; but it has also turned out to be a powerful amplification device for any renegade oligarch willing to take (or even just appear to take) the peons’ side.
What this has, in turn, exposed is a world in which nation-states on the post-1945 model are not yet fully redundant — but where these entities, their associated political forms and processes, and their mechanisms for generating political legitimacy map at best uneasily onto the new reality of where power actually rests. For digital wealth consolidation has catapulted us back into a world of lords and princes: titans whose riches accord them a status more akin to (say) a Lorenzo de Medici than anything the West has seen since the two World Wars.
It was the actions of such a prince — Elon Musk — that tipped last November’s Presidential election for Trump, first by buying Twitter (now X) and then by triggering a preference cascade that moved several other tech princes to the Trump side. And it’s Musk, too, behind the brickbats currently raining down on Starmer in relation to the grooming gangs, a campaign of posting persecution that’s generated so much noise and chaos it appears to have spurred Tate to launch the “BRUV Party”.
This in turn highlights another aspect of the new feudal order: namely that these lords and princes are beginning to test their strength against elements of the legacy political system. Once an individual’s net worth is higher than the GDP of a medium-sized nation-state, after all, it is far from clear who ranks higher: plutocrat or Prime Minister? This is the broader context in which a domino-chain of internet events led from Musk trolling Starmer with the UK’s shameful record on the rape gangs, to a kickboxing (alleged) “loverboy” announcing his intention to stand for Parliament and replace him.
For if Musk’s status and role doesn’t compute at all, in terms of the postwar order, it makes perfect sense as a 21st-century update of a medieval one. He is fabulously wealthy, commands a principal field for political battle, is an enthusiastic and unabashedly partisan participant in that battlefield, and (not unconnectedly) also most favoured courtier to the man soon to enter office as leader of the world’s preeminent superpower – and who now, also not unconnectedly, owes Musk a favour. This all adds up to a rank and power perhaps akin, in the pre-democratic world, to “grand duke”: below kings and emperors, but above mere sovereign princes or dukes.
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SubscribeThe power Musk wields is simply persuasive. He isn’t a threat to democracy. He is not much different than an Archbishop in the 40’s, a newspaper baron in the 60’s or Ted Turner in the 80’s. I think the difference is that all of the above were still part of a larger cabal that more or less agreed on the major narratives that were permissible in public discourse. In a very real way the control of the narrative became much more tightly held with the social media monopolies starting the 2000’s – right up until Musk blew it apart with his purchase of Twitter and its new anything goes mantra. Far from being anti-democratic – I think he is empowering democracy. For example the Democrats didn’t try any funny business this election cycle because they knew they couldn’t get away with it without the support of all the tech platforms. Another point about Musk is that no one is ever prepared to take his motivation at face value. He is a self interested billionaire for sure – but maybe he also actually believes in freedom of speech and democracy. I think he does. He may not be perfect – but he is far far better than an internet controlled by the Democratic Party and the US Deep State, and various authoritarian progressive governments. Finally – like a lot of people – he is probably heartbroken by what has become of the UK. Videos of people literally being arrested for sending out a mean tweets to their 17 followers do not sit well with me or many people. The Pakistani rape gangs and their institutional enablers are a symptom of deep deep rot. Something is seriously wrong with the UK. Musk is just pointing that out. If that changes the outcomes of elections then that is a good thing.
“The power Musk wields is simply persuasive. He isn’t a threat to democracy”
Democracy is based on persuasion…
Well then those who disagree with him and his influence will simply have to be more persuasive than he is.
Exactly. And
It was the actions of such a prince — Elon Musk — that tipped last November’s Presidential election for Trump, first by buying Twitter (now X) and then by triggering a preference cascade that moved several other tech princes to the Trump side.
Mary misses the mark. Musk was evolving into a MAGA supporter and it just took time for him to express his intentions. He probably dissuaded as many ‘eat-the-rich’, envious, narrow-minded Progressives as he pursuaded on the right. The other tech gurus are merely acting in their own selfish interest, fearing the wrath of Trump. They will kiss the boots of the next Prez when Trump is gone.
Not only their boots.
I do think Elon is a little bit different from other tech princes. Remember when Walt Disney and others coerced then on twitter. He could have bent the knee and change. He went on national TV and said F.U to the surprise of many. Respect is earned through action.
Excellent responce Peter
Musk has also stated that he believes that if Biden/Harris won, the Gov’t would destroy his businesses and he’d end up in jail. His breaking the social-media stranglehold of the left has enraged “Progressives” and the Democratic apparatchiks.
Given the threats against his Federal contracts, and the lawfare against Trump and his supporters, I’m inclined to agree with him. The US Democratic party would love to be able to suppress dissent like Starmer & Trudeau & Co.
There are good reasons that his contracts generate security concerns. Having one of the Dept. of Defense’s largest contractors chatting with Putin every few weeks may be harmless- but it would be negligent if there was no scrutiny. Now, there won’t be, unless it is by his Bannonite rivals.
Thank you. As my grandma says “money spraks all languages”. Musk’s intervention is as likely to be a commercial calculation, as a belief that Trump is the leader the US requires (his support came our 3 hours after Butler). Helen and Tom’s These Times podcast today asks “who is musk?”. Worth listening to – an altogether more cynical take on his neo-liberal assaults, including the Meloni “love in” and this week’s Starlink deal.
Musk is an individual and very much at risk from his opponents. It’s clear his UK opponents are happy to make alliance with knife wielding thugs, rape gangs and ofc hostile foreign forces eg Hamas. Not sure about USA – certainly the left are in bed with some very unsavoury Lat Am drug gangs and maybe the street addicts/robbers in their own cities.- I think the UK is starting to show elements of the mass psychosis one sees in NKorea, early Khomenei Iran and 1930s Germany. USA possibly not on a collective level but there’s enough nuts with automatic weapons. I met a guy in Britain recently who swears blind that Trump is a mobster not a leisure and property business owner. Same guy claimed that rainfall comes from glaciers and snow and not at all from evaporated seawater. The guy is retired, white, comfortably off and worked most of his life for an oil production firm. Not able to debate such issues ( left school at UK version of 8th Grade) he explained this must be true because the BBC and Newspapers said so. You’d expect a lot of gen x, y, z or whatever to be gullible and intellectually impaired but this virus seems to infect all ages. We oldies haven’t got an excuse as we were brought with a free press, public libraries and access to the wisdom of our elders.
