Twitter was the shining light of the priests of the #deathcult, and there liberal apologists, it was a “safe space” for our liberals to chatter about #mainstreaming and avoid the change and challenge we need to survive in the era of #climatechaos and the breakdown, that our 40 years of this worship has brought us. This has now changed to a much more direct hard right shift.
This has shifted with Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter (now X) which has shifted the platform’s political alignment and governance from this #deathcult worship to a more fascist path. It is easy to see that Musk’s ownership and decision-making have pushed this move toward authoritarian far-right ideologies.
Content moderation and policy changes, under #Musk, #X has made policy shifts on content moderation. These changes have allowed the platform to become a space where misinformation and extremist rhetoric proliferates. This shift to reduce oversight opens a space for echo chambers for polarized and extreme views.
Reinstating controversial hard right figures, this decision to reinstate previously banned accounts, including high-profile far-right figures and conspiracy theorists, has fuelled the shaping of the platform to support overt political agendas. This has bolstered the support for right wing politics, including Donald Trump, who was permanently banned from Twitter before Musk’s takeover due to incitement of the January 6 Capitol riot.
Public statements and affiliations, Musk’s public engagements and interactions have shifted to a hard right path. His tweets and public endorsements aligned with viewpoints and individuals who support right-wing and populist ideologies. This has led to that growing environment which subtly or overtly supports authoritarian and nationalist movements, the growth of fascism.
Fascism implies systematic oppression and state-level control, which is the outcome of his purchase of this one’s liberal social network. What can deferentially be said is that this is a partisan platform that is supportive of right-wing populism. And as can be seen with the election of Trump, it is being used to facilitating the growth of fascism in the USA and the wider world.
The current #mainstreaming paths are deeply embedded in capitalist structures, when looking at this critically, it reveals itself as a #deathcult, with the embodiment of unrestrained growth and consumption that runs counter to meaningful solution to #climatechange. While billionaires and corporatens may entertain the illusion of future-proofing their wealth and safety, the reality is more perilous than it appears to their narrow world views. Their greed fed opulence and influence can’t shield them indefinitely from a collapsing ecosystem that sustains all life, including their own.
At the heart of this is the inherent contradiction in capitalism itself: it requires perpetual growth to survive. This necessity for expansion is incompatible with the measures needed to mediate or stop #climatechaos. If growth halts, so does the economic machinery that upholds the current power structures, creating a destabilizing domino effect. While many might ask why those in power do not pivot to prioritize environmental preservation, the answer lies in the system’s relentless demand for expansion. Even if an individual capitalist—or a consortium—decides to scale back for the sake of long-term planetary health, the market will simply replace them with competitors who are more willing to pursue relentless profit, growth, and resource consumption.
The current path has a self-destructive logic, this paradox is why even billionaires who are conscious of the dire climate situation resort to insufficient and infective measures. They might fund green technologies and push for marginally lower carbon emissions, but the actions remain constrained by the underlying logic: protecting the continuity of capital. This capital-centric world-view can’t embrace the radical systemic change we actually need to avert ecological collapse.
Billionaires and the bunker illusion, the ultra-wealthy/greedy fuckwits, plan to retreat to their fortified bunkers and private, insulated zones once climate-induced chaos growes un medateable. While contingency plans do exist—high-tech shelters, land acquisitions in regions predicted to be less affected by climate change—these are temporary solutions. A world unravelling from the fabric of its ecosystems will not sustain even the most fortified enclaves indefinitely. Even if technology advances to the point of enabling space colonization, the timelines required for such ventures far exceed the immediacy of the crisis we keep pushing.
This is a systematic issue and we need a collective solution. Capital, the motivation and power for action, is not about individual capitalists but capital as an entity, the socio-economic phenomenon that exerts control over its arbiters. Capital needs infinite growth, prioritizing profit over sustainability and long-term human survival. Individual or even collective attempt to defy this logic and implement meaningful, planet-preserving strategies would be outpaced and outcompeted by others who align more closely with capital’s #stupidindividualism of ruthless greed is good.
