Neoliberal Futurology Twitterrant

Futurology is not social science, nor historical analysis, nor policy making, nor cultural criticism, nor philosophical thought.

Futurology is a genre of marketing and promotion. Like all advertising, futurology is deception & consolation peddled as information in the service of wealth accumulation & concentration. Quintessentially neoliberal, futurology sells stasis as progress, exploitation as liberty, violence as virtual, conquest as development.

The suffusion of personal and public life by the norms and forms of promotion and self-promotion is our prevalent religiosity now. Faithful advertising mobilizes irrational passions: Denial -- of aging and death, isolation, insecurity, error, life's contingency and wish-fulfillment fantasies -- of youthful health, sex appeal, easy money, relevance, and control.

In Robot Cults like transhumanism, singularitarianism and immortalism the techno-transcendental religiosity of futurology is conspicuous. But techno-transcendentalism isn't confined to such extremities: it drives venture capitalism, consumer fetishism, advertorial journalism. Futurist sub(cult)ures merely expose the underlying and ubiquitous deception and derangement of the neoliberal-neoconservative epoch.