Techno-Medievalism

We appear to be making a roundtrip to the Middle Ages

My colleague and friend, John Parikhal, has a knack for integrating history, culture, and trends in ways that often make you think he can see around corners. I invited him to expand on the kind of unique observation he’s famous for. Here’s what he offered:

“Techno-Medievalism is a regression into the perceptions and behaviors of most people in Europe during the Middle Ages, coupled with technology that allows more control over the “serfs” (that’s most working folks), and even the “nobles” (the wealthier among us) they disagree with.

“Here’s how it works…

“The Middle Ages was a time of superstition and ignorance. It was also a time when clear class and gender boundaries were created by force.

“They burned women who used herbal medicines, calling them witches. No surprise that one of Trump’s favorite tropes is “witch hunt.”

“Science” was focused on weapons and greed: military-might, stronger castles, better farming, and alchemy (trying to turn lead into gold). Sounds a little like today’s MAGA, huh?

“They tortured and burned people who didn’t follow the official religious orthodoxy, just as the fundamentalists of today’s major religions might like to do. Repression of thought was essential.

“The king and the nobles systematically stripped women’s rights, especially in England where women had been a huge factor in the economy for hundreds of years. For instance, theywere the ones keeping “noble” estates running while their husbands were off killing others..

“Today, we have kings popping up everywhere (Trump, Putin, Erdogan, Xi). They’re supported by a new breed of nobles (tech bosses like Zuckerberg, Bezos, and of course, Musk), and tech, finance, and business oligarchs and their toadies. We have gone backwards from the 20th Century when these roles were constrained by law and economic policy. Today’s oligarchs don’t wage wars with kinetic weapons, they wage war with their checkbooks.

“In the Middle Ages, the oversimplified strata was King, Nobles, Merchants, Free Holders (they had a bit of land and weren’t bound in servitude to their Lord), and Serfs (who lived precariously, tied to their Noble). During the 20th Century, these walls were broken down. Now they are being rebuilt.

“The reason that it’s Techno-Medievalism is Tech’s new role.

“It is eliminating the jobs of the working class (serfs), meaning they will starve if we don’t do anything to help them. Amazon is disintermediating merchants who are scrambling to eBay and Etsy to survive. Surveillance and facial recognition software mean “spies” are everywhere in our lives. Shades of Stalin and Chairman Mao. Algorithms are used to spread lies, especially against facts and science, while education is being dismantled by the kings and nobles who fear an educated and informed populace. Tech is supporting the new kings by helping them destroy more than they build. It’s always easier to knock down a village than to build one.

“The most critical thing then was to keep people ‘in their place.’ Just as Trump and the MAGA crowd want to do to Blacks, women, refugees, etc. The Middle Ages was a time of wanton cruelty and little if any empathy. The lust for power knew no bounds. There were pockets of kindness but even the Church was more about repression and extraction of wealth than helping.

“It’s worth noting that because of the attacks on science, Plague was loosed on the world—they didn’t have the word ‘pandemic’ then—it killed more than one-third of the people in Europe, then millions more in Asia and Africa.

“This upended society, making it ripe for change. So many people were killed that even an unskilled laborer earned good money in the open market. Try though they would, the powers-that-be failed to close that free market. As Plague tore down the walls of the kings and nobles, knowledge was ascendant, being spread by a new invention called the printing press. Such a game-changer, it opened up science, and even the idea of rational thought. It ushered in the ‘Modern Age’.”

Now, ironically, science is being thwarted by its biggest financial beneficiary, Elon Musk, who took his prized chainsaw to research universities, the Centers for Disease Control, and the National Institutes of Health. Clinical trials of potentially life-saving drugs have been shelved. Idled scientists don’t like their prospects, and some are going to work at universities in Canada, Europe, and China. This intentional brain-drain is undoing a century’s worth of work in one hundred days. The ultra-rich tech titans, like feudal lords of the Middle Ages, poured money into this president; Musk alone contributed north of $270M. Their return will of course be galactic. Our dividend will be hard times.

Is anyone else feeling this whiplash? In our lives, we’ve never gone backwards until now. I feel a little out of time.

Forward, into the past!

©2025 Jon Sinton