This #KISS understanding underscores the distinction between idealist and materialist interpretations of the crisis. Idealists believe that with enough awareness and willpower, the system can change from within. Materialists, recognize that capital is a structure that acts beyond the control of any individual or organization. It functions like biological evolution: it values reproduction and expansion above all else, even when those traits are in the end destructive.
There is some room for corrective action within the existing system, but it’s inadequate. Policies to mitigate environmental impact, even when enacted, are slow and piecemeal. The issue isn’t that #mainstreaming decision-makers don’t understand the problem; rather, they don’t grasp the depth of systemic overhaul required to address it. The principles they consider immutable—the rules of modern economics and finance. The “common sense” is the problem.
The need for radical change, the #deathcult of mainstreaming, propelling growth and consumption despite ecological warnings, is locked in a dance with CAPITALS logic. While billionaires may fund clean energy startups and talk about sustainable practices, their wealth and the power structures they uphold are bound up in the unsustainable status quo. Change and challenge requires uprooting fundamental beliefs about how economies must operate, not just superficial adaptations. Until this realization is spread, capital will continue on its path, indifferent to the ruins it leaves.
Best not to be a prat about this, thanks.
Why Capitalism and Climate Change Solutions Are Fundamentally Incompatible
The urgent need to address climate change collides with an uncomfortable reality, as we outline capitalism’s foundational mechanics make meaningful climate action impossible. This isn’t a case of individual negligence but a systemic flaw. Capitalism, by design, prioritizes profit and growth, at the expense of long-term, collective concerns and environmental preservation.
Capitalism favours the greedy few who can maximize profits in the shortest timeframe. It’s a path where the most ruthless and nasty competitor prevails, setting the standard that others must follow or face obsolescence. This constant pressure means that if an individual capitalist or company recognizes the existential threat of #climatechaos, they cannot afford to act on it meaningfully without losing their competitive edge. For example, a corporation that decides to limit emissions at the cost of profitability will quickly be outcompeted by one that does not.
The logic of capitalism ensures that any significant deviation from maximizing short-term profit results in failure within the market. Thus, while some companies engage in “green” initiatives to pay lip service to sustainability, these efforts are superficial. They exist to placate public concern and leverage marketing advantages, rather than drive the needed systemic change. The myths are that capitalism, through innovation and competition, will solve climate change. However, capitalist solutions boil down to maintaining leverage and coercing others into action. For example, the race for green technologies like electric cars and renewable energy can be more about dominating a new market sector than reducing environmental harm. Elon Musk’s ventures into space and sustainable technology, hailed as forward-thinking, illustrate this principle. Space colonization and technological fixes reflect an expansionist mindset, a search for new “territories” to exploit as resources on Earth dwindle.
Capitalism’s path needs to push costs onto external parties, the public and the environment. The system relies on government-funded infrastructure and socialized costs, as seen with subsidies for oil companies, highway construction for the automotive industry, or public bailouts for corporations in crisis. When it comes to addressing #climatechange, this reliance on externalized costs becomes a liability. The climate crisis is a global “cost” that capitalism, left unchecked, will not address willingly. It requires collective action that contradicts capitalism’s individualistic and profit-driven paths. This is why capitalist markets require regulation by state or more importantly collective paths to function at all or sustainably, and even then, such measures face fierce resistance.
The automation age: how the nasty few plans to survive. The question whether billionaires believe they can weather the storm of #climatecollapse is complex. Many of them, seeing the unsustainability of infinite growth, look for exit strategies. This explains the investments in space travel, underground bunkers, and gated communities. The implication is stark: they believe their wealth will shield them from the mass suffering climatechange will bring. Automation adds another layer to this story. With machines replacing human labour, the exploiters envision a future where their economic power persists without the masses of real people, that’s you and me. This dystopian reality shows the detachment of capital from human and ecological concerns.
We currently face a failure of collective action. One of capitalism’s critical flaws is its inability to coordinate collective action without state intervention. While some countries have managed to decouple emissions from #GDP growth through advancements in service sectors and digital economies, this decoupling remains insufficient to meet the global targets needed for net-zero emissions. The system’s piecemeal and reactive approach cannot match the scale of planning required for real and needed climate action. Without a fundamental restructuring that prioritizes the collective good over private profit, meaningful progress remains an illusion and out of reach.
