"A group of programmers are actually reprogramming civilization."

— Jeff Orlowski, director of "The Social Dilemma"

A new report from the House Judiciary Committee's antitrust panel deems that Apple, Amazon, Google, and Facebook have abusively wielded their monopoly-like power. The panel found that the "tech giants" hobbled innovation, slashed consumer choice, and threatened democracy itself. "These firms have too much power, and that power must be reined in and subject to appropriate oversight and enforcement," the panel wrote. "Our economy and democracy are at stake."

The panel's conclusions are not dissimilar to those of Jeff Orlowski, director of Netflix's top-10 hit "The Social Dilemma." "Hiding on the other side of our screens is code that is invisibly reshaping our society," Orlowski said following a recent screening of his alarm-sounding documentary. "A group of programmers are actually reprogramming civilization."

Olrowski hopes that his film will spark a movement to stop social media from "rendering people into profitable revenue streams" — and, in the process, dehumanizing and exploiting them. "Tech problems are code that people can change," in his eyes. And if enough people demand that change, their representatives in government may be compelled to write changes into law that will bring Big Tech to heel.

But that alone is not enough. Without the clear expression of the people's will, the government will do too little, too late. Just as environmentalists have responded to the civilizational threat posed by climate change, a new activist movement must take up the cause of the mental environment's destruction at the hands of technology firms. We invite you to do righteous battle against the powers of Big Tech. Join the Mental Liberation Front . . .  take back your mind by force.

The law of the Mainland is coming down hard on long-suffering Hong Kong. In July, teenage pro-independence activist Tony Chung became the first political figure arrested for violating the Beijing-imposed national-security law. Police reportedly surrounded Chung in a shopping mall, then “pulled him into a stairwell and pinned his head in front of his phone — an attempt to trigger the facial recognition system.” The 19-year-old remembers the officers’ asking him, “Do you know with the national security law, we have all the rights to unlock your phones and get your passwords?”

Harsh law-enforcement tactics such as these are becoming more widespread in the wake of the national-security law’s passage this summer. And they smack of the invasive, dissent-crushing methods employed in Mainland China. Tony Chung himself was accused of an offence that is common in the Mainland but (until recently) unknown in Hong Kong: internet-based thoughtcrime. He was arrested on suspicion of having called for Hong Kong’s independence — now illegal — on Facebook, which he denies.

Though released on bail, Chung may yet be subject to further intimidation-tactics — tactics similar to those that other Hong-Kong activists have faced. Weeks before her arrest, Agnes Chow reportedly noticed cameras near her doorstep, apparently “a common trick of the secret police” in the Chinese mainland. And in August, more than 200 police stormed the offices of the pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, seizing droves of materials in connection with the arrest of its owner, Jimmy Lai, on suspicion of “collusion with foreign powers.” (Among those arrested along with Lai were several newspaper-affiliated executives and Lai’s two sons.) Long a thorn in the CCP’s side, Lai — who is a British national — had earlier faced accusations of “subversion” for comments he had made on Twitter. “I have always thought I might one day be sent to jail for my publications or for my calls for democracy in Hong Kong,” he wrote, presciently, in May. “But for a few tweets, and because they are said to threaten the national security of mighty China? That’s a new one, even for me.”

“Might is right” regimes — like Xi’s in China, Assad’s in Syria, Lukashenko’s in Belarus, el-Sisi’s in Egypt, and Netanyahu’s in Palestine — must be held responsible for their atrocities. If the United Nations and our current crop of world leaders are not up to the job, then we the people, with the most revolutionary tool ever invented in the palms of our hands, must become a geopolitical “Third Force” and dispense radical justice from below.

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Amid the global pandemic of coronavirus that has seen over a million dead and millions more out of work, the wealth of the world's richest has reportedly risen beyond $10 trillion. Swiss bank UBS found that the collective wealth of the world's 2,000-odd billionaires grew 27.5% from April to July, some of the worst months of the worst pandemic in a century. The spike in billionaires' fortunes comes after many fat cats took advantage of the global market's springtime crash, buying copious shares at record-low prices. Then, as stocks recovered, their wallets ballooned to grotesque proportions. (The wealth of the world's richest man, Jeff Bezos, has grown by $74 billion — to $189 billion — since the New Year. That of space-clown Elon Musk has grown from $76 billion to $103 billion.) Fewer than 100 American billionaires have spared a philanthropic pittance of $4.5 billion in donations towards relief. Meanwhile, for many years to come, poor and working-class people are likely to bear the brunt of the worst health and economic crisis in living memory. And as cash drains from the pockets of everyday people into the purses of the ultra-wealthy, ramping up inequality to a level not seen since the Gilded Age, the divide risks provoking a fearsome backlash. But until that time, as everyday people get poorer and sicker — and many thousands among them die — the virus-insulated princes of global capitalism will continue to ride high. How can we begin to pull them down, forging a society that computes not just for a few but for all? For starters, we must demand that tax havens be abolished, the financial system rid of rot, and the regulatory apparatus purged of corruption. Only then will we, the People, be able to get a foothold on our own future.