Yarvin is a cheerleader for “neocameralism,” a system where states operate like corporations, prioritizing efficiency and governance by technocrats or capable leaders rather than elected officials
Meet Curtis Yarvin: whose seemingly crazed ideas have found fertile ground among technocrats and oligarchs who have never quite shaken entitled Ayn Rand’s “greed is good” sensibility.
Essentially, the guy wants the world to be run by smart CEOs commanding Corporate States. It is a form of National Socialism without the pollution of the socialism.
Yarvin began “life” as a software developer with desires to be so much more, and what better way to attract attention than to go way-out-loony. So, in 2008 — not kidding — he proposed a paean to Soylent Green, suggesting a “humane alternative to genocide” to wit: convert unproductive folks to biodiesel where they could be used to power various modes of transportation in Silicon Valley.
When hell broke loose, he wisely backtracked and said — hahaha, just kidding— it was all a big joke.
But was it?
His blog, “Gray Mirror,” offers dense insights into his philosophy. Not easy to digest but if you have the time and focus, it does reduce itself to a critique of modern governance and social structures through a lens of historical and philosophical analysis. Yarvin, or Mencius Moldbug if you prefer, argues that contemporary democracy and political systems are fundamentally flawed. His advocacy of more authoritarian forms of governance falls lockstep into the activities of historical examples from Caesar to Hitler and, currently, to Hungary’s Orbán.
According to Mencius: strong leader = stability and order. Well, as history has demonstrated in the first two examples, this can be finite. For Orbán? That remains to be seen.
But what would an activist sort of philosophy be if you cannot find those who will put it into practice?
Well, for Mencius, along came the dynamic duo of tech billionaire Peter Thiel and the current Vice President, J.D. Vance, both of whom became fans.
During the first Trump administration, Mencius was involved in a 2017 celebration organized by his publisher, Erudite Press, and attended by various figures within the neo-reactionary and alternative right circles. Within these groups there was an excitement that a changed political terrain would provide new opportunities for a shift in political power and ideology.
But that would have to wait eight years…Now Mencius stands poised to see at least some of his ideas put into practice.
And, pray tell, what are some of his ideas?
His Gray Mirror matrix takes you down an ontological rabbit hole highlighting how political ideologies can distort reality and perpetuate dysfunction. His love of “elites” takes you into the broader neo-reactionary movement, which promotes the idea of a return to traditional hierarchies and monarchies as a solution to the perceived failures of modern democratic states.
Mencius posits that political order and stability should take precedence over the ideal of political freedom. He believes that, in unstable environments, the desire for freedom can lead to chaos and, thus, a strong leader or governing body is necessary to maintain order.
Mirrors, as I am sure Mencius knows, often embody the concept of duality, representing the internal versus external self. It is a theme prevalent in psychological and existential art, where artists explore the complexities of human nature, identity and the human experience.
Artists from Titian to Dali often played with mirrors to create dramatic effects and a sense of theatricality. In the 20th century, surrealist artists like Salvador Dalí and René Magritte used mirrors to delve into psychological themes and the subconscious. Mirrors became symbols of distorted perception, exploring the nature of reality and illusion. Dalí’s famous “The Persistence of Memory” features reflective surfaces that challenge the viewer’s understanding of time and space.
So, let’s mirror what is going on in the cranial corners of Mencius’s mind?
In short:
One of Mencius’s notable concepts is “The Cathedral,” which he uses to describe the coalition of institutions — media, academia, and the state — that propagate a progressive ideology. He argues that this coalition shapes public opinion and policy in ways that reinforce its own power, often at the expense of alternative viewpoints.
Mencius posits that political order and stability should take precedence over the ideal of political freedom. He is a cheerleader for “neocameralism,” a system where states operate like corporations, prioritizing efficiency and governance by technocrats or capable leaders rather than elected officials.
He has attached himself to the influential far-right neo-reaction (NRx) movement: “Dark Enlightenment.” Giving props to the superiority of dictatorships, he pushes the idea of dissecting governments and transforming them into smaller units called “patchworks.” Patchworks, according to his thinking, would be dominated by tech corporations.
