23 April

This is the delusion. That ‘the people’ run democracies. Or anything. The people is not a thing, groups of people of whatever size don’t think, act or feel. They are always led, they always form hierarchies. Not because they’re sheep, but because a group of people has no group mind or will or any physical, practical way of suddenly becoming one thing. Americans love this delusion, it’s a defining characteristic of their entire culture. It’s also the basis of social media, and why it’s destroying the world. It doesn’t occur to Americans that these beliefs actually created Trump. They instead run B-grade Hollywood movie narratives about ‘oligarchs’ and ‘fascists’ and ‘Nazis’ overthrowing the people. Study social media, a technology beloved of ‘the people’ believers, and you’ll see it’s actually structured in intense and proliferating hierarchies. The exact opposite to what those who use it say it does.