Techno-Oligarchs and the New Eugenics w/ Joel Kotkin

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On this edition of Parallax Views, urban theorist Joel Kotkin, author of The New Class Conflict and The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class, to discuss his provocative UnHerd article, "Beware the New Eugenics." Together, they explore how today’s tech billionaires and Silicon Valley elites are reviving dangerous eugenic ideas—not through government programs, but through cutting-edge AI, gene editing, cloning, and transhumanist ideology.

Kotkin argues that the new eugenics movement and posthuman-focused big tech, driven by figures like Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Sam Altman, and Ray Kurzweil, threatens core humanist values: democracy, family, religion, and human dignity. Rather than enriching culture and community, Big Tech promotes an anti-humanist, dehumanizing vision that sees people as superfluous beings to be optimized or replaced artificial intelligence or machines.

Key topics we discuss:

• Big Tech’s cultural impact in the Bay Area and beyond

• The bipartisan danger within Silicon Valley (as in: both on the "right" and the "left" worlds of big tech politically) of fetishizing technology over humanity

• Historical parallels with past ideologies that sought to engineer a “better” human

• Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, the "Pleasure Principle", and Silicon Valley today

• Curtis Yarvin, aka Mencius Moldbug, and the techno-oligarchic right-wing in Silicon Valley

• Silicon Valley's desire to replace workers

If you're concerned about the rise of AI, transhumanism, and tech-driven efforts to reshape society, this conversation is essential listening.

Additionally, Joel gives his thoughts on the state of media and why he writes for more conservative leaning outlets, his criticisms of Donald Trump and his 2024 op-ed "The Phony Populism of [Kamala] Harris and [Donald] Trump", knowing Trump's unsavory characteristics from being a New Yorker and how Trump ultimately thinks like a rich man, thoughts on Bernie Sanders, and more.