“The basic idea of Patchwork is that, as the crappy governments we inherited from history are smashed, they should be replaced by a global spiderweb of tens, even hundreds, of thousands of sovereign and independent mini-countries, each governed by its own joint-stock corporation without regard to the residents’ opinions,” “Patchwork: A Political System for the 21st Century.”
Now it gets real Harry Potter with tech wizards trying to extinguish the light via clever use of their dark powers. The denizens in the patches could do what they liked but if the overlords were not pleased could easily unalive said residents. As a sovereign entity not beholden to any legal, regulatory or state system, they could, according to Mencius, get away with murder
Ruling over each patch would be a “realm,” i.e., a corporation with absolute power. My hands-down favorite — realm wise — is “Friscorp.” A San Francisco patch overseen by a Philip K. Dickish surveillance system which would require residents to carry Radio Frequency Identification Cards (RFID). [These cards use electrmagnetic fields to identify and track targets] Folks would be genotyped and iris-scanned. Movements anywhere and everywhere would be monitored.
NOTE: For more on this check out my previous CovertAction Magazine piece — ”Old Documents Reveal Roots of Modern-Day American Surveillance State” — where I detail how some of this technology — ubiquitous in China — has been employed by the NYPD.
Mencius reminds me of those intellectual outcasts at my high school — Brooklyn Tech — who thought they were too cool for school, all Napoleon Dynamites who harbored a “brilliance” they hoped would soon be embraced by the world. They were legends in their own minds.
The Mencius spin on humankind is obviously fascistic; it reverses a reality of the world Ursula Le Guin reveals in her anarchist novel, The Dispossessed.
To sum up: Mencius believes that political elites will see the path he has mapped out as a highway to infinite everlasting power (and, by extension, endless riches).
While Mencius denies that he is a white nationalist, critics have pointed out that his writing has delivered praise about some (“I’m not allergic to the notion”) and, furthermore, he does not seem to think slavery was so bad (as he told David Marchese in The New York Times).
It was Peter Thiel who provided the river down which Mencius could float his dark philosophy. In fact, he was soon labeled the “house political philosopher” of “Thielverse,” a group of sycophants offering fealty and support for the billionaire. Rewarding Mencius Thiel invested in Tlön, a 2013 software start-up he co-founded. By 2016 Mencius was whooping it up at Thiel’s election night victory party celebrating Trump’s first victory.
Vance sucked up the Mencius philosophy but has not gone all-in with the Patches cum Realms plan. However, in a 2021 podcast interview, when asked about some of the ideas being popularized prior to Trump’s re-entering the presidential race—including how to deal with liberals—Vance responded, “De-Nazification, De-Baathification…I tend to think that we should seize the institutions of the left. And turn them against the left. We need like a de-Baathification program, a de-woke-ification program.”
Looking back at some of the great literary works of dystopia—say, Jack London’s Iron Heel and Sinclair Lewis’s It Can’t Happen Here—the latter, no doubt, has been confirmed and the former, no doubt, may follow.
With Elon now dancing at his own fascist rave—rewriting a past that led the world through a brutal apocalypse—there is no doubt where this might be heading. Trump—to the chagrin of members of his own party—giving blanket pardons to the J-6 gang has responded by empowering his own Praetorian Guard, brown-shirt style. Daresay, Neo-Nazis the world over loved it!
For my sarcastic friends and colleagues, yes, some of Mencius’s dreaming may seem to have been birthed over shots of absinthe, bloviating with fellow writers at an 18th century Parisian salon.
But — as we say in martial arts — never underestimate your opponent’s style and, for the current group in power, they may shortly take off the gloves and dispense with any adherence to Marquess of Queensberry Rules.
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About the Author
Joel Sucher is a co-founder of Pacific Street Films (together with Steven Fischler) and has written for a number of platforms including American Banker, In These Times, Huffington Post and Observer.com.
Joel can be reached at Pacific Street Films.
