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It's so interesting to me that the whole "futurism" concept got co-opted into some sort of political propaganda machine. All the articles are negative hit piece

It's so interesting to me that the whole "futurism" concept got co-opted into some sort of political propaganda machine. All the articles are negative hit pieces, they're all reductive, they're almost all political in nature. I used to go on the futurism subreddit years ago and it's all the same there. You'd think "futurism" would be about .. promoting new technology, ushering in the future, you know .. futurism. Not just another political propaganda outlet.

jubilanti 22d ago
Futurism is a focus on the future. The future may be good or bad. Your desire to focus only on the upsides (for you) and not want to hear about the consequences, externalities, or dangers is one of the most "political" positions a technologist can have. Do you hate reading most science fiction? Because the ratio of dystopic to utopic scifi is pretty unbalanced.
- deleted 22d ago
  [deleted]
- kulahan 22d ago
  You could just say “no” - it would save a lot of space, be about as polite, and way less annoying. Sometimes people want to talk about science stuff without talking about human fallout and political implications. It’s perfectly fine to want an occasional break from those types of discussions.
  - ryandrake 22d ago
    Talking about "science stuff" without even mentioning the political and human implications is pointlessly incomplete. It's like trying to talk about a programming language without mentioning variables. Everything is human and everything is political. To pretend that it is not is, in itself, a political stance.
    - kulahan 22d ago
      Let's take the two pieces you put out there and just look at logical conclusions., because it's kinda hilarious to imagine you actually hold this actually-insane position. 1. Everything is political 2. Talking about something without mentioning political and human implications is "pointlessly incomplete" Topic: "Anyone wanna go swimming?" Normal people: "Sure." You, apparently: "Are you aware of how water is unequally distributed throughout the world? How can we possibly discuss swimming if we aren't willing to discuss the political fallout? This is pointlessly incomplete." Next panel, you're just researching local water table rights while everyone else is swimming and having fun
      - thrance 22d ago
        Nice strawman.
        kulahan 22d ago
        Nope, just showing how ridiculous it is to hold the position that everything is political. It's okay to just talk about things casually, dude. Chill out, it'll serve you well. If your position isn't that everything is political, don't say it is. If it is your position, this is perfectly in line with what you stated.
        thrance 22d ago
        Your strawman didn't show anything, except that you're unwilling to engage with other viewpoints in good faith and will immediately dismiss them as ridiculous instead of advancing actual arguments. Why should we be silent over the obvious political aspects of giving Musk more government contracts? Just to please you?
        kulahan 21d ago
        Why should you be silent about it? Because it’s not the topic. How is this SOOOO confusing and difficult for you? Do you not notice how annoyed everyone around you is when you desperately try to ram politics into every single conversation you have in life? Oh, you don’t really do that? You’re just being performative online? Got it.
- ralfd 22d ago
  That is a modern phenomena though. Classic scifi was optimistic and utopian. But today even Star Trek has to be bleak/gritty/depressing.
  - sharkjacobs 22d ago
    > Classic scifi was optimistic and utopian Yeah for sure, science fiction used to be optimistic and utopian, like Planet of the Apes, Brave New World, Frankenstein, 1984, Earth Abides, The Martian Chronicles, A Canticle for Leibowitz, The Time Machine, War of the Worlds, and Island of Dr Moreau, We, Farenheit 451 ...
    - dgellow 22d ago
      Forgot about We, I love that book
    - bodge5000 22d ago
      Great to see Island of Dr Moreau mentioned, people often forget about that but its one of my favourite books
