The Anti-Intellectualism of Silicon Valley Elites

I recently re-read Richard Hofstadter's Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, and now every time a reactionary Silicon Valley billionaire opens his mouth, I think about it. So I wrote about it for The Nation. Here's the column: On Instagram, there’s an activist named Brian Patrick (@pano.dime) who has dedicated

I recently re-read Richard Hofstadter's Anti-Intellectualism in American Life , and now every time a reactionary Silicon Valley billionaire opens his mouth, I think about it. So I wrote about it for The Nation . Here's the column : On Instagram, there’s an activist named Brian Patrick ( @pano.dime ) who has dedicated his account to “posting an insane thing an AI executive said every day in 2026.” I can’t stop thinking about his entry for Day 15, quoting the CEO of a company called Suno, Mikey Shulman, as he claimed that musicians hate the process of making music. “It’s not really enjoyable to

related reading

• The New Legislators of Silicon Valleytheideasletter.org
• The Silicon Valley Canon: On the Paıdeía of the American Tech Elite – The Scholar's Stagescholars-stage.org
• The Education of the Broligarchy - Colossuscolossus.com
• How Silicon Valley Broke the Economy | The Nationthenation.com
• Child’s Play, by Sam Krissharpers.org
• Silicon Valley Has a Harvard Problemtime.com
• Rewriting the Californian Ideology - American Affairs Journalamericanaffairsjournal.org
• Value Beyond Instrumentalization — Letters to a Young Technologistletterstoayoungtechnologist.com
• Tech Strikes Back - The New Atlantisthenewatlantis.com
• Don’t Be Evil: Fred Turner on Utopias, Frontiers, and Brogrammerslogicmag.io
• The Stanford Freshmen Who Think They Rule the World - The Atlantictheatlantic.com
• Understanding Anti-Intellectualism in the U.S.studioatao.org