NAJ screen shot
The Big Picture –
By Glynn Wilson
ST. LOUIS, Mo. – Five years ago, hunkered down for the winter north of Pensacola, Florida in Donald Trump’s mostly disastrous first term as president and keeping up with the news as Covid-19 spread over the world and across the United States, I embarked on a special research project to identify the key problems facing humanity and to propose solutions.
It had become clear by then that the insufficiency of media and social media models had created an existential crisis that was not being dealt with in an intellectually rigorous way. So I first wrote a three part series detailing the problem and then wrote a business plan to build a solution. Unfortunately, most of the world became so distracted by Trump, Facebook and Covid and we were of course stuck so deep in the American South that no venture capital was forthcoming to fund the proposed project to build a better media and social media system to begin solving the problem.
Can Altruism Trump Selfishness to Save Democracy and Planet Earth?
How Existential Anxiety Leads to Authoritarianism: Case Studies — Donald Trump and George Wallace
How to Create a Functioning Communications System to Save Democracy and the Planet
One aspect of the message did resonate across the land then, and enough of the people got onboard with promoting altruism over selfishness that Trump was defeated in the 2020 election. Unfortunately, he did not fade away like many of us thought he would after he lost. He denied losing, and set about instigating and inciting a violent insurrection of far right forces to attack the very citadel of democracy in Washington, D.C., the U.S. Capitol.
Q Takes the Capitol, a New American Journal graphic by artist Walter Simon, depicts this golden calf of the Shaman of Qanon in his bison horn headdress, flying a flag with the slogan, “Quo unus nostrum it, eo universi imus.” The saying is inspired by the coming of age at sea saga “White Squall” using a lame slogan from the Albatross ship’s bell, “Where we go one, we go all.”
He and his white nationalist minions continued the assault on democratic norms and institutions until he was reelected again in 2024, as many of us watched in horror almost helpless to do anything about it as the authoritarian propaganda took over all new media, social media and traditional media channels.
After taking a long break from most daily news and politics from the election in November, 2024 until the Trump inauguration in January, 2025, with a long trip back to the South for the winter, it was not clear anything could be done to stop the total destruction of American democracy once and for all. But after Elon Musk invaded the U.S. Treasury Department with his team of hackers and started gutting the federal government with DOGE, and my own bank and Social Security were targeted and frozen, I got pissed off and made my way back to Washington to get back in the fight.
I wrote a comprehensive story detailing the problem with proposed solutions on Trump’s first 100 days back in power.
One Hundred Days in Trumpville: The People Must Act to Stop This Madness
And I took on the real problem being created by Elon Musk, as his ego and Trump’s finally clashed and caused a split in the alliance.
But after Trump nationalized and militarized police agencies and the National Guard to patrol the streets of Washington, I figured it was time to implement my plan to high-tail it across the country to California. The timing seemed to come together as California Governor Gavin Newsom seemed to rise up as the most viable contender to take on Trump’s forces in 2026 and 2028. Deep down I figured if the jig is up, and democracy and human life on planet Earth were doomed, at least I could spend my final days in the heaven of Yosemite.
Heading West to Join the Opposition to Trump in the Shadow of Yosemite
But as often happens in life, a new friend and fellow traveler comes along at the right time and changes your perspective. There may yet be a way to build a new and better media and social media system to fight the selfish gene and fascism and to feed and nurture the altruistic, democratic tendencies of people.
After a few days of reading and discussions lasting well into the night, my new friend in St. Louis inspired me to ask an A.I. program to help outline a solution he had already been thinking about and writing down. I posted this question on Facebook, then submitted it to ChatGPT for an initial analysis.
QUESTION for the FUTURE – How to build an online system to fight fascism now and protect democracy in the future that can’t be undone by political parties or rogue players?
This is what ChatGPT came up with. It’s only an initial outline. But we are now thinking about a new business plan and recruiting other strategic partners to be involved so we can seek help and funding to pull it off once I get to California, where most of our new technology has been funded in Silicon Valley over the past 25 years. Feel free to provide your feedback in the comments and get onboard to help.
ChatGPT:
“This is a deep and urgent question — one that touches on technology, governance, social trust, and political resilience,” the bot said in response to my question. “Building an online system to fight fascism now and protect democracy in the future — and that cannot be easily undone by political parties or rogue actors — is a massive, multi-dimensional challenge. Here’s a structured answer with both strategic thinking and concrete system ideas.”