  - bodge5000 22d ago
    Classic sci-fi was far from universally optimistic, it had more optimistic pieces than we do today but I'd still say on the whole it was more dystopia than utopia. Even for its own time, the original Star Trek was considered uniquely optimistic, though a large part of that is that its just much easier to write a good story where the setting itself provides the necessary challenges for a story to work, rather than an optimistic setting which rules out a lot of the usual challenges. Even Star Trek struggled, a good chunk of its stories are about encountering a race or civilisation without that utopia, turns out telling a good story without any conflict is pretty tough, especially a long running one. But it does more generally reflect how society views technology as a whole too. People are generally a lot more pessimistic about new tech now, myself included, we've seen time and time again how its used to control or squeeze us. There actually was a Star Trek episode, "The Game" (season 5, episode 6) about an addicting device you could compare to smartphones (though the device in Star Trek doesn't spy on you to sell your every move to advertisers, missed a trick there), and that certainly wasn't supposed to be an optimistic look at technology, so you can see why things have gone the way they have.
- modeless 22d ago
  Yeah, I hate modern science fiction. It's almost all terrible. Sci-fi written in the time of actual ongoing world wars and the Cold War's constant threat of instant nuclear annihilation was far more optimistic, and far more imaginative.
  - ethbr1 22d ago
    Read more solarpunk then?
  - sillyfluke 22d ago
    "imaginitive" is a more contentious adjective but The Martian, Project Hail Mary, and the Expanse seem on the optimistic side of the spectrum to me.
    - modeless 22d ago
      Andy Weir's stuff is great, the exception to the rule. I hadn't heard that about the Expanse, I guess I should check it out.
      - sillyfluke 21d ago
        just a warning - The Expanse is not competency porn like the Martian, more like political/military action in space.
  - gxd 22d ago
    If you don't mind the shameless plug, you may want to check my optimistic sci-fi visual novel: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3040110/Outsider/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/3040110/Outsider/ It's on sale now :).
- m463 22d ago
  I've wondered about that. Recently I have read fiction where someone discovers a spaceship/artifact/portal/alien/mcguffin/etc and then they... get the mcguffin, get more stuff, get the girl, win. The plot is just a straight line. they're boring. Although not a straight line, any superhero movie. they're predictable and therefore, boring. So I found the stuff that used to fill me with wonder, I shy away from. I don't want to watch another marvel hero. I kind of wonder if non-utopia scifi, with reality and struggles and character development... is that the good stuff? doesn't have to all be dark forest or enshittification++ though. I liked district 9 for instance.
api 22d ago
That’s just a microcosm of everything. The culture war ate the entire public discourse to the exclusion of practical concerns and even coherent ideas. It’s all vibes and tribalism and bashing the other tribes, while the tribes themselves become increasingly incoherent in terms of what (if anything) they really mean or stand for. I just turned it all off, though it makes me fear for the future. Feels like the early stages of societal collapse.
- XorNot 22d ago
  Okay but Musk himself deliberately and continuously uses his companies and wealth to participate in the culture war so it's no surprise it comes up when his companies do. He could switch off and stick to building rockets and electric cars. It's very easy (notionally) to just not post on Twitter.
  - api 22d ago
    Yes he does, and he’s also a social media addict. With X the alcoholic bought the bar.
- Hoasi 22d ago
  > Feels like the early stages of societal collapse. Strongly agree, there is hardly any intelligent discussions with diverging opinions left anymore. People are too deep into their own propaganda, agenda, and echo chambers. Peak bullshit is near.
