|
It has to be said out loud.
Much of Big Tech—and the financial system that props it up—rarely creates anything of intrinsic value. Just: ✨ The illusion of innovation 📊 Relentless data harvesting 🧭 Faster, shinier ways to sell us more ads for things we don’t need 💰 Hype cycles that inflate stock prices without building anything real And now? I think that’s exactly why they’re hiding behind the authoritarian regime. They know what’s coming. When climate collapse hits, Facebook won’t bring you water. Google won’t feed your kids. And Amazon certainly won’t rebuild community. No, while we were glued to their platforms, they were building underground bunkers, buying up all the land and water rights, financializing nature to be sold as cryptobacked securities. Yep, you heard it right. They are going to let the lungs of our planet, the Amazon, be traded on the stock exchange. They were never about innovation or building things for the good of humanity. While I was skeptical, I never imagined the world would let them run so wild - so unregulated, so unaccountable - that they’d become key players in an authoritarian coup. It’s like we left the keys to society in the hands of drunken teenagers, and now the bus is flying off a cliff. Where were the adults? Where were the women in leadership? We are here because of decades of neglect. Of apathy. Of unchecked greed. And none of this was possible without the systematic violation of our privacy and autonomy - our data sold off by tech companies without consent, without shame, without consequence. No wonder the tech moguls, the Theils, Musks, Zuckerbergs don’t respect us. They turned us into products. And we sat there, swiping and scrolling while they took everything. When AI came out and started stealing everyone’s intellectual property, what did we do? Nothing. Why? Because we’re still pretending these men -Zuckerberg, Musk, Pichai, Bezos -are visionaries. They’re not. They’re not better. They’re not even grown-ups. They’re boys who never learned to share. Who built empires off of exploitation. They were rewarded not for wisdom, but for domination. And now we’re all living with the consequences. Business models that function like toxic parasites, draining life from the very society that enables them should not be revered.
We have to demand things. No one will do it for us. This is the bare minimum. Please, join the Digital Exodus. Take back our Democracy. Before it's too late. April 19th Day of Action - Join the Exodus Zoom Room for community and support on migrating off the Big 5 Tech monopolies.
0 Comments
Dear Young People, We’re sorry. Our actions, and our inaction, have brought us to this moment. It shouldn’t have to fall on your shoulders. But we need your help. Some of you may have never known a world without the internet. That doesn’t make you naive. It makes you native to a system we, your elders, over-trusted. We thought the tech moguls of our time were different. We believed they were building something new: ethical, open, progressive. But in truth, they just put a new face on old-school corruption. They became the new titans of industry. And while we were distracted, they consolidated unprecedented power - economic, digital, and now political. We are watching - in real time now - an authoritarian coup. And the technocrats are either funding it or failing to stop it. But here’s the thing: They only have power because we gave it to them. And therefore, we can take it back. 💥 Enter the Digital Exodus A peaceful, people-powered walkout from the Big 5: Meta, Google, Apple, Amazon, X. (throw in Uber if you like) This is our resistance. Our refusal to keep feeding the system that’s breaking the world. We move to smaller platforms, alternatives to the Big5 (like Bluesky, Mastadon, Proton, Discord) Yes, it might be a little slower. Yes, it might be less polished. But this is the price of freedom, and the reward is everything - a more habitable planet, more equal distribution of resources, opportunities for growth and housing, a world that invests in its children and nature. You are not powerless. You are not too late. You are the JEDI force for good.  📎 Learn the Plan:
