Get pumped for the Steroid Olympics
Have you ever dreamed up a completely deranged business idea but lacked the cash to execute it? Peter Thiel, the secretive tech billionaire who co-founded Paypal, doesn’t have that problem. He, along with a group of other venture capitalists, is currently deploying part of his vast fortune to help bankroll a pro-drugs version of the Olympics called the Enhanced Games. It’s exactly what it sounds like: a sporting competition in which participants are encouraged to take as many performance-enhancing substances as they can get their steroid-enlarged hands on. All in the name of science and innovation, naturally.
Honestly? It sounds amazing. I would 100% watch. It’s a real shame Thiel, who currently runs spy tech firm Palantir, doesn’t spend all his resources on reality TV ideas masquerading as science instead of his many other dystopian projects. Thiel, you see, isn’t just a guy who really likes the idea of bionic boxing: he’s a libertarian and ideologue who has an exerted an oversized and pernicious influence on American politics and culture. Max Chafkin, who has written a biography of Thiel, has said he thinks the billionaire is “secretly the most important person in Silicon Valley. He’s this behind the scenes player, who is behind so many of the really important things that have happened over the last two decades.” I wouldn’t disagree.
For all his obsession with innovation, Thiel has some stone-age views on the world. He doesn’t seem completely sold on the whole women-having-rights thing, for example. In 2009, for example, he published an essay lamenting that women being given the right to vote had dealt a blow to libertarianism. His exact words: “Since 1920, the vast increase in welfare beneficiaries and the extension of the franchise to women – two constituencies that are notoriously tough for libertarians – have rendered the notion of ‘capitalist democracy’ into an oxymoron.”
Thiel also isn’t a fan of diversity initiatives, which he has called “very evil and very silly”. This guy, let me remind you, is a key player in technology and one of the first outside investors in Facebook. With people like him at the helm, is it any wonder social media has such a massive misogyny and racism problem?
Thiel, like every obscenely rich person in America, has used a large chunk of his money to try and influence politics. He threw his weight behind Donald Trump in 2016 and backed numerous anti-abortion candidates. Interestingly, however, it looks like the billionaire is taking a step back from political funding in this election cycle. One reason for this seems to be the fact that he realizes (shock horror!) that Trump was dangerous and incompetent. Thiel, who is gay, has also said his his husband doesn’t want him to give the political candidates he formerly backed any more money. I wonder why that is? Maybe, just maybe, it’s because these candidates spend half their time yelling homophobic conspiracy theories about LGBT people being groomers.
Of course, the fact that Thiel is stepping back from direct political donations doesn’t mean he’s not going to meddle in politics any more. It doesn’t mean he is any less awful or dangerous than he’s always been. Still, we can grasp at straws can’t we? I, for one, am trying to find any reason to be optimistic about the future of our current hell world. And so I’m choosing to see Thiel’s retreat from the front line of politics and his embrace of drug-powered sports as a positive. Please, Mr Thiel, I implore you: spend a lot more of your time on steroid-fueled Olympics and less time on stripping away our civil rights.
Oklahoma bill would criminalize sexting before marriage
The wide-ranging bill – proposed by Baptist pastor turned state senator Dusty Deevers – makes viewing “obscene materials” a felony, and defines “obscene” extremely broadly. However, it does have some very specific exceptions. As Reason’s Elizabeth Nolan Brown explained: “[The bill] also contains this weird clause where it says, this is not meant to go after married couples who are communicating with each other. So it has this weird carve-out if you’re sexting while married.”
It’s not clear if this bill will pass. What is very clear is that Republicans are completely obsessed with porn.
Gen Z women are more liberal than their male counterparts
That’s according to a Financial Times analysis of Gallup data that’s gone viral. “In the US, Gallup data shows that after decades where the sexes were each spread roughly equally across liberal and conservative world views, women aged 18 to 30 are now 30 percentage points more liberal than their male contemporaries,” the FT notes.
It’s a similar story around the world–and in South Korea and China the difference is even more dramatic. The #MeToo movement helped spur this gender divide. And it seems very likely that influential “manosphere” influencers like Andrew Tate are also a component.
New study sheds light on why autoimmune diseases are more common in women
Women account for as many as 80% of all cases of autoimmune diseases. Nobody knows why this is but a new study suggests that it’s due to a molecule called Xist (which sounds like a name Elon Musk would give his kid) that is made only in female cells.
Trump ordered to pay E Jean Carroll $83.3m
Carroll has said she plans to spend the money on something the former president “hates”. However she probably won’t get the money for a while, if at all: Trump has said he will appeal the decision and this may take a while. So while it’s a victory for Carroll, the real winners, as usual, are the lawyers.
Could ovaries unlock the secret to living forever?
Tech executive Nicole Shanahan thinks they might – and she is spending $100mn to find out. The Financial Times has a fascinating long read on Shanahan’s pioneering investment in women’s reproductive longevity.
“If she is successful, this new knowledge may have the kind of profound consequences that came with the arrival of the contraceptive pill,” the FT notes. “And the ovaries, it turns out, could offer clues to extending the lifespan of all humans.”
Women are suing Tennessee for denying them abortions
“Although every state with an abortion ban has some kind of exception that should theoretically allow for abortions in medical emergencies, doctors and patients across the country have said that the bans are worded in such a way as to be unworkable in reality,” the Guardian reports. Now women who have been denied medically necessary abortions are suing.
The week in pawtriarchy
Don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure that “Missing monkey trapped by yorkshire pudding in Scotland” is the best headline I’ve read this week.
