Stupidity as a Systemic Outcome: Psychopolitics, Digital Architecture, and the Purge of Critical Voices in Tech

The Age of Compulsory Distraction

In Psychopolitics: Neoliberalism and New Technologies of Power, philosopher Byung-Chul Han argues that contemporary capitalism no longer depends on open repression. Instead, it governs through overstimulation, overinformation, and enforced positivity, creating a population that is exhausted, distracted, and politically passive.

Han’s concept of “stupidity as a systemic outcome” does not refer to a lack of intelligence. It refers to the erosion of sustained, critical thought in a culture of perpetual distraction. This condition is deliberately engineered. It is embedded in the digital platforms that shape public consciousness. In the United States technology sector, this architecture is reinforced through the deliberate removal of people who could expose or disrupt it.

Psychopolitics and the Manufacture of Cognitive Weakness

Han distinguishes between the disciplinary society, described by Foucault, where power commands “Obey,” and the achievement society, where power whispers “Perform, optimize, engage.” In the latter, exploitation is internalized. People drive themselves to be constantly visible, productive, and responsive, believing it is self-expression while in reality serving the needs of capital.

Digital platforms operationalize this through three primary mechanisms. First, the attention economy turns human focus into a tradable commodity, prioritizing endless engagement over comprehension. Infinite scroll, autoplay, and algorithmic feeds keep users in motion but never in reflection. Second, overinformation floods the mind until discernment fails. When contradictory claims share the same stage, truth and falsehood become indistinguishable. Third, forced positivity and self-branding reward shallow outrage and personal promotion while punishing depth or dissent. Direct censorship becomes unnecessary because the system itself prevents deep thinking from surviving.

The Architecture of Engineered Stupidity

The United States technology industry does not simply tolerate this condition. It builds it.

Interface design follows the logic of operant conditioning. Intermittent reward systems keep users compulsively checking for likes or notifications. Frictionless consumption removes pauses that could permit reflection, such as when headlines are stripped from shared links. Algorithmic filtering supplies only content that confirms existing beliefs, eliminating the discomfort that provokes serious thought.

This architecture extends into the internal structures of the companies themselves. Individuals who understand and resist these manipulations are systematically removed. Between 2022 and 2024, major firms such as Meta, Google, and Twitter eliminated thousands of positions in trust and safety, policy, and ethical AI. Whistleblowers like Frances Haugen and Timnit Gebru were driven out for revealing structural harms. Contract moderators and data labelers, who see the unfiltered reality of platform toxicity, are kept in precarious positions without protection or influence.

These purges are not separate from the architecture of distraction. They are its institutional counterpart. Removing those who might introduce friction inside the company mirrors the removal of friction from user experience. Both serve the same goal: a smooth, unbroken flow of engagement unimpeded by critical resistance.

Restoring the Capacity for Thought

Han’s framework makes clear that this condition will not be reversed by personal willpower alone. Structural change is required. Breaking the monopoly of attention requires alternative platforms that reject engagement-optimized design. Regulating technology must involve transparency in algorithms and a ban on dark patterns. Protecting critical labor requires strong unions, enforceable whistleblower protections, and the recognition that those who create ethical friction are a public resource, not an internal threat.

“Stupidity” is not just intellectual deficiency but also the systematic erosion of the capacity for sustained reflection, critical reasoning, and autonomous judgment.

Conclusion: Stupidity as a Profitable Condition

The erosion of critical capacity is not a byproduct of digital capitalism. It is a core operating principle. The same logic that builds infinite scroll also fires ethicists. The same logic that floods the user with noise silences the worker who tries to stop it. Until the architecture of distraction is dismantled and those who challenge it are reinstated in positions of influence, the cycle will deepen.

The central question is no longer why people are so easily manipulated. The central question is who profits from ensuring that they remain that way.