People like George Soros have done it for a lifetime. They were just moving behind the shadows until recently. I hate the idea of lobbying. Everything being done behind closed doors without allowing an entry is frightening to the people, but Musk is out in public, and that’s frightening to leadership. Musk is giving people a chance to participate in these machinations which is entirely new. We didn’t vote for any of them but now it seems like we have a voice. We shall see how it all plays out.
For year the public discourse has been dominated by the MSM controlled by the elites.
We got to hear about only what they wanted us to hear about, what the did not want us to hear about got suppressed or spun to oblivion.
With Musk on the scene the elite control of the discourse is under serious challenge and they have completely lost their heads. Their deny, deflect, dissemble, divide and denounce tactic is no longer effective. It is a joy to watch and long my it continue.
God bless Elon
…and Mary Harrington.
She’s brilliant, I always feel like my mind has been expanded in totally unforeseen ways when I read her stuff.
She does appear to have been reading Varoufakis’s Techno Feudalism.
Hear hear! – i think Musk is at risk of death or long gaol time due to the hatred, intolerance and criminality of his opponents. I expect there is some risk to Mary Harrington aswell – Hilda Morrell and Dr David ?? ( the Iraq WMD whistle blower) didn’t beat, stab or drug themselves to death!
Total tripe. The Rich Right already controlled much of the media and now they control even more. You just struggle with any opinion beyond your own.
Which is why Elon et al are ensuring maximum pressure as they don’t like the UK and EU approach to On Line Safety – are you too stupid to not see the true motive – whilst also making sure they avoid/distract from the things that would really help the folks that may have voted for Daddy. You noted how much Trump or Musk and the rest of Billionaires club mentioned US healthcare after the recent events and reaction? Yep, Zilch. No intention of helping with the bread and butter stuff have they.
Careful JW, with all that mouth foaming.
It appears that your way of failing to “cope with opinions beyond your own” is often to insult those who raise them. Your response above seems to be a great example of the “deny, deflect, dissemble and denounce” point made above.
Congratulations on inventing a new category of oppressors – “The Rich Right”.
The Rich Left (Bezos, Zuckerberg et al) of course have no media control whatsoever. What alternative universe are you living in? Please do not beam me up Scotty.
Elon, along with Joe Rogan, Tulsi, RFK Jr., and Donald Trump all were once voted for the Democrat party. The left, if you prefer the Democrats, actually betrayed them.
So the world’s richest men (no women it seems in that cadre) are not ‘elite’? Musk has purchased his way to the top of the top table and the others of his ilk are doing their best to climb up the wealthy-only ladder he has exposed. Be careful what you wish for.
Point well-taken, but I immediately think: Well, yes, he’s rich, but so is The Orange Man, and they seem to be the only two people on the planet fighting for the dignity of the common man. Maybe not everything in life boils down to wealth.
Bravo Ethnicidodo – yes we have to through chaos, but we have been living in the “design intent” chaos of the deep state, Bolb, and the elite class tht treat us like serf’s…
Jesus Christ. Musk IS one of the elite! This whole bullshit is just the elites battling for control re what levels of tax they pay, what level of control the state has. It’s frying pan into the fire stuff for the plebs.
Careful Glyn – the Musk-lovers like to think that he is just a straight-up guy like themselves, battling those pesky murky, un-named ‘elites’ of which he can’t possibly be one as an immigrant un-educated prole himself.
I don’t think it’s wise to blanket generalize people like that. I am both happy that musk is a person with lots of influence who also happens to be on (in my opinion) the correct side of history at the moment. But I am also weary of his wealth and his desire for power and influence, as I would be with any billionaire (trump included).
However, I also understand that even a good deed done for the wrong reasons is still a good deed.
The question for me now, is how long will it be before he gets so drunk with his own influence that he starts warping into something that we don’t want around anymore.
Trump seems to have the wherewithal to enjoy the power trip but also stay somewhat even when the rubber hits the road. Maybe that’s a function of age, having been around for a long time, he knows how to manage that in a humorous sort of way.
Musk sometimes comes across to me as that kid who was picked on his whole life, became rich, and now can’t get enough of his newfound power and influence.
I don’t know the man personally, and like I said I’m glad for the moment that he helped topple the far left, but I certainly don’t have any strong faith or trust in the man (yet). The upcoming years will determine that.
The penultimate paragraph illustrates why the swamp dwellers are so afraid of him – he is at the very least neuro-diverse and is very rich. These two inputs alone mean he is willing to go further with risks in opposing these thieves and muderers than most people. I think Trump and Musk are going to need suffocating security unless they can return USA (and its subject states like UK) to civic order and htey do not have long to do this.
Surely you can be financially “elite” but still ethically sound?
Yes.
There’s always the possibility that Musk is no longer obsessed with making MORE money. Lord knows he has enough and I would imagine that he has investments that will keep him swimming in the stuff no matter what the future brings. That’s why he’s so willing to throw away his money on Twitter.
No one wants to mention it, but it could be that there are some ‘better angels in his nature’. It might not be ‘peace and love’ but Starlink is a major improvement in millions of lives and without SpaceX the US wouldn’t have a viable space program.
Here’s the thing. The “liberal democratic order” is neither liberal nor democratic and it’s incapable or unwilling to maintain order when it’s non-whites causing the crime and violence. European countries are ruled by a narrow bureaucratic elite who actively despite their average native born citizens, and constantly try to undermine the will of the voters. The whole history of the EU is the elites ignoring the express wishes, and actual votes of the people.
