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I'm eagerly awaiting the forthcoming geek poet who'll write our Howl. Who saw the best minds of our generation destroyed by startups... their skulls bashed open

by mbrock 11y ago

I'm eagerly awaiting the forthcoming geek poet who'll write our Howl. Who saw the best minds of our generation destroyed by startups... their skulls bashed open by a sphinx of capital... that moloch "whose mind is pure machinery... whose soul is electricity and banks!" http://genius.com/Allen-ginsberg-howl-annotated/ http://genius.com/Allen-ginsberg-howl-annotated/ Moloch in whom I sit lonely! Moloch in whom I dream Angels! Crazy in Moloch! Cocksucker in Moloch! Lacklove and manless in Moloch! Moloch who entered my soul early! Moloch in whom I am a consciousness without a body! Moloch who frightened me out of my natural ecstasy! Moloch whom I abandon! Wake up in Moloch! Light streaming out of the sky! Moloch! Moloch! Robot apartments! invisible suburbs! skeleton treasuries! blind capitals! demonic industries! spectral nations! invincible mad houses granite cocks! monstrous bombs! They broke their backs lifting Moloch to Heaven! Pavements, trees, radios, tons! lifting the city to Heaven which exists and is everywhere about us! Visions! omens! hallucinations! miracles! ecstasies! gone down the American river! Dreams! adorations! illuminations! religions! the whole boatload of sensitive bullshit!

saulrh 11y ago
http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/
- mbrock 11y ago
  Thanks. I'm a few paragraphs in. Yeah, the poem is powerful because Moloch is not only a stereotyped evil other. ("The capitalists.") We are Moloch. "Moloch whose name is the Mind!" Speaking personally and unprofessionally, I feel a grand loss of innocence from the time when as a dorky kid when I wrote Emacs Lisp macros for fun. I don't blame others, I don't blame "capitalism," I don't blame teh evil bankers. I simply want money so that I won't need money so that I'll be "free," just like everyone wants this. I do appreciate what David has been saying for years.
  - rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
    Capitalism is certainly worth blaming, at least for offering a lens to justify the deterioration of the global middle class. Essentially, the wealthy have come around to the idea as seeing the poor and middle classes and resources to be exploited, like a coal mine, by offloading their tax burdens onto them. The more people chafe under low pay and high taxes, the more easily they can be tricked into thinking the social support system is unsustainable and should be dismantled before people are taxed to death. People who created this mindset and let it fester know who they are. The rich who benefit stay silent. That's why this generation of CEOs who may be highly vocal about social issues tend to be conspicuously quiet about tax policy. For every Warren Buffett, there are a dozen post-exit founders who are happy to leave their capital gains tax rate where it is.
    - dragonwriter 11y ago
      > Essentially, the wealthy have come around to the idea as seeing the poor and middle classes and resources to be exploited, like a coal mine, by offloading their tax burdens onto them. "Come around to"? That's the central essence of capitalism, for which it was criticized by the socialists who put the name "capitalism" on it in the 19th century.
      - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
        Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the term "capitalism" originally coined as a synonym for "wealth" (and particularly conspicuous wealth)? The novelist who coined it was writing a satire, but its origin doesn't strike me as implying an intrinsic value judgment.
        dragonwriter 11y ago
        > Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the term "capitalism" originally coined as a synonym for "wealth" (and particularly conspicuous wealth)? I was referring to the socialist critics of the dominant system in the developed world of the 19th Century who introduced and popularized the use of "capitalism" it as a label for an economic system (who, seem to be first users of the term, though that's somewhat tangential to the main point I was making.) > The novelist who coined it was writing a satire, but its origin doesn't strike me as implying an intrinsic value judgment. Presumably, you are referring to W.M. Thackeray's use in The Newcomes in 1854, which is counted on Wikipedia, with reference to the OED, as the first known use of the word in English; this postdates the early use of "capitalisme" in French to refer to an economic system, and even known earlier uses in English of "capitalism" to refer to an economic system [1]. Thackeray's use is somewhat oblique, and there seems to be some discussion among people who care about these things whether it was about wealth per se or some kind of attitude or orientation toward wealth. But, in any case, his use isn't the first (even if it may have been original, not directly following the others) and is a tangent from the use of the term to refer to an economic system. [1] e.g., W. B. Greene, Equality, 1849. https://books.google.com/books?id=yCQ3AQAAMAAJ&q=capitalism#v=snippet&q=capitalism&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=yCQ3AQAAMAAJ&q=capitalism#...
gaius 11y ago
Jeff Hammerbacher: ‘The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads… That sucks.’