To make the #mainstreaming agenda more functional in an #openweb reboot, we need to address issues of inclusion, governance, and sustainable development while ensuring that the openweb embodies participatory paths. How do we do this?
Strengthen community governance decentralized and transparent decision-making by createing frameworks for governance that involve more voices from the grassroots, like the #OGB project. Tools based on federated models (like those used in the #Fediverse) empower people to participation in decision-making processes. Collaborative standards, working groups that draw from a mix of tech experts, community members, and non-expert voices to create paths that reflect collective needs rather than top-down dictates.
Develop a supportive ecosystem for builders with funding beyond the #fashernistas. Shift funding mechanisms toward projects that align with the values of the #4opens (open data, open standards, open source, and open process). This means supporting those who build with the public good in mind, not just flashy, trendy ideas, and tech fashions. Empower developers with a community focus by highlighting developing projects that prioritize #UX and community needs rather than tech novelty. Encourage #FOSS governance practices that are transparent and inclusive. Foster this inclusivity by bridging silos with cross-community dialogues, this can facilitate discussions that bring together different sectors of alt-tech, civic tech, and grassroots movements to cross-pollinate ideas and useful paths to take.
Ensure that platforms being built do not only cater to niche tech communities but are accessible and usable by the public, to focus on practical relevance. This helps to empower people to understand the importance of decentralized tech and how it benefits them directly. Thus helping to break down the barriers posed by the #geekproblem and demystifies participation in the openweb paths. A strong part of this is organizing hands-on workshops that engage people in contributing to and shaping the projects.
Accept that failures are part of the process. Instead of discarding what doesn’t work, use these experiences as compost—breaking down what failed and learning from it to build stronger initiatives. This plays a role in shifting cultural narratives to challenge and change the stores around the #openweb and wider #openculture to include cooperative problem-solving and mutual respect. Shifting the focus from tech utopianism to realistic, impactful change.
Build tech paths that are adaptable and capable of evolving with peoples needs and global conditions, including #climatechaos and socio-political shifts that are accelerating. A part of this is support for meany small tech paths that link and flow information and communities.
To reboot the #openweb to become a part of a shifting mainstream, we need to promote messy participatory governance, redirect funding to genuine, community-oriented projects, and champion inclusive, sustainable paths. The composting analogy emphasizes learning from past mistakes and continuously building resilient, inclusive solutions #KISS
The act of linking goes far beyond a simple convenience; it forms the backbone of an interconnected, accessible, and transparent internet. Yet, many people overlook its importance or misunderstand its role, especially when transitioning from #dotcons (corporate-controlled platforms) to #openweb environments. To sustain the promise of an open, people-driven internet, we need to recognize and actively engage with the practice of sharing non-mainstream links #KISS
Don’t feed the trolls, keeps coming to mind, when looking at the #X influx, this is like waves washing on the shore, be the shore not the wave.
The political power that Silicon Valley and Big Tech pushed over this election is a real #geekproblem threat, with the #dotcons leveraging technological and financial influence to shape society in ways that benefit the nasty few and undermine basic democratic paths we need to be fallowing in the era of #climatechaos
One way to take the path to balance this #mainstreaming mess making, is the need for active and healthy critiques of the lack of institutional support for #openweb projects and paths that focus on humanistic alternatives to these Big Tech platforms. The problem we need to mediate is that organizations theoretically supportive of democratic values, such as #NLNet and #NGI, sideline core “native” paths in tech as “too radical”, instead favoring safe narrow #geekproblem and #NGO tech paths which we know do not work. This is frustrating, and with the increasing authoritarianism spreading worldwide, its a part of the #deathcult we all worship.
The “geekproblem” in tech is about a set of challenges arising from the culture and mindset within technical communities, particularly around developers and engineers. It is associated with an overemphasis on technical solutions, insularity, and a tendency to prioritize technological efficiency or novelty over broader social and ethical considerations.
