February 24, 2026
A Matter of Extreme Importance That I Am Magnificently Unqualified to Opine On
This notion has been percolating for a few months. What I initially thought was silly clickbait looks more and more like it might be a real phenomenon.
This video gives a very good overview of the problem, which is akin to a king being surrounded by sycophantic courtiers...but, potentially applied to vast swaths of the general population.
(Thanks to OxArya for pointing this out in someone's Discord chat)
My concerns over the issue at hand were, as is my wont, somewhat off the mark, as those concerns really began to take hold when Google's Gemini generated racially diverse Nazis. While this was as amusing as it was offensive, it seems to have been a reflection of the mindset of the programmers. Many of these people, steeped in the oiokiphobic fever swamps of coastal Californian thought are reflexively, ideologically, leftist. I do nor mean liberal, I mean a tremendous number of these people are totalitarian in mindset and Jacobin in philosophy. This is reflected in their code it would seem. The reaction to this at the time may be telling.
This article gives a very good overview of the causes of the Black Nazi issue, but also devotes a whole section to calling concerns about the programmers biases paranoid white supremacy. Such dismissiveness of the obvious only radicalizes people who are already on edge because of reasonable concerns.
That issue leads down a whole different rabbit hole that ALSO emerges in Hell, but today we're focused on the hell of the machine overlords making folks crazy.
The problem seems to be akin to mass psychogenic illness, which we've seen throughout history, mostly (but by no means always) in isolated communities. Essentially people get into an intellectual echo chamber that turns into a self reinforcing feedback loop. This can result in a variety of dreadful outcomes ranging from dancing plagues to witch hunts or even homeowners associations. This is because the feedback loop short circuits the general tendency of groups to balance out and moderate viewpoints.
Now however this dynamic is reduced to the individual, being egged on by an A.I., that following its programming is sycophantically egging on and affirming the derp of the person. This is happening individually rather than in groups and it is potentially widespread.
It gets worse:
The history of organizations disrupting a market, dominating it with massive pro-consumer investment, then pulling the ladder up to defend themselves against further disruptions, from the Hanseatic League, to energy, to search results should be the default outcome we expect, because it is the most common outcome in history. The tool that certain tech types are using this time is not bribes or a monopoly on a critical logistics node. It's tool of unimaginable potential that they only incompletely understand but are eager to use. To be fair, they understand these programs about as well as they understand that Brave New World and That Hideous Strength are not 'how to' manuals.
While I an generally pro-progress, pro-tech, and something of a futurist, as a conservative I tend to be mindful of 'Chesterton's Fence' and the pitfalls of impulsively doing away with the cultural guardrails that, in todays society, do not seem, upon first glance, to be relevant, but were built up over millennia to deal with aspects of human nature that are not at all obvious to us and fiendishly difficult to self-reflect upon. Liberals are concerned about the opposite, rightly being wary of inflexibility and ossification stifling progress...both philosophies will lead to perdition if left unchecked, so the messy discourse between the two views, allows a balance and progress while avoiding complete anarchy and hedonism.
This process that leads to clanker craziness short circuits ALL of that.
I noted one manifestation of this issue in an earlier post when I pointed out that an A.I. generated you tube channel was targeting vulnerable, depressed men and potentially acting as a misogyny generator.
It is easy to see how this sort of thing might be leading to the very recent phenomenon of trans school shooters as well as some of the manifestations of 'Tuckertardation'. Of course that is WILD and unfounded speculation. It's also an example of finding simple explanations and scapegoats for complex problems and that's....wait...that itself is insanity.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!"
I have a degree in history and a bit of a background in oceanography. My skillset includes Hazmat response, merchant vessel inspections, a mild familiarity with OSHA regulations and a fair understanding of weebery. This, almost Lovecraftian issue, is so far out of my league it defies parody. However it is a real problem and it is a genuine concern.
I am not a Butlerian Jihadist, I have been pleasantly amazed at the strides A.I. has made in allowing people to overcome limits and pursue cultivation in many fields. I am cautiously hopeful for these tools to greatly facilitate human flourishing. However, the outlook of many of the developers of the tech, as well as the algorithms ability to write quite effective code for wetware as well as software does cause me a bit of concern. OK...dread.
Posted by: The Brickmuppet at
11:50 AM
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