https://lnkd.in/g2FBFhnD 🎭 Satirizing Big Tech (amateur-style): https://lnkd.in/d4W_AxM7 🕊 An appeal to break free from the screens: https://lnkd.in/dpDycMWy Information is Power, But It's Only the First Step
I think by now, most of us that are paying attention can see what’s happening. This is a Project 2025–engineered dismantling of democracy, unfolding step by step in line with the classic authoritarian coup playbook. The endgame? The installation of a CEO-style dictator, just as envisioned by the Dark Enlightenment architects—Thiel, Yarvin, and Vance—who believe liberal democracy has run its course and must be replaced by top-down technocratic rule. Fine. We get it. The pattern is clear. Every day brings another catastrophic blow to checks and balances, civil rights, social safety nets, and the regulations that protect people and the planet. The list goes on. And while sharing this awareness with our circles is important, it's not enough. We have to act. But to act effectively, we need to step back, look at the big picture, and fully grasp what’s at stake—so we can realize the true urgency, stop talking about what's wrong and start doing what's right. The Climate Crisis is Real, and They Know It The current administration is fully aware of the climate emergency. They have access to the best research, data, and long-projections The wealthiest among us, people like Zuckerberg, Bezos and Altman, are preparing for the collapse. They are buying up water, land, and shelter, building bunkers and securing escape route. They know where this is going. But while they plan their escapes, others, like Project 2025 architects, fossil fuel interests, and techno-authoritarians are actively undermining climate progress - slashing funding for crucial climate research and carbon reduction strategies and aggressively expanding fossil fuel use, almost as if they are intent on accelerating the crisis. Worse still, theses same forces are dismantling the very systems that could help the average American survive what’s coming:
This Isn’t Ignorance. It’s Design. This is not a mistake, and it's not just ignorance, selfishness or short-term thinking. What we are witnessing is an extermination plan by design: a system that ensures the rest of us, especially the most vulnerable, will have nowhere to turn when the climate crisis truly hits. When this happens one of these things will happen to the masses:
I refuse to live in a country that allows this descent into dystopia. I refuse to accept helpless, silence and fear as the only option. We know what silence, and the side history those that stay silent wind up on. I am not giving up. But I can't do it alone. We need to move. Together. Now. Time is Running Out We have a narrow window—just a few years—to prevent irreversible climate tipping points. We have an even shorter window—just months—to prevent the authoritarian consolidation of power. If this administration cements its control (likely after the next budget passes in September), undoing the damage will become exponentially harder. And with that, any hope of meaningful climate action dies with it. There is Hope - But we have to Stop Talking and Start Acting We must reclaim power from the monopolies and corporate giants that dominate our economy and our government. We must break the dangerous feedback loop where profit is placed above people, and the planet is treated as expendable. That's why I'm calling for a Digital Exodus, beginning April 22, Earth Day, where we migrate off the Big5 (Meta, X, Google, Amazon, and Apple) Why Does That Matter? What’s the Connection?
And so, withdrawing those from the Big 5:
It’s all connected. This is a peaceful, nonpartisan act of resistance. A refusal to participate in the systems fueling our collapse. Together, we can take a stand and make a difference. Join the Digital Exodus. Reclaim your attention, your dignity, and your future. It’s free. No sign-up required.
And most importantly SHARE this with your networks! Let's move - together. For those entering the 6th stage of grief over the fall of our democracy:  It's Time to Mobilize Please join the Digital Exodus off the Big5, starting April 22nd, Earth Day.