- unknownfuture 22d ago
  Yeah you're right. Sci-fi has never included social commentary. Purely a modern "culture war" phenomenon...
root_axis 22d ago
Any particular issue you have with the content of the article?
Arodex 22d ago
>they're all reductive What is reductive in the richest man on Earth not paying his dues on time? What nuance, what depth do you think is needed here?
mandolingual 22d ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto_of_Futurism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto_of_Futurism It's always been political
- api 22d ago
  That’s Italian futurism, which was a specific movement. I think the term was being used more broadly here. Go find some Soviet space art, or mid century American “space age” stuff, or less dark forms of cyberpunk / cyber culture from the 80s and 90s. None of that is fascist yet all of it is popularly called “futurism.” I’ve even seen the term associated with solarpunk. As popularly used it means more or less the idea of trying to use human intellect to build or create something fundamentally new, or roughly that. It’s not a precise term more of a vibe.
  - mandolingual 22d ago
    Mid century American and Soviet space art had transparent political purpose, as does solarpunk. Futurism is rarely if ever just "it's the future, and that's neat!". It comes with the inherently political baggage of "We got from where we are to the glorious future, by way of (ideology)". Star Trek is a great example of this.
    - api 22d ago
      That could be said about everything including things usually not associated with futurism like romanticism. Everything carries at least a little political baggage. I was responding to what seemed like the implication that futurism was fascist.
- etc-hosts 22d ago
  Mussolini and other Italian inventors-of-Fascism figures were closely allied with the Futurism movement and Marinetti. https://www.booksontrial.com/mussolini-and-marinetti-a-timeline-of-the-futurist-fascist-alliance/ https://www.booksontrial.com/mussolini-and-marinetti-a-timel...
sillyfluke 22d ago
>It's so interesting to me that the whole "futurism" concept got co-opted into some sort of political propaganda machine. This was a very predictable outcome given the curcumstances. You forget to mention the guy who was the posterboy for futurism literally decided to turn himself into a political machine circa 2018 or thereabouts against half of the country, apparently triggered by his inablity to cope with his child transitioning and the bruising of his ego when NPCs on the internet made fun of him for failing where they succeded (the scuba diver pedo incident is one example). Prior to that, he was the second coming of Steve Jobs to the same cohort (pg even called him "Steve Jobs with no taste" on this forum at the time). Tech should be considered with its political direction (or lack of) to be deserving of adulation. The Cold War dictated the Apollo program for Christ's sake. The whole thing was saturated in politics. The difference is that most people were united for the cause. Believe me, if the people running the Apollo program declared war on half the country it would have been remembered and popularized quite differently. I'm sure Jewish German scientists had a reluctant admiration for whatever Wernher Von Brauhn was acheiving with the Nazi space program but it would be completely secondary to the fact that he was enabling the Nazi party to "win". No engineering feat could or should eclipse that fact. Regarding Tech without taking into account the direction it's pointed at is ridiculously naive, whichever side of the political spectrum you are on. It's not like Germany would have magically grown out of the Nazi party if only Von Braun kept on building cool shit.
tim333 22d ago
I had a look back at Futurism.com for nov 2017 when it started https://web.archive.org/web/20171123090521/https://futurism.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20171123090521/https://futurism.... top stories nov 2017 - science updates, asteroid mining allowed, battery advances top stories now (aug 2026) - Trump is crap, Musk is crap, Obesity drugs are crap Maybe just everything gradually gets taken over by political moaning over time?

