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  "origin": "https://www.msweet.net/notes/",
  "page": "867-plum-seals",
  "author": {
    "name": "Matthew McDowell-Sweet",
    "url": "https://www.msweet.net/"
  },
  "created": "2026-10-23T19:55:52Z",
  "updated": "2026-10-23T19:55:52Z",
  "version": 1,
  "content_md": "Hmmmm.\n\n> Unlike civilization, Darwin’s tangled bank does not present any legible sort of murderous competitiveness, where some sort of lofty aesthetic of “fitness” rules, recognizable by (for instance), “real man” and “real woman” Instagram ideals. This is something the architects of what I’ve taken to calling Bloodsport Planet don’t get. The stylized Darwinism they hope to turn into a planetary logic of power is based on a not-even-wrong understanding of evolutionary mechanics. It is an aestheticized theater of legibilized “fitness” featuring Platonic beauty ideals achieved through plastic surgery, vaguely homoerotic guns-and-masculinity performances, and sanitized spectatorship of what are effectively snuff films staged far from their larp theaters — in foreign countries, immigrant ghettoes, and internment camps. It is a pathetic show that can at best rule a stadium, not a live planet.\n\n[Engineering Liveness - by Venkatesh Rao - Contraptions ↗](https://contraptions.venkateshrao.com/p/engineering-liveness)",
  "content_html": "<p>Hmmmm.</p>\n<blockquote><p>Unlike civilization, Darwin’s tangled bank does not present any legible sort of murderous competitiveness, where some sort of lofty aesthetic of “fitness” rules, recognizable by (for instance), “real man” and “real woman” Instagram ideals. This is something the architects of what I’ve taken to calling Bloodsport Planet don’t get. The stylized Darwinism they hope to turn into a planetary logic of power is based on a not-even-wrong understanding of evolutionary mechanics. It is an aestheticized theater of legibilized “fitness” featuring Platonic beauty ideals achieved through plastic surgery, vaguely homoerotic guns-and-masculinity performances, and sanitized spectatorship of what are effectively snuff films staged far from their larp theaters — in foreign countries, immigrant ghettoes, and internment camps. It is a pathetic show that can at best rule a stadium, not a live planet.</p></blockquote>\n<p class=\"source\"><a href=\"https://contraptions.venkateshrao.com/p/engineering-liveness\">Engineering Liveness - by Venkatesh Rao - Contraptions ↗</a></p>",
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