When your Gov’t behaves as the UK and German Gov’ts have in ignoring the people, subverting basic civil rights, and unleashing hordes of predatory or parasitic immigrants on them, the Gov’t should be disrupted. Hell it should be overthrown.
Ever lived anywhere outside of the liberal democratic order AG? I suspect not and I suspect you’d be running back fairly sharpish counting your blessings.
Funny, aren’t we moments away from a repeat of 1930s Naz1 Germany, well that’s according to all the progressives.
Have you not seen how the UK is slipsliding away from a liberal democracy? It is pathetic and sad to watch.
Good grief, you LVR and AR need to get out more and maybe travel a bit to real Autocracies. Are you spending too much time indoors being panicked by your media feed?
No JW, once again that’ll be you.
In the US we still have rights. You’ll don’t. If a person can be jailed for a nasty tweet and questioned by the police for a “non-crime” you live in an autocracy. Unless you’re Muslim, then you can do whatever you want.
I lived for many years in Singapore. Hardly liberal and certainly not democratic in the western sense of the word. I’d leave the UK to return there in an instant if they’d let me stay.
Absolutely – UK, Fr, De, Se & Dk for sure no longer governed by consent ( government by the people for the people) They are ruled by force w/o consent. There is no legitimate government, only small minorities sitting on thrones – bit like Alawite Syria. This means they will not voluntarily relinquish power and if they lose elections will use non political means to regain it. (Weaponising diseases, allying with terrorists or drug cartels, misuse of public servants or employees of state suppliers etc etc) This puts us more peaceful grown ups who seek civil order in a difficult position. The amount of force necessary to stop these criminals may also endanger the whole socio -economic structure – Russia in 1917 and Spain in the 1930s are good examples where two mad collectivists ( Stalin & Franco) eventually emerged in charge of much depleted societies. I am hopeful the woke virus and its outriders pseudo Marxism and Violent Islam can be stopped within the rules based system. Look at your Trudeaus, Starmers, Scholz (?) etc and it doesn’t look hopeful. Yet surely there must be people who belive in Keynesian economics and a good social safety net for the poor and vulnerable who aren’t also advocates or Hamas or rape gangs? As a former lefty myself i cannot see why they want such nutters in the tent? Unless its the old US doctrine of “they’re bastards, but at least they’re our bastards”. This segues into the fact that the US war for independence and eventual declaration didn’t have the collateral damage of the French or Russian revolutions because the tyrants were seperated by 2500 miles of ocean from their victims and the hastily mobilised red-coats hearts mostly weren’t in the fight.
Where have all the responses to this gone? Someone on UnHerd doesn’t seem to like free speech.
Oligarchs influencing the electoral process is nothing new. Recently, you had the Koch brothers on the right, Soros and Reed Hoffman on the left. At least Musk wields his influence out in the open, rather than lurking behind closed doors. If Musk wasn’t saying stuff that resonated with a huge number of voters, no one would listen. His legitimacy results not from his money and reach, but the popular support for what he says.
Such as his eagerness to retain H-1B Visa’s so he can acquire cheaper indentured immigrant engineers and minimise how much he has to invest in training and developing Americans? Not that he’s short of a penny.
His popular support is waning. In part that’s why he’s jumped across to the ‘further Right’ with some red meat stuff. Also helps him put pressure against the On Line Safety Bill. He’s just weaponising an issue for his own gain.
Isn’t debate on H-1B within the GOP a good thing? That’s what democracy is all about.
Yes. Point being though where Elon is on the issue. And it appears Trump too.
Doesn’t look like a change coming that favours Americans more does it.
Problem is the businesses need the engineers, analysts, programmers etc NOW. The left have had decades to damage the education systems in UK/Eu and to an extent US though that seemed to improve from say 1983 to 2008 before declining again since (i say this from a STEM employer’s perspective) It will take several generations to rebuild the wests’ education systems and the problem worstens now because who will teach the teachers? Also i have further concerns about some free market thinkers views on education – especially the Christian and Moslem right who ar ewary of educating women. Also remember Thatcher had a pathological dislike of education at large and educators in particular – i can see why as the UK ones were often USSR stooges but that’s no reason to stop the free milk for poor kids! Or to throw the STEM training baby out with the Communist bathwater of Michael Foot and Arthur Scargill lol
Not sure you understand about tech hiring in the US. I’m fairly sure that Musk’s companies here primarily on quality and not on price. There isn’t the supply of sufficiently talented US born engineers. I know plenty of people that moved to the US to work in tech and they’re certainly no being exploited or underpaid. You’re also falling into the zero sum game fallacy here. Hiring the best people allows companies to grow faster and hire more people.
Train them. He’s got plenty of money.
We’re not talking about the next Albert Einstein’s getting a Visa.
He likes the indentured nature of their employment. Fewer problems. Folks need to wake up and see these examples as the veil being lifted.
Again, you don’t understand the type of people he’s looking for. You can’t train some of these things. People either have the combination of personality, intellect, curiousity, determination, etc for these roles or they don’t. There’s simply a limited supply at the top end.
Plus math and structured coding skills way beyond what most UK/Eu/US institutions can supply. Look at the pay for Eu + UK academics! – you literally couldn’t get a ladder logic programmer for that money.
This is another straw man. Neither Musk nor Trump have ever been opposed to immigration of skilled workers. In fact it’s a central plank of their nationalist economic programme. You’re still avoiding the issue.
Indeed the irony of the elite that Musk and Trump are very much part of us much as the British ruling classes. They know who to wind the plebs up over immigration and immigrants, but operate as open door policies as they are able to do.
Here we go, a switch of position on the principle. Predictable. Were it Starmer you’d be foaming at the mouth HB.
I have no idea what you’re talking about. Worse still, neither do you.
Replace the word Trump for Musk and we can all see why MAGA Trump romped home in the USA election, he is popular for what he says, while the Democrats thought just loathing him and saying nothing was enough, what a surprise.