jubilanti 22d ago

Futurism is a focus on the future. The future may be good or bad. Your desire to focus only on the upsides (for you) and not want to hear about the consequences, externalities, or dangers is one of the most "political" positions a technologist can have. Do you hate reading most science fiction? Because the ratio of dystopic to utopic scifi is pretty unbalanced.

deleted 22d ago
[deleted]
kulahan 22d ago
You could just say “no” - it would save a lot of space, be about as polite, and way less annoying. Sometimes people want to talk about science stuff without talking about human fallout and political implications. It’s perfectly fine to want an occasional break from those types of discussions.
- ryandrake 22d ago
  Talking about "science stuff" without even mentioning the political and human implications is pointlessly incomplete. It's like trying to talk about a programming language without mentioning variables. Everything is human and everything is political. To pretend that it is not is, in itself, a political stance.
  - kulahan 22d ago
    Let's take the two pieces you put out there and just look at logical conclusions., because it's kinda hilarious to imagine you actually hold this actually-insane position. 1. Everything is political 2. Talking about something without mentioning political and human implications is "pointlessly incomplete" Topic: "Anyone wanna go swimming?" Normal people: "Sure." You, apparently: "Are you aware of how water is unequally distributed throughout the world? How can we possibly discuss swimming if we aren't willing to discuss the political fallout? This is pointlessly incomplete." Next panel, you're just researching local water table rights while everyone else is swimming and having fun
    - thrance 22d ago
      Nice strawman.
      - kulahan 22d ago
        Nope, just showing how ridiculous it is to hold the position that everything is political. It's okay to just talk about things casually, dude. Chill out, it'll serve you well. If your position isn't that everything is political, don't say it is. If it is your position, this is perfectly in line with what you stated.
        thrance 22d ago
        Your strawman didn't show anything, except that you're unwilling to engage with other viewpoints in good faith and will immediately dismiss them as ridiculous instead of advancing actual arguments. Why should we be silent over the obvious political aspects of giving Musk more government contracts? Just to please you?
        kulahan 21d ago
        Why should you be silent about it? Because it’s not the topic. How is this SOOOO confusing and difficult for you? Do you not notice how annoyed everyone around you is when you desperately try to ram politics into every single conversation you have in life? Oh, you don’t really do that? You’re just being performative online? Got it.
ralfd 22d ago
That is a modern phenomena though. Classic scifi was optimistic and utopian. But today even Star Trek has to be bleak/gritty/depressing.
- sharkjacobs 22d ago
  > Classic scifi was optimistic and utopian Yeah for sure, science fiction used to be optimistic and utopian, like Planet of the Apes, Brave New World, Frankenstein, 1984, Earth Abides, The Martian Chronicles, A Canticle for Leibowitz, The Time Machine, War of the Worlds, and Island of Dr Moreau, We, Farenheit 451 ...
  - dgellow 22d ago
    Forgot about We, I love that book
  - bodge5000 22d ago
    Great to see Island of Dr Moreau mentioned, people often forget about that but its one of my favourite books
- bodge5000 22d ago
  Classic sci-fi was far from universally optimistic, it had more optimistic pieces than we do today but I'd still say on the whole it was more dystopia than utopia. Even for its own time, the original Star Trek was considered uniquely optimistic, though a large part of that is that its just much easier to write a good story where the setting itself provides the necessary challenges for a story to work, rather than an optimistic setting which rules out a lot of the usual challenges. Even Star Trek struggled, a good chunk of its stories are about encountering a race or civilisation without that utopia, turns out telling a good story without any conflict is pretty tough, especially a long running one. But it does more generally reflect how society views technology as a whole too. People are generally a lot more pessimistic about new tech now, myself included, we've seen time and time again how its used to control or squeeze us. There actually was a Star Trek episode, "The Game" (season 5, episode 6) about an addicting device you could compare to smartphones (though the device in Star Trek doesn't spy on you to sell your every move to advertisers, missed a trick there), and that certainly wasn't supposed to be an optimistic look at technology, so you can see why things have gone the way they have.
modeless 22d ago
Yeah, I hate modern science fiction. It's almost all terrible. Sci-fi written in the time of actual ongoing world wars and the Cold War's constant threat of instant nuclear annihilation was far more optimistic, and far more imaginative.
- ethbr1 22d ago
  Read more solarpunk then?
- sillyfluke 22d ago
  "imaginitive" is a more contentious adjective but The Martian, Project Hail Mary, and the Expanse seem on the optimistic side of the spectrum to me.
  - modeless 22d ago
    Andy Weir's stuff is great, the exception to the rule. I hadn't heard that about the Expanse, I guess I should check it out.
    - sillyfluke 21d ago
      just a warning - The Expanse is not competency porn like the Martian, more like political/military action in space.
- gxd 22d ago
  If you don't mind the shameless plug, you may want to check my optimistic sci-fi visual novel: https://store.steampowered.com/app/3040110/Outsider/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/3040110/Outsider/ It's on sale now :).
m463 22d ago
I've wondered about that. Recently I have read fiction where someone discovers a spaceship/artifact/portal/alien/mcguffin/etc and then they... get the mcguffin, get more stuff, get the girl, win. The plot is just a straight line. they're boring. Although not a straight line, any superhero movie. they're predictable and therefore, boring. So I found the stuff that used to fill me with wonder, I shy away from. I don't want to watch another marvel hero. I kind of wonder if non-utopia scifi, with reality and struggles and character development... is that the good stuff? doesn't have to all be dark forest or enshittification++ though. I liked district 9 for instance.

api 22d ago

That’s just a microcosm of everything. The culture war ate the entire public discourse to the exclusion of practical concerns and even coherent ideas. It’s all vibes and tribalism and bashing the other tribes, while the tribes themselves become increasingly incoherent in terms of what (if anything) they really mean or stand for. I just turned it all off, though it makes me fear for the future. Feels like the early stages of societal collapse.