Overemphasis on Technical Solutions: People involved in tech prioritize creating or improving technical features while overlooking social impacts or peoples needs. This leads to “solutionism,” where every problem is assumed to have a tech-based answer, neglecting simpler, social, or policy-based solutions.
Insularity and Group Think: The tech world can be insular, with tight-knit subcultures that resist input from outside communities and dismiss perspectives that don’t align with technical paths. This leads to narrow solutions and a resistance to diverse perspectives, ultimately #blocking the social change and challenge we need.
Focus on Control over Collaboration: Tech communities are often defacto hierarchical, top-down in the paths of design and governance, leading to a “we know best” paths. This often alienates non-technical people and discourages cooperative and participatory input, making it hard to integrate open, community-based governance in to the narrow paths that are imposed.
Ignoring and Dismissing Social Issues: Focused on technical work overlook social issues the tech is supposed to be addressing and solving. By focusing only on engineering, they overlook who has access to the technology, who benefits from it, and what ethical implications it brings, perpetuating the disconnect between technology and the communities it made for.
Resistance to Broadening Perspective: Tech creators often actively resist moving beyond their own narrow areas of expertise and interest, they block ideas and initiatives that don’t fit within their immediate understanding, inhibiting growth and the needed experimentation. This resistance limits meaningful progress, community needs, and alternative technologies.
In sum, the #geekproblem stems from a blend of narrow technical focus, resistance to diverse input, and lack of attention to social impact. Addressing it involves building more inclusive, collaborative, and socially aware tech paths that embrace #4opens broader perspectives beyond the purely technical.
A century ago, Mussolini’s rise in Italy laid the blueprint for fascism, exploiting fear and weaponizing power to obliterate political opposition. Fast-forward to today, and #Trump’s rhetoric and promises echo this history of mess and lies leading to war. In the closing stretch of 2024, Trump’s agenda to use military force against political adversaries mirrors #Mussolini’s moves to consolidate control. Targeting “enemies from within,” Trump’s public calls to use force against officials is a direct echo of growing authoritarianism that brought the world to the brink of destruction in the middle of the 20th century.
If re-elected, Trump can invoke the Insurrection Act, deploying the military to target political dissenters. With #sycophants rather than protectors of democratic institutions in key positions, there are few to push back against this, much like Mussolini purged opposition from Italy’s Parliament and judiciary. Trump’s base becomes a modern-day paramilitary force, following his promises to pardon January 6 rioters and uphold them as martyrs. This rhetoric is reminiscent of Mussolini’s “black shirts,” who terrorized Italians into submission.
Mussolini’s unchecked power obliterated Italy’s democracy within three years, in the era of #climatechaos militarized politics will inevitably bring devastating consequences. If Trump is re-elected, the thread thin democratic safeguards are in jeopardy. The chilling lesson from history is that unchecked right-wing power corrupts. The current mess we call liberal democracy, is a poor defence of freedom, and history’s echoes warn us of the steep costs of complacency on this path.
We have already seen the mess that trump brings, let’s not repeat this history. Mussolini’s leadership in Italy was marked by glaring failures, with a historical consensus that he was an incompetent leader. Initially, he was a charismatic figure with an ability to mobilize the public, centralizing power and establishing a fascist state to “make Italy great again” he promoted a “modern” alternative to democracy and the “dark” path of communism. His early years in power saw a continues stream of propaganda, including infrastructure projects like roads and railways, which were more rhetoric than fact, this was about boosting national pride by expanding Italian “influence” rather than real benefit.
This failer of governance was quickly revealed, foreign policy blunders were particularly damaging: his decision to ally with Hitler and join World War II on Germany’s side resulted in disastrous military defeats, revealing Italy’s unpreparedness for prolonged conflict. His military leadership was marked by poorly planned invasions, such as those of Greece and North Africa, which ended in failure and stretched Italy’s resources thin. Furthermore, Mussolini failed to establish a self-sustaining economy capable of supporting Italy’s ambitions, leaving it dependent on German support during the war.