That and the exciting rockets…
Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden are each on record lamenting the many challenges to their progressive hegemonic monopoly on generally-recognized digital distribution channel ‘authorities’. They’ve each stated that they wish we could all return to the days of the mid-20th century … when bandwidth limitations meant that only so many TV channels and radio stations existed. In their eyes, living in such a world would mean that their ‘approved’ messaging could be adequately controlled and distributed.
But to their ongoing dismay, the current progressive monopoly on ‘authority’ channels keeps getting challenged and disrupted by libertarian and conservative upstarts. We’ve all witnessed the progressive game of Wac-A-Mole that has been waged against these upstarts that defy the preferred progressive message.
New digital rules and regulations, the FBI ‘muscling in on’ and monitoring businesses, threats to businesses from Democrat Congresspeople and Presidents and so on. The “disinformation” and “misinformation” (terms that only seem to apply to these libertarian and conservative channels) had to be stopped. These new information channels were wreaking havoc as progressives’ preferred political news narratives were consistently debunked in disastrously humiliating ways.
But as with all things, when there’s a mismatch between theory – including our desires for how things should be – and reality (i.e. the truth), an arbitrage of one sort or another might be found.
George Soros made a cool billion pounds by short-selling the sterling. He made a bet that reality was different than the authority messaging from “confidence men” at the Bank of England.
Rupert Murdoch made the same bet in 1996 when he realized that powerful progressives in media organizations were trying to steer cable news messaging to fit their personal biases. So he started Fox News and widened the Overton window so that it included reality as seen by half of America.
Elon Musk is in the same mold as prior entrepreneurs. He recognized that the perception of reality, as observed by the American people, was vastly different from progressive-controlled digital distribution channels and messaging.
And this is the rub for progressives – had they allowed enough space for reality messaging, along with their progressive informercials, Elon might not have been successful with X. Instead, their messaging was deemed so distant from Americans’ perceived reality that Elon found and exploited the arbitrage between progressives’ overvalued echo-chamber theories and perceptions, and America’s undervalued reality.
Rupert Murdoch started Fox News in some altruistic move to widen freedom of speech? Ha ha – Murdoch has only ever been driven by the accumulation of wealth – he saw a gap in the market and placed Fox firmly there.
Straw man. I didn’t say anything about altruism. You merely agreed with the point of my post.
Excellent stuff.
Musk’s influence-peddling is obviously extra-democratic, in this sense. But many other more progressively inclined lords and princes meddle openly in the democratic process without triggering nearly the same fury.
Seeing the reaction to Musk’s interventions is amusing on several counts, but seeing the furious have to grapple with the fact that, no, you didn’t go nearly so ballistic when George Soros waded into the Brexit issue (for example) is one of the better bits.
And I think this is part of the Musk strategy: purposely go too far, purposely say something well off the mark so that our current leaders (if you can call them that) have this false sense of security in their response and happily trot out the well-worn platitudes (misinformation, far-right, don’t interfere in our democracy blah blah blah)…which only serve to make them look entirely out of touch and hypocritical when you remind them of their own past behaviour, thus undermining their own authority further.
It’s an incredibly efficient method of wielding power. All Musk does is write a sentence, maybe an article if we’re thinking about the Welt am Sonntag piece, and it sets off a dynamic and a debate that runs all on its own. It’s also self-reinforcing in that everything our leaders try to do to then get out of the mess just ends up getting them even deeper into it.
While I do think that we’re in a time of massive reorganisation, I think these “leaders” would be massively helped by just thinking things through a couple of steps before responding. It doesn’t take a genius or chess grandmaster to do this, just a bit of self reflection.
But no – Starmer just stands there and sputters about the far right and seems horrified when, oh dear, it’s not working quite as well as it did in summer, what do I do now? The way he over-pronounces “far right” is a sign of the rising panic that he must be feeling about the tools in his arsenal which he believed to be nuclear disintegrating to dust on impact.
I also think it is possible that this Musk onslaught is being at least tacitly supported by Trump and that it is a way of telling European governments that the relationship to the US is going to be on a different footing going forward.
As far as Germany is concerned, the message I see is: if you openly insult our leader and expressly/implicitly support the other side in the elections, we’re going to bring that right back atcha. DON’T FORGET WHO (STILL) PAYS FOR YOUR SECURITY. Be nice.
I’m overly fond of saying this, but Europe really is like a spoilt kid that’s now being kicked out of the cushy situation it’s got way too used to.
More than tacitly; Donald Trump, when asked yesterday, said he fully supported Elon Musk and that he’s a great man.
Indeed. You can argue that the main political parties in the UK (Labour and Conservative) are still playing their political games as if the old Global Liberal Elite was in power. The Conservatives have been roundly punished for not waking up and smelling the coffee, and Labour have doubled down on the excuses that used to work. Political parties in other countries are struggling grimly to hold on as the old elite, but are also failing.
The new elite is gradually coming into its pre-eminence. Reform may or may not be able to seize the opportunity in the UK. Musk may or may not prove to be a catalyst in the formation of the new elite. But the old elite is dead and cannot be saved – too many skeletons have been hidden in too many closets, and the closet doors are swinging open.
I think Musk has learned a lot in this approach from his proximity to Trump. Throw out some outrageous statement (the more outrageous the better) and while the bien pensant politicians and their subservient propaganda machines are busy choking on their coffee, the Overton window for acceptable thought and speech has moved several notches one way or the other. People are seriously discussing Canada becoming the 51st state.
Brilliant article, thanks a lot. I would add that Musk purchasing Twitter was a ‘stick in the spokes’ moment for the established post democratic world order and that we’re into a brave new world here. While Soros and Gates have been left to freely peddle influence on behalf of the elites for decades, Musk has disrupted the entire cartel by togging out for the other side.
