The Treachery of Technofeudalism

“Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards.”

― Aldous Huxley, Ends and Means

We cannot lose the Sword of Damocles and after November 5th we’ll know whether or not we have succumbed to this ultimate misfortune if Donald Trump is not elected.  

If you’re not familiar with the origin of the Sword of Damocles I’ll take a moment to explain the significance as it’s extremely valuable to you, your family, your friends, your neighbors, and every potential friend that you may ever meet. 

The famed Sword of Damocles is a moral parable that was made famous by the Roman philosopher Cicero in 45 B.C.. In his book Tusculan Disputations his tale centers on Dionysius II who happened to be a tyrannical king who ruled during the fourth and fifth centuries over the Sicilian city of Syracuse. 

Dionysius was a very rich and powerful man, however despite this fact he was a very unhappy individual. The fact of the matter was that because Dionysius was a tyrant he had racked up quite an enemy’s list of opposition which always occupied his thoughts and always kept him looking over his shoulder. 

Dionysius was so tormented by his fear of being assassinated that he slept in a bedchamber that was surrounded by a moat and he only allowed his own daughters to shave his beard with a razor as he didn’t trust anyone else to get that close to him.   

As Cicero tells the story the tyrant king’s dissatisfaction came to a head one day when a court flatterer named Damocles took it upon himself to shower the king with compliments and made remarks about how great and blissful the king’s life must be. 

However when Dionysius heard this he was annoyed and he posed a question by asking Damocles that if he believed his life was so great then “Do you wish to taste it yourself and make a trial of my good fortune?” 

After Damocles agreed to this trial Dionysius seated him on a golden couch and ordered a host of servants to wait on him. Damocles was spoiled and treated to the best cuts of meat and he was showered with the best perfumes and treated with the best ointments of the time. 

Damocles couldn’t believe his luck, but just as he was getting into the groove of enjoying himself by living the life of a king he noticed that Dionysius had hung a razor-sharp sword from the ceiling directly above his head. As if the presence of this sword wasn’t disturbing enough, what made it even worse is that it was only hanging by a thin single strand of horsehair.

After experiencing this new realization from then on the courtier was in fear of his life which made it impossible for him to enjoy the feasts and the ongoing luxury of having servants to wait on him hand and foot. After the agony of nervously glancing up at the blade on numerous occasions Damocles asked to be excused as he no longer wished to be as fortunate as he perceived the king to be. 

For Cicero this tale involving Dionysius and Damocles represented the idea that those in power always must labor under the specter of anxiety and death. In short, the lesson to take away in this scenario is that because of these circumstances, no one can find happiness who is under such constant apprehensions. (Source: History)

Convenience

Now I want to take a moment to shift gears and to look at another modern day scenario. As you’re reading, or listening to this episode you have the ability to either scroll your Facebook feed, or order your next meal through DoorDash all from the touch of your fingertip probably on the same electronic device you’re using to listen to this very podcast.  

This is certainly a readily available convenience of life that you and I are able to take advantage of due to the technological advancement of our society these days. Of course, the readily available convenience of such things doesn’t come without a little bit of work, at least in the beginning. 

I mean I don’t know about you, but every single time I decide to try to use a particular service through an online site, or app I always have to create an account with a username and a password. Like you I have so many of those accounts I had to create an organized notepad with all of the login information of every single one of these accounts just so I can get back into the account of my choice should the need arise again. 

I personally am not a fan of Amazon from the standpoint of having worked on the seller side of the site in addition to understanding how destructive the company is to the overall fabric of our economic system and to small businesses. However, I have shopped on Amazon in the past and with a functioning Prime account I understand just how careful I need to be in terms of where I click because it’s extremely easy to place an item into the cart, have it ordered, and shipped with what seems like a single unnoticed click sometimes. 

It’s insanely easy to order stuff off of Amazon and because Amazon has gotten so big and so efficient at handling orders, the headache involved with customer returns, and the ever challenging tasks of customer efficiency the popularity of the site has grown strictly due to the convenience they’ve worked to provide for the consumer. 

However, as we’ve learned in the last few years convenience isn’t necessarily a good thing. There is a very large and dangerous price for convenience as well. After all, I’d rather put up with a little bit of inconvenience than have a select few big tech companies grow to the point that they can corner an entire market for providing the majority of goods to society while putting small businesses through the wringer. 

This is especially troubling to see while understanding that most every single one of those small businesses are already struggling trying to figure out how to make it in a horrible stagflationary economy. The big tech corporations have the manpower, resources, and lobby to influence the power players in Washington D.C. to their benefit all the while the mom and pop store get railroaded by a weakened dollar, a lethargic economy, and endless tax and bureaucratic compliance that just keeps squeezing and squeezing every last drop of blood out of the American entrepreneurial body. 

This environment has stifled economic growth, disincentivized the entrepreneurial spirit, and has resulted in the single biggest transfer of wealth to these giant companies from the pandemic that the world has ever seen.