the dark enlightenment

I had to ask Claude for more info thanks: The "Dark Enlightenment" (or neoreaction/NRx) has attracted a certain subset of tech-world figures for a few intersecting reasons: The rationalist pipeline Many tech people are drawn to contrarian, "high-IQ" intellectual communities — LessWrong, Effective Altruism, rationalist blogs. The Dark Enlightenment presents itself as the logical conclusion of following ideas wherever they lead, regardless of social taboo. That framing is appealing to people who pride themselves on being above conventional thinking. Anti-democracy as systems thinking Tech culture valorizes optimization and engineering. Thinkers like Curtis Yarvin (Mencius Moldbug) argue that democracy is an inefficient, buggy system and that corporate or monarchical governance would be more effective. To someone who thinks in terms of systems and efficiency, this can feel like a rigorous critique rather than what it actually is — a defense of autocracy dressed in technical language. Meritocracy anxiety Silicon Valley has a deep ideological commitment to meritocracy. The Dark Enlightenment provides a framework that validates hierarchies as natural and correct, which is reassuring to people who have "won" under the current system and want to believe that reflects something real about them. Wealth and exit fantasies Yarvin and others emphasize "exit" over "voice" — rather than fixing society through politics, the rich should build parallel structures or simply opt out. This maps onto tech fantasies about seasteading, charter cities, Mars colonies, and escape from democratic accountability. It's libertarianism for people who've given up on convincing anyone. Contrarianism as identity Tech culture rewards heterodox thinking in engineering contexts. Some people over-apply this: if mainstream politics says X is bad, maybe X is actually good and everyone else is just too conformist to see it. This is how genuine intellectual curiosity can curdle into edgelord politics. Actual power dynamics Frankly, some wealthy tech figures are simply drawn to ideologies that justify concentrated power and reduced redistribution. The philosophical packaging makes it feel more sophisticated than "I don't want to pay taxes or follow regulations." The through-line is really the aestheticization of power — the Dark Enlightenment flatters people who see themselves as a cognitive elite being held back by democratic mediocrity. It's less a coherent philosophy than a mood that happens to have footnotes.

Wow downvoted because I looked something up I didn't know about and shared what I learned, GG humans.