What this has shown is the absurdity of the ceremonial democracy we currently have. We have been presented with uni party candidates for years who pretend to squabble over some of the little issues but have marched in step on the most important issues like immigration, taxation, climate change, woke ideology etc. Any political or media entity that tries to challenge this performative democracy was labelled as dangerous or far right. Now that Musk has his giant soap box he is able to point out how naked the emperor is and it is abundantly clear how absurd the current situation is: that, for decades, we have been presented with a false political dichotomy that very clearly does not have our interests at its heart.
performative democracy
Perfect.
Virtue signal. Sound bite. Celeb endorsement. Photo op. TV time. Vague positive slogan (hope and change). Government handouts. These things have become the stuff of elections rather than policy, track record, and experience.
Excellent synthesis, bravo!
One thing’s for sure: Mary Harrington is back on form.
Come to Seattle, Mary Harrington, and I’ll put on a seminar about The Most Unjust Ruling Class in History. I mean of course the educated class that has dominated and despoiled us and driven us into the killing fields for the last century and more.
Really, those feudal lords and Grand Dukes weren’t so bad after all. For one thing, they weren’t much into World Wars.
I understand Elon not as a feudal lord but as a Great Man helping to destroy the monstrous and unjust culture of Mass Media and replace it with the hope of Independent Media. And if he gets to Occupy Mars on the way, so much the better.
Spot on.
What a massive, three-generation grift the dominance of ‘Virtuals’ has been. No coincidence that it began with the ‘cultural revolution’ of the sixties, which of course wasn’t any ‘revolution’ at all, just the beginning of the Age of Narcissism. (What is a ‘Virtual’ but a self-interested sociopathic solipsist with a mass media platform; AKA a Boomer ‘cultural revolutionary’ with a smart device.)
The Age of Narcissism has disguised the street hustle with posh labels – ‘social democracy’, ‘progressive politics’, ‘liberal intellectual plurality’, what-ever – but really the post-WW2 ‘consensus’ in the West has been nothing more sustantial or noble than…the self-serving hijacking of the Village’s Tribal Talking Stick, by an unrepresenative and self-perpetuating cadre of opportunist secular priests: the Triumph of the Empty But Eloquent. Journalism, academia, politics, public service, NGOs, growing wodges of the corporate realm…defacto taxpayer-funded Village ‘me-me-me activists’ of all kinds have progressively colonised the abstract realm, and re-tooled it as one of real applied power, not to mention quickly seized and maintained privilege. I don’t know of a single ‘progressive’ leader over my lifetime, in any field, who isn’t…stinking f**king rich today.
And they wonder why the world doesn’t trust all the ‘peace and love and fairness’ bullsh*t that has fuelled their rise to becoming – spot on again – the ‘Most Unjust Ruling Class in History‘. Their profoundly mendacious post-war construction of a Virtuals’ Ivory Palace – viciously defended by its Praetorian Guard, that ‘monstrous and unjust culture of Mass Media’ – has exploited, abandoned and stranded the Village ‘Physicals’, untethering their own powerful virtuality from an increasingly powerless (but no less real for it) material reality. Inevitably, to the point where – surprise, surprise – we Physicals have now had the f**k enough.
We are sick of the Virtuals’ fanciful and careless abstractions, p*ssed down on us from their Ivory Palace. Elon Musk – and in his way, Donald Trump (his voters) – is just our means for saying to the world’s ‘Virtuals’: Get a real f**king job, you hypocritical Village freeloaders and scam-artists. One connected to, and which adds value to, the material Village we all live in – not simply your personal Ivory Palace of lucrative words. Get a real job, in the real Village, Virtuals.
Or shut your grifting eloquent gobs, pack up your snake oils and your freeloading privileges. And f**k off out of our Village.
So you haven’t noticed Trump’s comments on Greenland, the Panama canal or Canada? UnHerd is being very quiet about them too.
He only annouced that yesterday, give it time.
It’s been rumbling away for weeks, merely restated yesterday, and personally I’d expect vague threats from the US to NATO allies to be worth mentioning.
No op-ed piece on The Guardian so far, or are they being very quiet too?
I don’t read it
As Trump often does, he is expressing blue-sky dreams that have no possibility of actually being enacted. However, mentioning these things makes people consider their options for deflecting such imagining. It’s a classic negotiation ploy used to put the other side off their game. Trump is a master at this.
Trump ‘thinks big’ and imaginatively and creatively – something few if any leaders do today, perhaps excepting Putin, who miscalculated ‘bigly’. When Trump called Europe on the mat for not paying its negotiated share for NATO defense, many Europeans laughed at him. I suspect that’s not happening today.
Well Putin, Xi and other power-crazed imperialist dictators around the world must be very happy that Trump is welcoming the invasion of neighbouring sovereign states.
You could well be right, but are Canada, Denmark and Panama really the other side?
I suspect that you haven’t much studied history. ‘Feudal lords and Grand Dukes’ kept the world in almost constant war in their power and money struggles. They ‘weren’t much into world wars’ because they didn’t have the geographical spread of influence required, however if you look at the imperial dominations of Alexander, Rome, Persia, Genghis Khan etc they were pretty much worldwide in their sphere, and of course the Seven Years War of the mid-18thC is usually described as ‘the first world war’.
It’s the ‘educated class’ which has tried to extricate the world from constant warfare, sadly with limited success. At least most of Europe has moved beyond permanent warfare although Putin (does he count as educated?) is doing his best to drag us back into hell.
“It’s the ‘educated class’ which has tried to extricate the world from constant warfare”.
Weren’t Dubya, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Nuland, Blair & Co part of the educated class? Dubya may have spent his time at Yale partying, but I’m pretty sure that still counts as an education.
Fair enough, shall we say some of the educated class!
The power of major donors in the American political system has grown, is growing and ought to be diminished. Elon Musk is the prime example BUT I think “Neo-feudal” is a misleading metaphor. The idea that Musk is a free standing power dictating to the US and other governments is wrong. The reality is more complex and two way.
