You Cannot Criticize "Flaccid Power" Without Reading My Unattainable Thesis


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You spent dozens of hours listening to my hard-hitting guest interviews on myriad podcasts, read countless 3,999 character tweets, you even went so far as to analyze the places where I wasn’t filling the airwaves with content, like searching for shadows of my ideas to sculpt the soft outline.

And I’m telling you, that is not far enough. I’m sorry, but unless you read my 400 page thesis — of which a single paper copy resides on a forgotten subbasement shelf in a dusty MIT library — you are not qualified to critique me, my ideas, my forthcoming book “Flaccid Power,” available for pre-order on Amazon™, or my confusing choice of innuendo for its title.

This must be hard for you, even if it’s not for me.

Look, I get it. You find joy in pointing out holes in arguments. I would to, if I were capable of debasing myself to seek out holes. But how can you know what the arguments are, if you’ve only listened to hundreds of hours of me saying contradictory and inconsistent things? You simply can’t; it’s a fool’s errand. I am rock solid, a bricked wall, and your attempt is a faint breeze. A big bad wolf simply incapable of blowing my house down.

I’m sorry, but it’s impossible to blow me away.

But you’re going to try. And keep trying. And you wouldn’t believe it, but your attempts are a perfect example of “turgid violence,” a concept I have outlined in great detail in my thesis, of which you are completely unfamiliar. But rest assured, it is.

Do you disagree? Wow, another case of “turgid violence.” If only you had read my thesis, so you could understand why.

Are you sure you don’t want to spend $40 to buy my book? Despite what you might expect it’s only available in hard-cover.

Reading my book will, of course, still disqualify you from critiquing the ideas contained within it. Because — and I feel like I’ve been both clear and hard as crystal on this point — the ideas are only adequately covered in my thesis.

…what do you mean you’re buying a plane ticket to Boston? No no, look, there’s no need for that, the PDF will be updated on MIT’s website in the next three months. Why not just wait until then to–

Yes it’s in the Hayden Library. They are reorganizing things there so good luck finding it.

Oh, you found it? Very helpful of the staff to point it out for you. Cool. That’s cool. Are you sure you don’t want to wait until the PDF is uploaded? I’m sure that would be more convenient for you. Why not just wait instead of cracking that softly bound thesis open–

You know what? I don’t have to explain myself to you. You clearly don’t have the level of pedigree to understand the significance of my work. And yes, my thesis did require 50 annotated pages comparing nation-state cyberwar capabilities with various dildo designs, and NO, I will not explain why.

At least not until you’ve tried them.