XorNot 22d ago
Okay but Musk himself deliberately and continuously uses his companies and wealth to participate in the culture war so it's no surprise it comes up when his companies do. He could switch off and stick to building rockets and electric cars. It's very easy (notionally) to just not post on Twitter.
- api 22d ago
  Yes he does, and he’s also a social media addict. With X the alcoholic bought the bar.
Hoasi 22d ago
> Feels like the early stages of societal collapse. Strongly agree, there is hardly any intelligent discussions with diverging opinions left anymore. People are too deep into their own propaganda, agenda, and echo chambers. Peak bullshit is near.
unknownfuture 22d ago
Yeah you're right. Sci-fi has never included social commentary. Purely a modern "culture war" phenomenon...

root_axis 22d ago

Any particular issue you have with the content of the article?

Arodex 22d ago

>they're all reductive What is reductive in the richest man on Earth not paying his dues on time? What nuance, what depth do you think is needed here?

mandolingual 22d ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto_of_Futurism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manifesto_of_Futurism It's always been political

api 22d ago
That’s Italian futurism, which was a specific movement. I think the term was being used more broadly here. Go find some Soviet space art, or mid century American “space age” stuff, or less dark forms of cyberpunk / cyber culture from the 80s and 90s. None of that is fascist yet all of it is popularly called “futurism.” I’ve even seen the term associated with solarpunk. As popularly used it means more or less the idea of trying to use human intellect to build or create something fundamentally new, or roughly that. It’s not a precise term more of a vibe.
- mandolingual 22d ago
  Mid century American and Soviet space art had transparent political purpose, as does solarpunk. Futurism is rarely if ever just "it's the future, and that's neat!". It comes with the inherently political baggage of "We got from where we are to the glorious future, by way of (ideology)". Star Trek is a great example of this.
  - api 22d ago
    That could be said about everything including things usually not associated with futurism like romanticism. Everything carries at least a little political baggage. I was responding to what seemed like the implication that futurism was fascist.
etc-hosts 22d ago
Mussolini and other Italian inventors-of-Fascism figures were closely allied with the Futurism movement and Marinetti. https://www.booksontrial.com/mussolini-and-marinetti-a-timeline-of-the-futurist-fascist-alliance/ https://www.booksontrial.com/mussolini-and-marinetti-a-timel...

sillyfluke 22d ago

>It's so interesting to me that the whole "futurism" concept got co-opted into some sort of political propaganda machine. This was a very predictable outcome given the curcumstances. You forget to mention the guy who was the posterboy for futurism literally decided to turn himself into a political machine circa 2018 or thereabouts against half of the country, apparently triggered by his inablity to cope with his child transitioning and the bruising of his ego when NPCs on the internet made fun of him for failing where they succeded (the scuba diver pedo incident is one example). Prior to that, he was the second coming of Steve Jobs to the same cohort (pg even called him "Steve Jobs with no taste" on this forum at the time). Tech should be considered with its political direction (or lack of) to be deserving of adulation. The Cold War dictated the Apollo program for Christ's sake. The whole thing was saturated in politics. The difference is that most people were united for the cause. Believe me, if the people running the Apollo program declared war on half the country it would have been remembered and popularized quite differently. I'm sure Jewish German scientists had a reluctant admiration for whatever Wernher Von Brauhn was acheiving with the Nazi space program but it would be completely secondary to the fact that he was enabling the Nazi party to "win". No engineering feat could or should eclipse that fact. Regarding Tech without taking into account the direction it's pointed at is ridiculously naive, whichever side of the political spectrum you are on. It's not like Germany would have magically grown out of the Nazi party if only Von Braun kept on building cool shit.

tim333 22d ago

I had a look back at Futurism.com for nov 2017 when it started https://web.archive.org/web/20171123090521/https://futurism.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20171123090521/https://futurism.... top stories nov 2017 - science updates, asteroid mining allowed, battery advances top stories now (aug 2026) - Trump is crap, Musk is crap, Obesity drugs are crap Maybe just everything gradually gets taken over by political moaning over time?