Tech Bros and Girl Bosses is a two-part series on the role of technology and science in the lives of Millennials and others in the Crisis Era and the COVID-19 pandemic. Part One - "Silicon Valley" focuses on the male-centric side of technology in the current crisis.
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It wasn't Santa Claus dashing through the snow on a one-dog open sleigh.
It was Victor Frankenstein, and he was chasing his own child-- that which is known simply as "The Creature."
In the opening to Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus, the title character is rescued from near-death as he pursues the murderous monster he created and neglected. The Creature, brought to life by electricity and composed of body parts stolen without sanctimony from graveyards, desires love and friendship, but receives neither. He is an unnatural child, and the only one Victor will ever bear— his wife murdered on their honeymoon by the vengeful Creature, Victor passes away on the ship of his rescuer shortly after relaying his tale of woe.
What relevance can this fever-dream of science and fantasy from the early 1800s hold for us today? Can the story of a technologist man, written by a professionally ambitious woman, provide a lens through which to view our own modern troubles? What happens when the Tech Bros and the Girl Bosses of an entire generation use their influence and expectations to shape the culture in a Crisis Era?
As Victor Frankenstein said, “I believe that the strange incidents connected with [my tale] will afford a view of nature, which may enlarge your faculties and understanding.” *
THE WHO AND WHAT OF TECH BROS
Victor Frankenstein made The Creature because he could, and he wanted to.
Fascinated by occult sciences and electricity from childhood, as well as free from any fear (or respect) for the supernatural, young Victor pursued his curiosities— nay, obsessions— to their natural, selfish end. He created an enormous, eight-foot monster, and dreamed not of how his work would benefit humanity, but how it would it would bring fame and adulation to himself. Even his method of toil was destructive, like the lightning bolt that decimated an oak tree in his youth and introduced him to the notion of electric power. Victor describes his laboratory as a filthy cell and his overnight work sessions as exhausting. He had no moral qualms about gathering body parts and torturing animals to reveal the secrets of life. Even on the brink of burnout, he was relentless— only to find that what he creates terrifies him.
BECAUSE THEY CAN, AND THEY WANT TO
Unfortunately, it seems that the technologists of Silicon Valley, sometimes referred to as “Tech Bros,” carry forth the same mindset as Victor Frankenstein. Articles such as this detail the way that the digital revolution, meant to be a rising tide to lift all boats, has failed to deliver much more than an improved ease of consumerism. Longtime technology journalist, author, and former startup employee Dan Lyons details the way many startups are actually designed to fail**, siphoning off just enough venture capital to make a few people rich, burn out the rest, and snowball the funding into the next project.
Meanwhile, larger, more successful tech companies avoid taxes that could (possibly) fund much-needed human services in their communities. As they provide lip service to “woke” ideology, Silicon Valley’s workforce remains overwhelmingly white and male, attracting the children of “Bobos in Paradise”— white liberal intelligensia of the creative class. Therefore, the tide has not risen at all. Tech jobs in Silicon Valley pay extremely well, and they go to the children of people who were already paid extremely well. Of course, one has to be wealthy to live in San Fransisco these days— it’s one of the most expensive places to live in the United States, and has an enormous problem with homelessness. Why? Because San Fransisco is on a peninsula, so new housing must expand up, not out. Unfortunately, affordable vertical housing can’t be built because the "Bobos" have passed local building codes to ensure their sunset views aren’t destroyed. Thus, the law of supply and demand comes into play: supply is short, demand is high, and housing prices skyrocket out of the hands of the working class and into those of the Tech Bro.
ARE YOU BEING SERVED?