by mbrock 11y ago

saulrh 11y ago

http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/ http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/

mbrock 11y ago
Thanks. I'm a few paragraphs in. Yeah, the poem is powerful because Moloch is not only a stereotyped evil other. ("The capitalists.") We are Moloch. "Moloch whose name is the Mind!" Speaking personally and unprofessionally, I feel a grand loss of innocence from the time when as a dorky kid when I wrote Emacs Lisp macros for fun. I don't blame others, I don't blame "capitalism," I don't blame teh evil bankers. I simply want money so that I won't need money so that I'll be "free," just like everyone wants this. I do appreciate what David has been saying for years.
- rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
  Capitalism is certainly worth blaming, at least for offering a lens to justify the deterioration of the global middle class. Essentially, the wealthy have come around to the idea as seeing the poor and middle classes and resources to be exploited, like a coal mine, by offloading their tax burdens onto them. The more people chafe under low pay and high taxes, the more easily they can be tricked into thinking the social support system is unsustainable and should be dismantled before people are taxed to death. People who created this mindset and let it fester know who they are. The rich who benefit stay silent. That's why this generation of CEOs who may be highly vocal about social issues tend to be conspicuously quiet about tax policy. For every Warren Buffett, there are a dozen post-exit founders who are happy to leave their capital gains tax rate where it is.
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    > Essentially, the wealthy have come around to the idea as seeing the poor and middle classes and resources to be exploited, like a coal mine, by offloading their tax burdens onto them. "Come around to"? That's the central essence of capitalism, for which it was criticized by the socialists who put the name "capitalism" on it in the 19th century.
    - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
      Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the term "capitalism" originally coined as a synonym for "wealth" (and particularly conspicuous wealth)? The novelist who coined it was writing a satire, but its origin doesn't strike me as implying an intrinsic value judgment.
      - dragonwriter 11y ago
        > Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the term "capitalism" originally coined as a synonym for "wealth" (and particularly conspicuous wealth)? I was referring to the socialist critics of the dominant system in the developed world of the 19th Century who introduced and popularized the use of "capitalism" it as a label for an economic system (who, seem to be first users of the term, though that's somewhat tangential to the main point I was making.) > The novelist who coined it was writing a satire, but its origin doesn't strike me as implying an intrinsic value judgment. Presumably, you are referring to W.M. Thackeray's use in The Newcomes in 1854, which is counted on Wikipedia, with reference to the OED, as the first known use of the word in English; this postdates the early use of "capitalisme" in French to refer to an economic system, and even known earlier uses in English of "capitalism" to refer to an economic system [1]. Thackeray's use is somewhat oblique, and there seems to be some discussion among people who care about these things whether it was about wealth per se or some kind of attitude or orientation toward wealth. But, in any case, his use isn't the first (even if it may have been original, not directly following the others) and is a tangent from the use of the term to refer to an economic system. [1] e.g., W. B. Greene, Equality, 1849. https://books.google.com/books?id=yCQ3AQAAMAAJ&q=capitalism#v=snippet&q=capitalism&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=yCQ3AQAAMAAJ&q=capitalism#...

gaius 11y ago

Jeff Hammerbacher: ‘The best minds of my generation are thinking about how to make people click ads… That sucks.’