{"id":38904,"date":"2025-01-19T13:30:07","date_gmt":"2025-01-19T21:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=38904"},"modified":"2025-01-19T13:51:19","modified_gmt":"2025-01-19T21:51:19","slug":"i-knew-one-day-id-have-to-watch-powerful-men-burn-the-world-down-i-just-didnt-expect-them-to-be-such-losers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2025\/01\/19\/i-knew-one-day-id-have-to-watch-powerful-men-burn-the-world-down-i-just-didnt-expect-them-to-be-such-losers\/","title":{"rendered":"I knew one day I\u2019d have to watch powerful men burn the world down \u2013 I just didn\u2019t expect them to be such losers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Rebecca Shaw<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thu 16 Jan 2025 (TheGuardian.com)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg\u2019s desperation to be cool as they suck up to Donald Trump is so cringe it makes my skin crawl.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Mark Zuckerberg is a different kind of cringe \u2013 but cringe all the same. His cringe moments drip through more sparingly but, when they do, my body tries to turn inside out at my bellybutton,\u2019 Rebecca Shaw writes. Photograph: Bloomberg\/Getty Images<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t know if anyone else has noticed this but everything seems to be going down the tubes quite fast. And not fun tubes, like at a waterpark. The \u201cending in shit\u201d kind. The issues are complicated, the reasons diverse, but there are a few culprits who have been making themselves extremely visible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alongside those holding political office, tech gragillionnaires (I had to invent a new number) like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg<\/a> obviously wield huge global influence with their computers and numbers and whatnot. There has been a lot written about them and there will be more, as they continue to shape the world and win favour with Donald Trump. Big, scary, probably ruinous things lie ahead. But I\u2019m here to discuss the smaller part. The insult to injury, the sprinkling of salt in the wound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether I am engaging with the news, or with Musk tweeting constantly like a man with no job or friends, or with Zuckerberg <\/strong>sending out weird videos and appearing on Rogan, I am in pain. Not just because I don\u2019t like what they are doing but because they are so incredibly, painfully<\/em> cringe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Marina<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I knew that one day we might have to watch as capitalism and greed and bigotry led to a world where powerful men, deserving or not, would burn it all down. What I didn\u2019t expect, and don\u2019t think I could have foreseen, is how incredibly cringe <\/em>it would all be. I have been prepared for evil, for greed, for cruelty, for injustice \u2013 but I did not anticipate that the people in power would also be such huge losers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve always been someone who cannot tolerate embarrassment. I hate being embarrassed more than just about any other emotion and I\u2019ve always skipped content based on cringe humour like Meet the Parents, Borat or Nathan for You. It makes my skin crawl and it makes the contents of my stomach try to crawl out of my mouth. But I cannot skip world events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nor can I skip Musk\u2019s clear desperation, even as he holds this much wealth and power in his hands, to be thought of as cool. There are endless examples<\/a> of him embarrassing himself while attempting to be funny or to gain respect. Unfortunately, while you may be able to buy power, it\u2019s impossible to buy a good personality. Watching his Nigel-no-friends attempts to be popular, his endless pathetic tweets that read as though they come from the brain of an 11-year-old poser, has made me start to believe we should bring back bullying. If yet another humiliating report in the last couple of days is to be believed, he appears even to have lost the respect of some of his gamer audience, who the report claims suspect<\/a> that he may have been lying about his achievements in hardcore gaming (cursed sentence).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Zuckerberg is a different kind of cringe \u2013 but cringe all the same. His cringe moments drip through more sparingly but, when they do, my body tries to turn inside out at my bellybutton. His physical makeover for Maga reasons, performing music<\/a> because no one will stop him, trying to look cool<\/a> on a surfboard \u2013 all these are extremely difficult to watch. He has been trying to suck up to Trump, going on Joe Rogan\u2019s show<\/a> to say society has been \u201cneutered\u201d and companies need \u201cmore masculine energy\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Putting on what is clearly a bro disguise to join the boys\u2019 club and sit at the big boy table \u2013 it should feel humiliating. This came as Zuckerberg rolled back hate speech<\/a> and factchecking rules at Meta, in a clear swerve to the right before Trump\u2019s inauguration. What could be more masculine and cool than selling out vulnerable communities and women to impress the alpha male?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Climate crises keep coming, genocides continue, women keep getting murdered, art is being strangled to death by AI, bigotry is on the rise, social progress is being rolled back \u2026 AND these men insist on being cringe? It\u2019s a rotten cherry on top. This combination of evil and embarrassment is a unique horror, one that science fiction has failed to prepare us for. The second-hand embarrassment we have to endure gets even more potent when combined with other modern influences on young men, like Jordan Peterson<\/a> and Andrew Tate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Arwa<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Peterson is a big voice in men\u2019s rights \u2013 well, a small Kermit\u2019s voice in men\u2019s rights \u2013 and he\u2019s also an embarrassment. So much so that he has his own Know Your Meme page<\/a>, which covers that time he<\/a> <\/a><\/strong><\/em>reportedly retweeted an image<\/a> from a fetish film, apparently believing it was a Chinese communist \u201csperm extraction\u201d facility. He deleted it shortly afterwards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tate is facing human trafficking charges but rose to fame as a voice for young men, a misogynist in bad outfits who does really cool things like smoking cigars, wearing sunnies inside and trying to drag human rights back 100 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Living your life to impress other men by hating women is one of the most embarrassing things I can imagine. Looking up to any of these men for how to live your life is even sadder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve worked hard to keep these kinds of men out of my personal life, to keep them away from me, out of my goddamn sight. Now they are in my face daily, not only influencing the world for the worse but making me nauseous at how uncool and pathetic they are, on top of their other sins. It\u2019s too much, I can\u2019t take it, there needs to be a change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s time for us to start getting revenge on the nerds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n