And what of the average worker, or the product itself? Even surrounded by ample evidence of their failures, the Tech Bros forge ahead. In an interview with OneZero, Mary Berk (ethics specialist and Big Tech veteran), explains the rationale behind how these companies operate:
“Usually in a tech company, you’re working so hard and running so fast that there’s not a ton of time for reflection. […] An important takeaway is that Silicon Valley requires lots of young employees because if you don’t have the stamina to be working nonstop, full time as overtime, you’re not going to cut it. And in performance reviews, you’re competing against your colleagues, so the pressure is always there to do more. It’s relentless. […] On top of this, as I already mentioned, you notice that people who do speak up and ask critical questions end up getting humiliated and fired.”
Elsewhere in the article, Berk explains that egotism and financial rewards incentivize leaders of tech companies to double-down on their goals in spite of or in reaction to outside criticism, making them deaf to real concerns. Like Victor Frankenstein, who ignored the warnings that nature, his friends, and his own body tried to give, Tech Bros are obsessed with success. And what is success? Well, that depends on your goals.
For a long time, the stated purpose of Silicon Valley was "saving the world." A fine ideal, if a fuzzy one, and something sure to appeal to Millennials (born 1982-2004), a generation raised to believe that such is their purpose in life. However, when mission creep begins to set in, ethical problems abound. Suddenly, "helping people connect" becomes "increasing customer engagement"-- with advertising. Expressing favor becomes approval addiction. Giving people a chance to be heard becomes censoring what they say. In the Netflix documentary The Social Dilemma (see trailer here), workers from Big Tech who begin to realize the dark implications of their creations (such as the "Like" button) share their stories, their dismay, and also their surprise that so few people share their concern.
Perhaps that's because destruction is considered part of creation for the Tech Bros. Even the language surrounding Silicon Valley carries destructive connotations, just like Frankenstein's tree: “Disrupt”; “Digital Revolution”; “Move fast and break things.” Has anyone stopped to consider that the reshaping of the world, the supposed solving of problems, might wipe away things of actual value and create new problems? That the unholy marriage of success-obsession and huge monetary rewards would create a cultural Creature- unnatural, gargantuan, and injurious?
Actually, someone did think about it.
"The linearist view of technology fails to appreciate the dangers a new turning can bring. Microsoft founder Bill Gates is now predicting that everyone will soon tune into a world of unlimited options via high tech portable devices. What he nowhere mentions is that by merely reversing a few circuits the same technology could empower a central authority to monitor what every individual is doing. Consider a few other technologies Americans have recently associated with individual choice-- birth control and genetic testing-- and imagine a similar shift for them. While few Americans want to revisit the forced sterilization and eugenics vogue of the 1930s, we would be imprudent to declare that a higher-tech America will never again lurch in that direction."
That's a quote from Strauss and Howe's The Fourth Turning, published in 1997 (p. 117).
And now we're here in the Crisis Era, where these supposed "save the world" technologies have been used lengthen the COVID-19 pandemic and enable lockdowns. Why would you need to go to a store? Just order it online! Why would you need to go to school? Just have class online! Why would you need to see family members in person? Just video chat online! And if you refuse to follow the protocols? Those "high tech portable devices" Bill Gates talked about (we call them smart phones now) can be used to geotrack you, spy on you, record you and report you.
The problem is, people need people. Technology is nothing more than a fancy tool. And whatever problems the human condition has, tools alone can't solve them. In the Information Age, too many of us have succumbed to the lie that knowledge is the key to elevating society; that "if we knew better, we'd do better." The problem is, it ignores three things: the principle of incentives, the principle of free will, and the principle of sin nature.
The Garden of Eden is the perfect object lesson to demonstrate all three.
The serpent incentivized Eve to try the fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. She perceived a reward from choosing to eat it.
Eve had free will to choose wisely or foolishly.
Because Eve chose to sin, knowing the fruit was forbidden but taking it anyway, the rest of us are born with the propensity to choose what is sinful, selfish, and evil.
There's only one cure. And it's not technology, or government regulation, or social justice. But you still have to choose it for yourself.
Stay tuned for Tech Bros and Girl Bosses: Part Two!
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* All quotes taken from Norton Critical Edition, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. (1996)
** Interview contains some language