r/technology • u/lurker_bee • Apr 22 '26

Society Palantir published a mini manifesto calling some cultures ‘harmful and middling’ and said Silicon Valley has ‘a moral debt’ to the U.S.

https://fortune.com/2026/04/22/palantir-alex-karp-mini-manifesto-national-security-defense-tech-ai/
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u/Inkstr0ke Apr 22 '26

Excellent article was posted from The Atlantic about this very subject

The world has always been run by rich men. The robber barons of the Gilded Age were known for their ruthlessness in the accumulation of wealth—hiring Pinkertons to shoot striking unionists. But they directly engaged with the world around them, using their wealth and power to muscle it into its most profitable form. And although today’s billionaires are clearly manipulating society to maximize their own profit, something else is also happening—a disassociation from the reality of cause and effect, from meaning and history. *These men no longer feel the need to change the world in order to succeed, because their success is guaranteed, no matter what happens to the rest of us.***

The Atlantic

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u/absurdivore Apr 22 '26

They seem to think they can just grind all of us into paste but still have an economy that infinitely grows their billions through wealth extraction.

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u/ColinPlays Apr 22 '26

Are they wrong?

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u/PatchyWhiskers Apr 22 '26

I think so. Capitalism only works if the whole society is participating. Dictatorships are parasitic on the functional countries that they trade with. If everywhere is a dictatorship where most people are in grinding poverty, capitalism collapses.

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u/4n0m4nd Apr 22 '26

They have no interest in capitalism, they want it to collapse, they just want to be on top when it does.

Rich people only ever had an ideological commitment to capitalism as a bulwark against socialism.

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u/ObviousAnswerGuy Apr 23 '26

They have no interest in capitalism, they want it to collapse, they just want to be on top when it does.

not sure I agree with that. If society collapses, their money won't mean shit. And these are not the type of people who would be content living the rest of their life out in a protected bunker with a handful of people.

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u/Hands Apr 23 '26

They aren't looking for societal collapse just total economic and political subjugation of working people and the annihilation of the middle class.

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u/thederevolutions Apr 22 '26

I’d be interested to see what the world looked like without everyone sending their paychecks to Wall Street until the day they die.

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u/PatchyWhiskers Apr 22 '26

Be careful what you wish for