Fate has not been written yet. I read an interesting Medium article by Aletheiesthenes that tracks closely the information I've been gathering about the strategic dismantling of our democracy. Like many writers have noted, what we're witnessing in the U.S. follows the classic playbook of an authoritarian coup. It's been in the works for decades, gaining momentum through efforts like the Project 2025 authored by the Heritage Foundation and its ideological alignment with a cohort of technocrats (Peter Theil, Curtis Yarvin) who envision the U.S. being run like a company with a CEO-style leader and unchecked executive power, a style also lauded by our VP. The article points to the end of April as a critical tipping point - specifically April 20th - as the end of a 90-day window in which the Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security are expected to deliver their assessment of the Insurrection Act. Under the guise of border security, this would allow the president to declare martial law and deploy the military domestically. and allows the President to call Martial law and deploy the military domestically. I had already bookmarked this date after hearing that the Heritage Foundation had set a 90-day target for enacting key parts of Project 2025. But the article goes a step further, laying out what could unfold if we don’t wake up - and if we fail to avoid falling into a trap that justifies a crackdown. It describes a chilling possibility: mass protests infiltrated and escalated by provocateurs, a “false flag” event used to justify martial law, arrests of journalists and liberal opposition leaders, militias deputized to restore order, internet blackouts in urban areas, and even the suspension of future elections. The author noted that this reads like dystopian fiction, but it’s drawn directly from the playbook of historical authoritarian takeovers and, as we are in the midst of one right now, makes it worth taking seriously. But that said, this is only one possibility. This is the warning Frodo saw in the Mirror of Galadriel, what may come to pass if we fail. There is still time. We must not give up hope. Let this not serve as a prophecy but as a rallying cry - a call to mobilize while we still can: Boycotts. Strikes. The Digital Exodus. Let's reclaim our power and our sovereignty that we've given away to the Big 5 companies complicit in the breakdown of democracy. We start now, and we go public on Earth Day.  Read the rest of Aletheiesthenes' (think Galadriel) warning here:
This post is part of a personal letter I originally wrote to family, friends and colleagues earlier this week, which I've adapted into a blog post as it covers a lot of important ground about the digital exodus and the stakes at hand that I want to share more broadly as well. I’m sorry for the urgency and the persistence, but something is happening right now, both in the US and globally, that requires a different level of action we've never seen before. I’m reaching out now because I believe we are at a critical crossroads, and what we do in the next year, could decide the future of the earth and its inhabitants. In my a past post, I shared why a Digital Exodus from the Big 5 (Meta, Google, Amazon, X and Apple) may be the most powerful leverage point we have right now to stop the dismantling of our democracy. These companies are not just monopolizing resources and squelching competition. They're shaping the future of society, steering it toward an authoritarian, surveilled, screen-addicted and deeply unequal world. What we need is more voices at the table. Women's voices. Diverse voices. Voices that have been silenced. But to do that, we have to take our power back. These companies operate in the currency of today: attention and convenience. If enough of us pull away our attention from these apps and devices, we interrupt their economic model and their influence pipeline, reduce their power, and ultimately create an opening to influence what comes next. What we're asking people to do:
It is not just me advocating for this. I shared this idea on a LinkedIn Post a week ago and received more support and responses than almost anything I’ve shared online before - from lawyers, teachers, engineers, writers, environmentalists. Even a tenured Wharton professor commented that this idea makes sense. Wired has also been sounding the alarm about migrating off these same platforms. Here’s a simple overlooked step: We migrate. We unplug. We reclaim our digital and economic power. Big Tech companies - Meta, X, Google, Amazon, Apple - are not neutral platforms. They're actively profiting from surveillance, division, and in some cases, enabling political and climate collapse. Regardless of your political leaning, the consolidation of power in those 5 companies is extremely dangerous - something I’ve heard concerns about from conservatives and liberals alike. And now that their surveillance technology is being actively used in collaboration with an authoritarian government, the downside of this kind of consolidation of power has come into sharp relief. The time for implicit trust in technology and paternalist figures has ended. The spell has broken. And we need something different. But to create something different we need to come together and take our power back first. A Recent Experienced Opened My Eyes In September of 2023, I experienced an event that profoundly changed me. I was violently assaulted by a neighbor, an upper middle class man, someone I had known and trusted. That night, everything I knew about the world and my safety was turned upside down. Because I had no defenses up at the time (I genuinely believed in the best in people) when it happened I couldn't process fast enough and I froze. After extensive research, I learned this wasn’t because I lacked the strength or will to fight back - it was because of something biological. In moments of cognitive dissonance, the body can go into freeze mode as part of a predator-prey dynamic. Predators actually rely on their victims not recognizing danger until it’s too late and that freeze response is real. I'm