How to Survive a Pre-Collapse Dystopia: a Conceptual Segmentation

In every pre-collapse dystopia there are three types of people: those who represent and curate it, those who have sided with it, and those who detest it.

1. Parasites. Main driver: profit acceleration

The first group needs no introduction.  It represents the classic self-centred human, typically exemplified by the ruthless accelerationism of “destroy-now-pay-later” suicide economics of necrocapitalism.  Members of this group are key cogs in the Unhappiness Machine, seeking to maintain as close a connection as possible to power, money and the production apparatus.  They see the world with the eyes of a parasite: they’re not here to make friends, but to eat their friends.  No regrets or remorse.  Because of their selfish nature, the parasites are not at the least concerned with the future of humans or the planet.  As long as they are winning in the present, the destructive consequences of their actions can be picked up by those who care, either in the present or future.  The parasites have no concept of what a conscience is and regard conscientious people as “losers”.

2. Sheep. Main driver: survival

Despite being victims of the dystopia, the Sheep refuse to acknowledge its existence because deep down they are terrified of it.  Their greatest fear is seeing themselves within the dystopia, so they choose to ignore it.  This is by far the most interesting group of the three as they demonstrate the most extreme cognitive and behavioural biases.  These biases are so intense that the sheep are living inside a Mind Prison they have constructed, an impenetrable fortress of virtual reality which protects them from “scary stuff”.  Their existence can be described as an “out of body” experience whereby they have managed to package and compartmentalise inconvenient truths in exchange for the everyday distractions of a mostly consumatronic existence.  The dystopia does not simply enable this type of existence:  it is made specifically for the sheep, so much so that the vast majority of them do not even suspect they are part of a constructed matrix.  In terms of strategy, the sheep have decided to go down with the ship, and hold on for as long as they can by making close alliances with the parasites.  They are hoping and praying that the parasites will reward this compliant behaviour and give them and their family last-minute invites to their much hyped yet inexistent escape vessel.  Suckers. A minority of Sheep are collapse aware, but the urge to follow the herd is too strong and wins them over in the end.

3. Cassandras. Main driver: ethical redemption

The third group is collapse-aware, yet at varying levels of awareness and with varying raison d’etre which places them within distinct subgroups.  For example, Cassandra Pragmatists are passive observers of civilisational collapse, keenly aware of the repetition of history and of the cognitive handicaps which prevent humans from averting self-destruction.  At the other end of a pragmatism – optimism continuum within this group, we have Cassandra Hopefuls which are self-explanatory.  The Hopefuls may or may not overlap with Sheep to some extent depending on their level of self-denial.  Throughout the Cassandras there is much movement back and forth along the continuum as this is a very restless group.  This is a segment who “knows what’s coming” and has suffered significant mental distress.  Being the only group of the three who is actually processing its trauma though, it is, at least on psychological terms, the most resilient to collapse.

George is an author, researcher, molecular biologist and food scientist.

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