The same week that world’s richest man has been throwing his weight around has also seen the third richest, Zuckerberg, running for cover, tossing Clegg overboard and adopting X style free speech in the hope of placating Trump. Musk, Bezos, Zuckerberg and others have as much to fear as gain from the new Trump Administration.
The expansion and intrusion of the regulatory state has created a blurred situation with the public and private sectors commingled and each compelled to seek to influence the other. The old paradigm of companies pursuing their interests within an impartial framework of laws while largely keeping out of politics has collapsed. If anything, the new system resembles less feudalism that the endless bureaucratic manoeuvring of pre Xi China as political factions / economic blocs (eg the energy / security grouping) sought to retain favour and access to resources.
In the long run, I am optimistic. The absurdity of the status quo is so self evident that reform seems probable. Free speech is already regaining ground. The growing corruption since the Citizens United case has become as blatant as that of the Age of the Robber Barons and – as in that case – will provoke a reaction. Even the underlying blurring of private / public boundaries as the result of the growth of the regulatory state will probably eventually get sorted out.
The power of major donors in the American political system has grown, is growing and ought to be diminished.
How do you explain that Kamala spent more than $2 bn, more than twice what Trump spent, and yet got her butt kicked. The candidate means more than the money at that level. At a local level the money has a larger impact since it takes a critical mass of money to get noticed – without that you are not in the game.
And NO, their power should not and will not be diminished. They can get around any barrier you put up.
What’s Mr Tate’s view on Gaza? Isn’t that the new determining factor in UK elections?
Will this gentleman provide a novel synthesis of all the factors involved in these disquieting controversies? A ‘bruv’ who is also a follower of the religion of peace would, as a ‘pound shop demagogue’, offer his fan club among the ‘white working class’ a difficult choice.
The ‘bureaucracy’ only sees the activities of the ‘grooming gangs’ as a failure of bureaucracy. The ‘solution’ is more procedures, systems, processes, and…bureaucracy. Multiplying the eyes of Argus; eyes that are only sleepy with euphemisms.
What a beast Musk must be. Our Jess reports that her world has been turned upside down by his tweets; so fragile is our gal that she’s all teary over the hurty words from thousands of miles away emanating from the ‘special relationship’.
If these legacy political parties, the old ones from the 19th century, are reaching their Bourbon moment, they would be completely unaware of the sans culottes about to be unleashed by the personages of the internet salons.
I like the way you’ve introduced the “legacy” element into the discussion, reflecting the “late Victorian” take on our culture in another of today’s articles. There’s something in that which adds to the perspective in this article.
Our political parties are leftovers from the Industrial Revolution, unable to cope with the Digital Revolution epitomised by Musk.
The MSM are in overdrive trying to defend the status quo, utilising every available resource to denigrate and denounce those who challenge what they thought was their cultural hegemony.
As others have said, this is amusing but how far will they go now their positions are threatened? We’ve had working class tweeters jailed. The point you make about Tate and his (no doubt opportunistic) ‘conversion’ to Islam being at odds with those communities who’re part of the second tier in our two-tier state is well made.
I suspect the UK is in line for one term governments in the near term. A period of political volatility looms that will prevent the like of 14 years of insipid Tory rule. Division, anger and increasing frustration will be pervasive in the electorate.
The way the world looks to be headed, things are going to a lot more disrupted than a bit of political instability.
I’m taking bets on Starmer being consigned to the dustbin of history by the end of the year.
I think feudal princes were tied to a particular place. MH gives the example of the Medici clan. They were tied to Florence… and then France, through advantageous marriages.
In contrast, Musk wields his influence in a way that is not tied to a particular place, and the reason is that his influence machine Twitter/X is one which is disembodied and dislocated… themes which MH is very familiar with.
Maybe the best analogy is with other captains of industry who have wielded great influence in the past through similar abstract mechanisms of information and financial influence, unmoored from ties to a particular place, such as William Randolph Hurst, Rupert Mudoch, and Nathan Rothschild.
Perhaps Andrew Tate didn’t just “pop up” but is rather sponsored and guided by monied or political interests of one form or another, who might well have both the means and motivation to keep a grip on all parts of the media narrative spectrum? And, at the risk of exciting the ire of many UnHerd commentators who seem to see Musk as their knight in shining armour coming over the hill, perhaps – just maybe – the utopian oligarch who wants to put a proprietary chip in everyone’s brains to foster a new era of trans-national transhumanism ain’t quite the Burkean champion of liberal conservatism and freedom of conscience he’s sometimes cracked up to be?
Maybe not, but he’s certainly stirred up a hornet’s nest in the cosy salon of uniparty politics on both sides of the pond.
What is Anglo-Bukelism ?
Apart from that one odd line, a great essay and fascinating analysis. I very much agree with it, though I’m not at all keen on Andrew Tate getting a foot in the door.
It is interesting that with, what seems to be, the collapse of liberalism (from overeach ? feminisation ? decadence ?) ‘strong men’ are rising. Inevitable I would have thought, it’s the way of the world.
Democracy will only work for good if the populace is reasonably well educated, which is what happened during most of the 20th century, but not any more. And so the edifice of democracy becomes weak and unstable. Strength is bound to come from somewhere to fill the space and assert itself.
I think you’ve answered your own question regarding Anglo-Burkism with “And so the edifice of democracy becomes weak and unstable. Strength is bound to come from somewhere to fill the space and assert itself”. I.E. the murder andselling off of a dead body for dissection, in this case liberal democracy (if I’ve read it correctly).
As in Nayib Bukele, the strongly libertarian president of El Salvador (educated guess).
Thanks to both of you.
This article highlights for me the 2 dimensions we are now confronting: horizontal (somewheres/anywheres) and vertical (virtual/embodied). I.don’t know how it plays out, but I think about it alot. Thanks for the shout out to Peter Turchin who is doing serious academic work applying math to history.
Musk has 220 million followers on X. That is 2.5 x the population of the UK. A single tweet touches most important people and is then amplified a thousand times. This is the real power.