sharing this because what’s happening right now feels eerily similar, both in terms of the speed of the assault on our democracy, and in the lack of empathy and otherizing by those in power - they are moving fast, relying on people being too distracted, frozen, good-natured, or confused to fight, which mirrors my experience with my neighbor. I don't want us to make the same mistake I did and only register the danger until the harm is already done. The 900+ page Project 2025 playbook is the blueprint for an authoritarianism transition which strips women, marginalized communities, and workers of their rights. It's a rollback of humanity that feels like a return to the dark ages. What people are capable of doing to others that they see as less than human - well, we only need to look at history. I’m sure you’ve heard and seen comparisons to 1930s Germany by now. They have been planning this consolidation of power for years, and in a terrible twist of fate, climate change, AI revolution, the Heritage foundation’s Project 2025, the consolidation of power in those Big5 companies, and a dictatorship ideology by major Technocrats (Theil, Yardin) are coming together in real time as we speak. We are in a Lord of the Rings epic showdown right now, and we must join in fellowship: small gentle people, together, can change the course of history. There's a Simple Solution to Take Back Our Power We have to break out of the freeze state and start moving. The solution I’m offering is EASY and SIMPLE. Unless you are an influencer or small business who makes money off ads on social media or Amazon, everything about this strategy ultimately saves money and time. There’s a little bit of work up front required (e.g. canceling subscriptions, migrating browsers, forwarding Gmail to Proton. etc.) but it doesn’t have to be perfect and you can do it in bits and pieces leading up to Earth Day. Migrating off 80% of the Big5 platforms, in numbers, will be enough to make a difference. Europe has always been skeptical of the US companies and is already doing this naturally. We just need to accelerate it. I'm hoping that you will at least consider, despite my not being famous or powerful, that there just might be something to what I'm saying. And I do have some expertise: I studied public policy at the Kennedy School of Government, chemistry at Reed; I've worked in energy law and sustainability consulting. I know the science, I've seen the numbers. The stakes are high. Yest what is being asked of really doesn't cost that much, but a little bit of time and the rewards are potentially immeasurable. And the worst case scenario? If for some reason my assumption of this being a powerful leverage point is wrong? Then we have a long-needed digital detox from toxic. There’s really no downside. And it’s 100% peaceful and aboveboard. The Stakes Just to reiterate the stakes: Billions of lives on the planet and millions of lives in the US are on the line right now.
And even if global climate wasn't at stake, and we just look at the state of US democracy - every day that goes by that this dismantling continues makes it harder to go back. Even if we put a new president in office tomorrow - rebuilding and refunding the agencies, and bringing neutrality back to the military and courts could take years if not decades. It's not that our government didn't desperately need reform - it was already heavily captured by the corporations. But what they are doing now is consolidating power into the corporation MORE not less. And it's going to make things worse for 99.9% of people, not just in the United States but around the globe because climate change knows no boundaries, and authoritarianism spreads. And once we pass the climate tipping point in a few years, there's no going back at all. We Are All Connected I realize that property owners, retirees, and people who aren’t in financial survival mode may not feel the impacts right now as much as vulnerable people and younger people that are watching jobs disappear due to AI. Some people may even be inadvertently benefiting from what is going on in the stock market. But studies show that life spans decrease as inequality and injustice increases across ALL income levels due to the stress of living in such an unjust world. And no one can outrun climate change. Ultimately, I think we all are feeling the assault on ideals and trust in the justice system, no matter our specific political ideology. From beloved institutions like PBS and Sesame Street coming under fire - to budget changes that are putting loved ones at risk of losing medical care - to the mass unemployment we are seeing from AI taking jobs - to the attacks on universities - to the inevitable social unrests that will follow if we do not act soon. Climate change is happening much much faster than scientists originally predicted. Climate migration is already happening. And once we hit tipping points, we can’t go back. The Exodus Rally Cry Meta, Google, X, Apple and Amazon are all complicit in this: silencing truth, extracting our data, addicting our minds, and quietly backing policies that destroy the future. Every scroll, every click, every view feeds the machine, and speeds up their consolidation of power. But we can take it back. It doesn't have to be perfect, we just have to act now. If you reduce your use of these platforms by even 80%, it will help. I’m sorry if I sound like an alarmist, but this is real and I cannot, I refuse to, stay silent. Bernie has sounded the alarm on Oligarchy and he says we cannot wait for the government to protect us. It has to come from the people. Financial experts have sounded the alarm on climate change and the economic impacts looming. Tech experts have sounded the alarms on AI replacing millions of jobs. We have to act now. In numbers, WE are more powerful than they are. And once we get our power back from the digital world, I believe we can have a seat at the table and turn this ship around. Please join me in the Exodus away from the Big 5: Meta, Google, Amazon, Apple and X that have hijacked our minds, our lives and now democracy itself.