Domestically, Mussolini’s used violence to repression and silence dissent, this alienated the population over time, and his inability to foster genuine, stable economic growth led to widespread poverty and disillusionment. His propaganda machine masked Italy’s growing weaknesses, but as the war progressed, his lack of competent governance became undeniable. His removal from power in 1943 by his own #Fascist Grand Council underscored the loss of faith even within his ranks.
Historians agree that Mussolini’s appeal and ambition could not make up for his incompetence, poor judgment, and reliance on authoritarian repression, all of which led to his countries downfall and contributed to Italy’s suffering.
Does the US want to take the world down this path with Trump?
Reflecting on the last 40 years, it’s clear that the trajectory toward #climatechaos has been pushed by the entrenchment of corporate power and increasing capital-driven approach to global challenge. This era, the “neoliberal” era, normalized policies that favoured deregulation, privatization, and financialization. This shift didn’t just allow corporations to thrive; it redefined our social priorities, encouraging a culture where profit overshadows community and basic environmental welfare. These #deathcult worship have permeated public institutions and policies, making it harder for grassroots systemic change to take root.
The liberal majority, typically positioned between activism and power, has been to side with the “#mainstreaming” approach, which, while sometimes not as overtly destructive as corporate power, clearly lack the willingness to disrupt the status quo. These liberals express concern over climate change but favour “market-friendly” reforms that repeatedly fail to challenge or change the root causes of the #climatecrisis. This creates a paradox: despite their environmental concerns, they end up blocking radical changes. On the fluffy side, movements like Extinction Rebellion (#XR) and initiatives like the Open Media Network (#OMN) highlight how pushing this middle ground to support change—not just acknowledge it—is essential for challenging entrenched powers.
The OMN serves as an example of a shift from centralized, profit-driven platforms toward community-based, participatory paths. Unlike platforms that build on capital agendas, the OMN draws from grassroots energy and shared values, allowing it to organically support social goals. This shift is key: if OMN and similar #openweb initiatives grow, they’ll likely reflect their foundation—community engagement and shared purpose—versus the profit-at-all-costs paths.
While the liberal centre currently act as a buffer zone that resists necessary change, supporting projects like OMN can help reshape this middle ground by creating an accessible alternative to mainstreaming stories and corporate lies. In this sense, belief—especially in sustainable community-driven projects—becomes a tool for social transformation. And belief is crucial; without a sense of possibility, it’s easy for people to fall into cynicism and adopt the fear-based messaging spread by right-wing agendas
The challenge is to compost the “bourgeois struggle” between conflicting nasty interests by promoting grassroots, #4opens paths and projects that focus on cooperation, transparency, and community.
There is a divide in #FOSS between #openculture and #opensource that is becoming more visible and a significant tension today, with each movement originating from different perspectives on sharing and collaboration, even though they overlap in the broad mission of making knowledge and technology more accessible. You can see this in the AI debates and in grassroots “governance” in the #Fediverse and the issues this brings up as current examples. The differences are in focus and motivation:
Value path: Open Source focuses on the technical, structured development of software, with licences that ensure people can access, modify, and redistribute code. It tends to be practical, driven by the necessity to create robust, community-driven technology.
Open Culture, however, extends beyond software to include media, art, and knowledge. It centres around the idea that cultural paths—art, literature, music, and other media—should be freely accessible and adaptable by all. It values knowledge sharing in all forms, encompassing the ethical path that information and culture should be democratized.
Legal frameworks and licenses: Open Source relies on licenses like GPL, Apache, and MIT licenses that set clear boundaries on how code can be used and ensure that software modifications remain open. This fosters collaboration but also keeps contributions within a strong structured framework.
Open Culture, leans on Creative Commons (CC) licenses, which are more flexible in terms of content usage and address a broader range of creative and educational materials. These licenses vary widely, allowing authors to shape how much or how little freedom people have to use their contributions, which can lead to different interpretations of “openness.”
Open Source communities are more driven by practical needs and more standardized approach to governance, which function at times as gatekeeping and can be seen as restrictive by Open Culture advocates. There’s often an emphasis on the meritocratic and structured contributions, rather than the more mess cultural paths.