Don’t overthink it. He’s doing the job that your government, ever-fearful of being called “racist,” hasn’t been doing for, probably, two decades – and by calling them out before the entire planet, Elon is bringing down upon their heads the opprobrium they deserve.
I recommend you consider adopting a Bill of Rights, if for no other reason perhaps to afford these girls’ parents the ability to at least speak out without risking arrest or confiscation of their homes. I know where you can find a model document, if you’re interested ….
You have to realise that Musk’s voice scales much bigger than just the US or UK. His posts are being picked up in India and Asia for instance, which potentially means much wider discussions of things like free speech, or equality under the law.
Online conversations for ‘big hitters’ are now global via social media. We’ve had global celebrities before (eg Charlie Chaplin, Elvis) but only very rarely have they used their celebrity to try to communicate directly to a global audience, or have had the means to do so, without it being filtered through media and journalists.
What’s more, Musk will have the tools within Twitter/X to see where his posts are landing, and who is reading them, and where he is getting reactions and, I guess, AI summaries of their effect on different populations. Other social media leaders can also do the same things, but they’ve tended to be restrained on what they post and how they manage their reach in order to protect the ‘neutrality’ of their platforms.
Social media celebrities are breaking out of normal national boundaries and then boosting other players, for instance, giving Farage a presence in the US that belies his political role in the UK.
‘Grand dukes’/political donors/agenda setters are not new. It is just that it usually happens behind the scenes. Musk is obviously front and centre and also the principal political backer, which is not a great look for the Trump administration. Musk also ‘unsilenced’ Trump in a way no one else in the history of American presidential elections has. Musk is just overt about what he wants.
BTW, has anyone wondered how much dirt there is on most politicians that keep them in play by their paymasters?
Trump needs a private army, a consigliere (and money-man) like Elon Musk and architects and builders of the vision of Michelangelo, Leonardo and Bramante.
It remains to be seen whether Musk comes even close to the influence of the oligarchs and dynasties who have constructen their cony networks for decades. Musk is mostly very vocal so far, which is partly because he happened to have captured a huge social media platform.
Nevertheless, it is interesting that some oligarchs have started singing out of tune but in the end rhetoric is just rhetoric. Just as big capital engaged in green and pink washing I can see they would engage in MAGA-washing if they think it is beneficial.
And that should also make us think about the more fundamental question. Do we want to live in a second Gilded age or is the massive inequality – which is really the underlying reason for neofeudalism – inherently problematic for most people?
Great points. Musk has the opportunity to make real changes through the Dept of Gov Efficiency. We will have a chance to judge whether his influence can be translated into actions. Given his success with Tesla, SpaceX, Starlink, et al, my guess is he will have some success here as well.
Interesting article. I’d like to see Mary’s take on the generational aspect of this; Musk is firmly Gen X. The Boomer political cohort is on the way out, what do the pre-Millennials bring to the table? Growing up pre-internet, Gen X seems less censorious (and more potentially rebellious) than Boomers and Millennials both.
Gen X are supposedly more independent (latchkey kids as they used to be called, at least in the UK). But there aren’t very many of them and are mostly forgotten in generational discussions (or increasingly just lumped in with the Boomers).
Musk’s influence is really no different than that of Soros, Gates, Schwab et al, he just doesn’t wield it from the shadows like the others do. What you see is what you get.
I’d rather that than someone who says prayers and kisses babies in front of the camera and then slithers over to the Sunset Inn to bang lines of coke off of the supple cheeks of Brittni and Jazmyn (they say they’re twins) before heading home to his wife and children.
The Way of the Dragon.
You have to remember, dragons although mostly benign, are not controllable, can be capricious, and follow their own agenda which may be opaque. But you definitely don’t want to be on the wrong side of an enraged one. And the mouse-squeak manner in which Starmer, Shultz and Macron are pushing back against the brickbats raining down on them indicates these clowns are aware of the the risks. Do you think they will henceforth simply refer to Musk as ‘He Who Must Not Be Named’?
There is a symmetry in the way the political opponents of Soros and Musk view each man
Yet there is no symmetry in how either walks his talk. Soros put his millions into electing prosecutors who refuse to prosecute, effectively turning multiple major cities into dystopian centers. Musk has yet to burn anything down.
He can’t have the American presidency but he may just secure the first British one.
Never has a government looked more likely to be overthrown from outside the usual processes.
If that happens then it may finally be Britain’s revolutionary republican moment.
I would love to see you compare and contrast that with Cromwell.
This is interesting, but I don’t agree entirely. Musk is actually taking a huge personal risk. He is the exception, not the rule. Most oligarchs exercise their power through quiet patronage of the political class. Politicians exercise their power over oligarchs through the threat of regulation. So we arrive at where we are now, mostly, which is a kind of guardian corporatism. Musk has joined Trump in blowing the lid off this cosy, corrupt, consensus.
Very nice, thank you.
At what level of income should one shut up and distance themselves from their constitutional rights as a citizen? Or should one check in with Mary Harrington first to see if it offends her sensitibilites? Raped kids should stay quiet and it’s unethical to speak for them I guess. I didn’t realize you were a monster.
Musk is powerful so long as he is rich. But how long will he stay rich if his weird business empire continues as it is at the moment?
It is sad to see UnHerd readers have so little imagination that they can only imagine a world with either the so called ‘liberal elites’ – actually just neo-liberals with a facade of liberalism like Hilary Clinton or Keir Starmer, or the ‘Grand Dukes’ or robber barons like Musk and Trump. Seriously can we not do better?
And p.s. any one who tweets **** like ‘liberate Britain from tyrannical government’ or that Jess Philips is a “rape genocide apologist.” is a certifiable ****-stirring loony.
A bit of an aside, but I have to admit ‘snivelling cretin’ made me double up with laughter.
Musk, like Farage raises issues which are of genuine concerns to ( small c) conservative people. It dismays me that people who question the merits of a liberal ethos are labelled ‘far right’ .