You can start by taking 10 minutes to do something today. You don’t have to do it all at once. Do a little each day until Earth Day, April 22nd. You don’t even need to delete your accounts, you can deactivate (though I recommend deleting the app on your phone because they still make money off of tracking your actions even when you aren’t on the apps). Start by cancelling Amazon, changing your Chrome browser to DuckDuckGo or even Firefox. And PLEASE SHARE THIS with anyone and everyone who you know to be concerned about what’s happening. The Goal is 5 million people in the US by Earth Day. If each of you sent this letter (or some version of it) out to 20-30 people you know, and just five of them took action the next day and shared this with their network and so forth - we could reach 10 million in a week or two. This is not a long shot. The only thing it hinges on is enough people speaking up with their attention and taking action. Worst case scenario? As I mentioned, if I’m wrong, we get a welcome digital detox and support smaller businesses. But if I’m right? We may have just created the leverage we need to fight back against corporate consolidation and dismantling of democracy through a practical, peaceful, and powerful act of defiance. Let's reclaim our power together. History is watching us now. Together, we can make this happen. Our collective action is the key to turning this tide. Let’s not go quietly. References
There are gatherings all across the country to speak out against the dismantling of our democracy on April 5th, coming in 2 days!
 For other events follow 50501.
This is a great high level summary of what has happened between January 20 - April 3, 2025. It's a serious situation, but Bernie offers hope. Change is going to have to come from the people, and we can win if we mobilize. I love that several comments talk about how Bernie is the "greatest president the US never had." I am not giving up, and neither should you. They need us more than we need them. This is how we take back our power. 🔥 The Digital Exodus We’re watching the foundations of democracy, climate justice, and truth itself is falling away, and many people are asking, “What can we actually do?” Here’s one concrete, overlooked step: --> We migrate. We unplug. We reclaim our digital and economic power. Big Tech companies - Meta, X, Google, Amazon, Apple - are no longer neutral platforms. They are actively profiting from surveillance, division, and in some cases, enabling political and climate collapse. But they only have power because we give it to them. What to do in the next 30 days:
How to PREPARE for the MOVE:
This isn’t about perfection. It’s about leverage. This is the most obvious, untapped leverage point we have. They gave us the key when the Big5 stood on the dias on inauguration day. Their arrogance shall be their downfall. If I’m wrong, the worst that happens is a long-overdue digital detox. If I’m right, this is how we begin to disrupt the infrastructure of collapse. Like the Last Alliance in Lord of the Rings. THIS moment matters. We still have time. But not much. Let’s move. Let’s take our power back! The power we gave away was over digital. So to get it back, we have to get off it. We don't need to part the river - we ARE the river.  For more details, visit The Peaceful Return Exodus
For those needing support while navigating tech transitions off the major platforms, with writing letters to Congress, or sharing the message, I am re-opening my J.E.D.I. (Just Effing Do It) community writing group, for Free. It's about Using the Force for Good to empower each other to speak up. The focus is on restoring peace, democracy and justice and building a world that cares for nature and all people, including the most vulnerable.  |
 Download the Exodus Guidebook
About
Blog focused on concrete actions we can take towards protecting life, justice and human rights.
Author
Amanda Ianthe Greene, Research, Policy and Systems Analyst, Archives
January 2026
Categories |
RSS Feed