Open Culture communities are more fluid, valuing inclusivity, encouraging contributions from broader groups. This can create tension with Open Source projects that prioritize hard structured paths.
Today, we see this division in action with increasing calls from the Open Culture side for a more inclusive, less restrictive approach. Open Culture argue that #FOSS and Open Source can be rigid, excluding many types of cultural contributions and voices that don’t fit neatly into software development paths. Conversely, Open Source proponents view Open Culture as lacking in the clear boundaries that have shaped Open Source to work in structured technological development.
Bridging the gap: For #openweb projects, addressing this divide requires a path that respects both technical standards and the inclusiveness Open Culture calls for. Projects like #OMN and #4opens navigate this divide, building on community-driven networks where technical governance is balanced with cultural openness. Building tools that emphasize accessibility and collaboration—while being technically robust and community-driven—bridge the gap, aligning Open Source rigour with Open Culture’s inclusiveness.
To move forward, both communities benefit from dialogues focused on shared values, finding where their paths complement each other, but with clear strengthens and weakness to both paths. This issue is important as we confront the composting of #techshit and #dotcons and in the wider world the onrushing #climatechaos that all require technological, cultural, and social innovation.
#climatechaos, in twenty years, the global trajectory faces a grim reality, #geoengineering will have been attempted, driven by the need to stave off #climatecollapse while maintaining the capitalist path for the privileged. However, its effectiveness is questionable. Geoengineering operates on the linear logic of immediate technological fixes, while our climate’s complexity is non-linear and unpredictable. History already shows us unintended consequences from small-scale projects—scaling this up is akin to “the butterfly effect” on a colossal scale, with potential to worsen the current catastrophic mess.
Yes, wealthier segments might shield themselves better, accessing dwindling resources, while the majority face harsh impacts. Social divides will deepen as flooding, heatwaves, and storms intensify, and resources become scarcer. Meanwhile, the systemic #blocking of an anti-capitalist movement holds back the needed radical shift, despite our obvious evidence of human adaptability, creativity, and resilience.
This uncertain reinforces that geoengineering is a temporary measure at best. Without shifting away from capitalist consumption, we repeat the cycles of hasty, inadequate fixes that worsen catastrophic global and local outcomes. If adaptation and ingenuity, common in human nature, can be shifted toward systemic change, we avoid more destructive paths and lay a foundation for humanistic paths.
I understand people’s frustration. We’ve been working for decades at the forefront of social and environmental activism, particularly in the realm of tech, aiming to create change through initiatives like the #4opens and the #OMN. It’s clear that we’re addressing serious, fundamental issues—especially around how the #openweb has been captured by corporate interests with people’s use of the #dotcons.
People might misunderstand the path as less serious because they don’t grasp the depth of the critique or are overwhelmed by the complexity of the issues. They may also be caught up in their own perspectives, pushing back against ideas that challenge their comfort zones and #blinded entrenched interests.
We’re offering a radical, long-term solution to counter the #deathcult of neoliberalism and environmental collapse, yet people all too often mix up urgency and extremism. The good faith we’re extending in these discussions—despite resistance—shows we are dedication to finding real, grounded solutions, instead of surface-level fixes.
Maybe framing the conversation with clearer, step-by-step plans for practical actions might help open a few people’s eyes from their self-inflicted blindness to see the gravity of the situation without dismissing it as “too radical” or “not serious.” We are, after all, pushing for both radical and liberal coalitions to confront the massive issues of #climatechaos, #openweb, and our very real lack of collective future.
As ever, stay strong, it’s through persistence and clarity that we’ll navigate past the mess-making and onto the real work that so urgently needs doing.
The path I am advocating is rooted in a few core principles: a return to grassroots governance, prioritizing community-driven technology, and composting failed ideas for new growth. To enable this, we need to develop tools and frameworks that uphold transparency, empower collective action, and keep the focus on sustainable, open alternatives.
I believe to try and balance much of the current mess, people should focus on grassroots activism and building alternative systems to combat the current social, ecological, and technological mess. With a strong emphasis on open processes (#4opens), fostering collective action, to challenge the #neoliberal status quo (#deathcult) through direct engagement, rebooting independent media, and creating sustainable, community-driven alternatives to #mainstreaming structures. The path is to reclaim agency and work toward positive, systemic change from the grassroots up.