The state of the current government is a pretty good mirror of what is happening to Trudeau and his party in Canada. Liberalism, like communism, is just not working.
The people who hold this view are therefore perfectly within their rights to seek alternatives to the current system and they will.
The issue is that Musk and others are standing up for freedom and free speech, and for the hard-working ordinary person, more than the mainstream institutional authorities, and that gives Musk and others a lot of weight in public opinion.
The medium is the message! Cannt remember the name of the brainer who coined it!
Marshall McCluhan
Thank you! I remembered the double Ms but could not get it out of my tongue!
Zuckerberg has just fired the FB fact checkers and is going full-on X.
The (New York) Times they are a’changing.
Although he undeniably does much good, like drawing attention to the rape gangs right now, Musk is absolutely not to be trusted and is an immature, dangerous megalomaniac.
He’s essentially a transhumanist who believes he has a special right to decide the fate of the world. He doesn’t care about the British girls victimized in that horrific way – he’s using it to increase his power, in a very clever way. After all, the establishment truly has let them, and the whole nation, down.
But you will never see him say anything about Israel killing a Palestinian child every 30 minutes (18,000 thus far in Gaza). He has his own political/technological agenda and to hell with anyone who doesn’t fit into it. His anti-Islam bias is now undeniable as he tries to connect the rape gangs with a faith of 2 billion people.
He won over MAGA until he spat in their face with his H1-B Visa stance. They realized he doesn’t care about American jobs. Together with Peter Thiel, David Sacks, and others, he has infiltrated the US government and it’s pretty scary looking ahead to be honest. I think the majority of his admirers will wake up only when it’s too late and he’s too powerful.
I’m glad your ended your column on a sartorial note. No Western leader is better dressed than Keir Starmer, for which all thanks must be given to Lord Alli, another rich man. And yet the prime minister still manages to give off the impression of an empty suit. Elon Musk is one of those great men who appear at long intervals of human history. It is quite natural that the wee people don’t understand him.
Tempting though it is to applaud anybody sticking it to this hapless government, Musk’s tweets (at least as reported) sound like the ravings of a madman. Perhaps its just a question of register.
I think they’re deliberately “over the top” in a way designed to create maximum effect, and he’s succeeding.
Our elites have got away with their cultural dominance by invoking ‘politeness’, epitomised by the term “be kind”. It’s by changing the register that Musk – and Trump, of course – have undermined that ethic.
It is also reported that Musk is addicted to ketamine, which would explain the nature, volume and timing of his excretions.
Indeed yet the UnHerd readers have voted you down 2 to 12.
Hard times ahead for rational and sane people.
It’s been hard times for rational and sane people for a long time, but you’re right, it isn’t getting any better.
Let us be clear here that Keir Starmer is being persecuted by a right wing media that has twisted what he is trying to achieve and is galvanizing its readers around a far right interpretation of what is going on.
The truth is that Keir Starmer and the Labour Party are delivering on their promises to govern like grown-ups in a way which has been entirely absent from the Conservative Party for decades, who have been a complete disaster for this country in every way.
Don’t let the right wing press or Elon Musk tell you otherwise.
I wanted to copy the gif from PK’s post above but don’t have the technical skills to do it.
Musk is a numpty, folk need to realise Twitter (X) isn’t the real world
I don’t often ‘uptick’ but have for this as the use of the good Yorkshire epithet ‘numpty’ is both unusual and absolutely spot on!
And pray enlighten us as to what is the real world?
Musk is neither a prince, an engineer or anyone of note, but a jester handed an obscene amount of money by the Americans’ curious reverence for wealth. His attack on Starmer seems to have boiled down to a Twitter rant like all his others, and when he and Trump inevitably fall out we’ll see exactly how much power he really has.
One has to suspect Mary secretly enjoys the Musk schtick if it’s directed at her preferred bogeymen (or women) like Starmer. Maybe she approves of Elon calling a decent woman, Jess Phillips, who has long campaigned against the abuse of women, often bravery against Islamists, a ‘rape genocide apologist’ entirely designed to frighten and intimidate? She chooses to not mention and essentially glosses over it. So whilst she well knows it’s toxic and dangerous she equivocates. She weakly fixates on what it may say about the British State instead than the far more important matter of what it says about US politics and who has taken control – that a Billionaires Club has rode the back of grievances from the ‘many’ to gain power and have absolutely no intention of seriously addressing the inequalities that create those grievances. What it says about the British State is thank goodness it can’t happen here and that our national instinct is to be repelled by this sort of thing. That’s a strength we can be proud of.
What she should be starting to also say is ‘we’ve been had’. That they’ve ‘done the age old trick of sowing division and identifying scapegoats to throw us all off the scent of who’s really loaded the game in their own favour’. And that ‘perhaps I’ve played a small role in enabling it’.
Like the other day, you’re commenting on an article that doesn’t exist. Perhaps you’ll like to write one of your own.
Ya. If it wasn’t for billionaires like Musk et al, the British state would be hunky dory – ditto for Germany, France and the rest of Western Europe.
Who’s being scapegoated JW? The groomers and the rap1sts, wasn’t it the progressive enablers who scapegoated the girls? Looks like you’re the one that’s been had.
The primary villains in this sad saga are/were the policemen right at the bottom who failed in their duty – hardly a cadre of ‘progressive enablers’ but rather the very opposite.
JW loves to project, so I did some of my own. Now some people like to argue that since the election of New Labour the police have become politicised and they along with the councils thought it best to suppress the story, all for the sake of that magical multiculturalism.
indeed and it was misogynism and bigotry from the police involved against the poor that had them designate abused girls as ‘child prostitutes’.
This was no liberal woke bullshit but traditional reactionary prejudice.
nb there was ‘woke’ bullshit from some of the social workers involved clearly.
And that ‘perhaps I’ve played a small role in enabling it.
Isn’t that what you’ve been doing on here for weeks – trying desperately to change the subject?