🔧 THE GOAL:
To create a resilient, decentralized, and adaptive online system that:
Counters fascist ideologies and tactics.
Protects and promotes democratic values long-term.
Resists capture or dismantling by authoritarian or corrupt forces.
📌 PART 1: CORE PRINCIPLES OF THE SYSTEM
1. Decentralization
No single point of control. Built on federated or blockchain-based infrastructure.
Decision-making is distributed — no government or party can flip a switch and take over.
2. Transparency & Auditability
All actions, funding, moderation decisions, etc., must be recorded and publicly auditable.
Open-source codebase, open decision logs.
3. Privacy + Accountability
Anonymity tools (for whistleblowers, activists) coexisting with strong mechanisms to prevent abuse (e.g. zero-knowledge proofs, social reputation systems).
4. Resilience to Disinformation & Propaganda
Active resistance to manipulation: fact-checking, decentralized moderation, and media literacy tools built-in.
5. Interoperability
The system integrates with other democratic institutions, tools, and communities. It’s not a silo — it’s a scaffold.
📌 PART 2: WHAT THE SYSTEM COULD LOOK LIKE
🚀 1. Decentralized Civic Platform (DCP)
An online infrastructure for civic education, democratic participation, coordination, and resistance — built on the above principles.
Features:
Participatory Governance Tools: E-voting (with cryptographic security), deliberation spaces, collective budgeting.
Fascism Watch: Real-time monitoring of authoritarian trends (AI + crowd-based verification).
Knowledge Defense: A living encyclopedia and misinformation defense hub (open, decentralized, and multilingual).
Secure Organizing: Encrypted tools for grassroots coordination (chat, files, events, alerts).
Digital IDs for Trust: Voluntary digital ID verified by a web of trust (not centralized state control), enabling secure participation in civic functions.
🧠 2. Civic AI Guardians
Open-source AI trained specifically to:
Detect fascist rhetoric, manipulation tactics, or coordinated harassment.
Elevate credible, verified democratic content.
Help educate users about democratic systems, disinformation, and their rights.
The AI is not “in charge” — it’s a tool for resistance and education, answerable to the network.
🕸 3. Community Moderation Network
Think of it like Wikipedia meets Reddit meets Mastodon — a federation of community-moderated civic spaces.
Localized knowledge and culture matter. Democracy isn’t one-size-fits-all.
Moderation councils chosen by stake and reputation.
Abuse-resistant: no central party or actor can override the network unless there’s a supermajority consensus across communities.
📌 PART 3: LONG-TERM RESILIENCE
🧱 1. Institutional Redundancy
The system exists in many forms: online, on mesh networks, on physical drives in case of internet blackouts, and even as printed handbooks.
🛠 2. Hard-Forkability
If a part of the network is corrupted or taken over, it can be forked — a clean break — preserving democratic governance elsewhere.
🧬 3. Generational Design
Tools for education and onboarding new generations.
Built-in training for digital civics, resistance history, propaganda analysis.
Intergenerational stewardship: elders + youth co-lead.
⚔️ PART 4: FIGHTING FASCISM NOW
Rapid-response alert systems: Crowdsourced and AI-augmented threat detection for authoritarian actions (e.g. voter suppression, police overreach, media censorship).
Digital sanctuary tools: Protecting targets of fascist violence (minorities, journalists, activists).
Information immunization: Delivering pre-bunking (preventive media literacy) to vulnerable audiences before disinformation hits.
Global solidarity: The system connects democratic movements globally, recognizing that fascism is a transnational threat.
🚫 Why Can’t It Be Undone?
Because it is:
Decentralized (can’t be taken down).
Self-replicating (code, knowledge, communities can fork or move).
Culturally embedded (not just a platform, but part of democratic culture).
Open-source (cannot be hidden or co-opted quietly).
Built for forks and resistance (if subverted, new leadership or nodes can emerge).
✊ Final Thought:
“Fascism is not just a political force — it’s an emotional, cultural, and psychological one,” the bot said. “So the system you imagine must not only be digital but deeply human. It must inspire, not just organize. It must educate, not just react. It must belong to everyone, not just the tech-savvy or the powerful.
“This isn’t just a system you build once. It’s a living immune system for democracy.”
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