I am thus critical of #NGOs and #mainstreaming paths, as they often compromise their radical potential by seeking funding and approval from larger institutions and establishment hierarchies. This to oftern leads to co-optation and dilution of grassroots values of “native” paths, turning them into tools for maintaining the status quo rather than challenging it. We need to actively resist this corruption and ensuring that alternative, community-driven projects can thrive without becoming fatally entangled in mainstreaming mess.
I have extensive experience navigating radical activism and grassroots media projects. Having been involved in open technology movements, such as #Indymedia and #OMN (Open Media Network) and more recently the Fediverse and ActivityPub movement, emphasizing trust-based, DIY approaches. Thus, the critique of the #NGO sector for undermining radical efforts through the influence of funding and institutionalization, having witnessed how NGO paths often lead to stagnation or failure. In reaction to this, the creating and championing of decentralized solutions that remain faithful to their grassroots origins while resisting co-optation by the #mainstreaming.
My #boatingeurope life reflects a life outside the #mainstreaming, a simpler”native” more sustainable #DIY lifestyle, away from the chaos of every day #deathcult worship. Living on the water is a metaphor for self-reliance, resilience, and independence, while offering life connected with nature. The lifeboat is a metaphor for #climatechaos, I sailed away ten years ago, after campaigning agenst #climatchange and ecological destruction for 20 years, continuing the path to live outside conventional structures, a little away from the stress of activism. However, the world is round, so have since returned, re-engaging with tech activism, a remainder that retreat won’t solve the broader systemic issues facing the world and the people that live in it
I see a core tension between alternative cultures and the mainstream: the mainstream demands that alternative cultures conform in order to be effective, while the alt paths intentionally resist this push, aiming to remain distinct and radical. This clash creates a deeper issue—#mainstreaming voices tend to block and reject the need for a bridge between these two spaces. The failure to recognize the importance of building such bridges leads to division and stagnation, perpetuating the current social and political mess. The root problem lies in “common sense” blocking and an intolerance toward the very idea of bridging these divergent paths, hindering progress from both sides.
There’s a pervasive and damaging cycle in activist and alternative communities that we need to recognize and break, the victimhood narrative. This is not about dismissing genuine struggles or the real problems we face (and let’s be clear, we all have these in abundance on alternative paths). What I’m talking about is the deliberate use of victimhood as a tactic, a card played to push an agenda or gain sympathy at the expense of collective progress.
When someone plays the victim card, it sets off a feedback loop. Others pick up on this narrative, and whether they mean to or not, they reinforce it. Before long, the person who played the card becomes trapped in their own creation. They become victims of the very narrative they set in motion. Those who latch onto this story to push their own agendas also fall into the trap, ultimately damaging the causes they claim to support.
This tactic does more harm than good. It doesn’t address the actual issues we’re facing; instead, it creates a toxic distraction that undermines real work that we need to do. By focusing on the victim narrative, we lose sight of the bigger picture, the subjects we should be addressing with urgency and clarity.
Let’s stop and think. Let’s step away from this destructive loop. We need to be clear about the real issues and not allow this negative narrative to cloud our judgment and derail our efforts.
Please, don’t reinforce this mess.
On the other hand, there are real victims, but these people aren’t playing card games, recognizing the difference should not be so hard for people.
The process of challenging this mess making runs into the #mainstreaming of safety culture, we can reflect on Douglas Gwyn’s famous quote about Unix:
“Unix was not designed to stop people from doing stupid things, because that would also stop them from doing clever things.”
This is a powerful insight into the dangers of blinded regulation and unthinking control in tech and social paths. The quote speaks to the value of bindings of strong #4opens process in design, which allows for creativity, experimentation, and the change and challenge we need to build trust, yes there is the cost of occasional mistakes it’s a price we pay for taking this path.
Safety culture, particularly as it gets pushed into more regulated, closed systems, stifles the our humanistic experimentation we need to tackle the challenges ahead. The push to make everything safe, moderated, and controlled risks, creating paths where nothing truly transformative can happen. It feeds into the #mainstreaming#deathcult path of conformity, where other paths are sacrificed for the sake of avoiding “mistakes”.
By maintaining an #4opens process, as with Unix, we create spaces where people are allowed to fail and, in doing so, come up with new solutions, something that’s becoming more and more vital in the context of our ongoing struggles against #climatechaos, #dotcons dominance, and other meany systemic issues we face.
We need to balance this tension between safety and creativity, recognizing that without the latter, we inadvertently push the very problems we’re trying to solve.
To get past people being lost and thus pointless, It’s useful to frame left and right as driven by fundamental emotional motivators—fear for the right and trust for the left, a way to cut through the complexities of political debates. This lens highlights how cycles of fear perpetuate control-oriented agendas, while trust foster openness and collaboration. It’s a powerful way to step outside the immediate mess, recognizing the #KISS dynamics at play.
Do you think this could be used to influence current #openweb projects and the paths they take amidst #mainstreaming pressures?
For people who focus on working with the #dotcons there are meany traps, and a lot of dead-ends. This is less of an issue for people fighting them, the problem here is “common sense” #blocking this second path which is a much less lucrative and a thank less task. So we will continue to have more people on the first path. A post that grew from a toot seed, I wonder if Mastodon is to Meta what Firefox once was to Google a small but significant project that big corporations can point to whenever regulators start murmuring about monopolies.
In the early #openweb days, #Firefox was seen as the open-source challenger to the #dotcons of Internet Explorer and later Google Chrome. The NGO #PR represented it as a scrappy, independent alternative, championing the openweb against the increasing dominance of corporate-controlled browsers. But over time, and a lot of funding, Firefox became a tool for companies like Google to gesture toward whenever their monopolistic practices were questioned., “Look, there’s competition! We’re not the only game in town.” The blotted NGO that Firefox became, let the dotcons who funded them, maintain the appearance of a healthy, diverse internet while consolidating power and control.
Today, Mastodon, the corporation, and new NGO projects like the #SWF are likely, unthinkingly, to end up playing a similar role for Meta (#Failbook). With #Meta’s monopoly and influence across social media, platforms like Mastodon offer a symbolic counterpoint. The wider #Fediverse, decentralized, federated model, the alternative “nativist” path, that rejects the data-harvesting, surveillance capitalism model perfected by Meta and the rest of the #dotcons. But in a world where Meta dominates user attention, advertising dollars, and social engagement, the existence of Fediverse when we push #NGO agenda, as people will, like most people did with Firefox could feel more like a token gesture toward competition than a real threat that it needs to be.
The danger on the NGO paths is that Mastodon, and the Fediverse becomes a shield for Meta, just as Firefox was for Google. With the regulators knocking, Meta points to Mastodon and say, “See? There’s healthy competition in the market.” Meanwhile, our grassroots #DIY path will continue to struggle with the challenges that come from operating, outside the #mainstreaming, on the margins, limited resources, scalability, and the constant threat of being drowned out by the sheer weight of the dotcons inflow into our grassroots #openweb reboot.
The truth is, while #4opens decentralized paths like Fediverse are vital to the change and challenge we need, not to mention keeping the spirit of the #openweb alive, they’re still pushing hard for space in a corporate-dominated internet. If we only take the #mainstreaming and NGO path, the existence of projects could be used by the dotcons to maintain their monopoly while paying lip service to “competition.”
The question, can we really afford to be only the ‘token alternative’ when the stakes are so high? Or do we need to find a way to build native projects that not only stands apart from the #dotcons, but also changes and challenges them on equal ground? It’s time to think beyond being the counterculture, and start focusing on how we grow and sustain real #4opens alternatives. If we don’t, if we cop out on #fluffy only paths, there is a danger that we’ll just keep serving as convenient props in mainstream monopoly charade.
Let’s try very hard not to be irrelevant in the fight for humanity and ecological sustainability in the era of #climatechaos and social brake down being pushed by the #mainstreaming mess making, we are composting.
The #openweb, a partnership, not a nasty walk over
