Techbro Saves the World

Satire, Episode 1

Techbro wakes up 5 minutes before his 5 am alarm. He’s always pleased about this. As he brushes his teeth, he admires the close shaved stubble look his celebrity barber has arduously achieved for him. He can go in for a trim next week. Or maybe he could just pay the barber to come to the house? After all he’s busier than the barber who styles A list Bollywood actors.

There’s a new episode on the Cult Tech podcast. He slips on his LV Light up Earphones. He doesn’t want to disturb his sleeping partner. Techbro is considerate like that. She needs to look her best for the dinner they may have to attend tonight. The top tech disruptors award is probably his and there should be no bags under her eyes this time. She’s given it all up to help achieve his dreams and raise his children. Voluntarily, of course. Never mind that she has an MBA from MIT.

After all, selling his company for $666 million USD means they can both pursue their passion. His passion naturally is power. Hers- to look good. Though they still haven’t been able to get their hands on Ozempic yet. The personal trainer has utterly failed to help her drop those extra 300 gms around her waist. She’s desperate now.

The staff has his gym bag ready. Manu, the driver has not cleaned the Buggati today. He had last cleaned it the day after Techbro had used it last. Techbro takes three deep breaths to stay calm. He always goes to the Gym on Wednesdays in his Buggati. Why Manu doesn’t understand that the cars need to be cleaned from the inside again on the day he uses it is unfathomable. He will have to use the Maybach to drive. To the gym he has set up at the end of his farmhouse.

His trainer greets him. The warm up is on the whiteboard. The Cult Tech Podcast has X on . With great power comes great responsibility. He had a duty to buy Babble. To safeguard free speech and protect democracy. Governments couldn’t do it anymore. It was the duty of the free market and the TechBro Cult to protect the world from itself. After all, they had all the resources needed, And the added benefit of zero accountability for the experiments they could run on the populace. Life is about the quick pivots. If they needed to raise capital, their poorer Cultcousins FinanceBros would help them with it. In the hope that they would get to partake in the spoils of victory.

Photo by Victor Freitas on Unsplash

Warm up is complete. Techbro does two pulls up and switches from the podcast to dark techno. H in his podcast yesterday had suggested dark techno music allows cognitive function to switch, tricking the body into doing more pull ups or bench presses than it thinks it can. The other way of course is to have the trainer spot you. Then you only have to do half the work.

Techbro drinks his chocolate protein shake. The chocolate reminds him of his mother. The Hersheys chocolate milkshake she used to give him after his tennis lessons. It was a simpler time. Back then, his parents barely had enough money to send him to engineering prep school in Kota. And then to pay for IIT. And then for Harvard Business School. It was a tough time, but that gave him faith in capitalism. He had worked very hard. He had to take on teaching assistant positions for his weekly beer money. He couldn’t even afford a cleaning lady at $75 an hour. Had to do his own dishes and wash his own clothes. But he had persevered. If you wanted it badly enough, everything was achievable. Rewards were for the taking. All you needed was the grit to work really hard.

He had taken a class on Philanthrophy 10 years ago. He still remembered the fat girl with the piercing green eyes in that class who looked like she would put him through the wall every time he spoke. One time, all he’d said was that politics had nothing to do with the private sector. Obviously, the endowment had a fiduciary duty to make money. He didn’t see why one would divest from fossil fuel or prisons. The mandate was clear. Make money. She had stared him down for the rest of the class. And then waited for it to end to corner him. “It’s because of assholes like you, that the world is a shit show. Every decision you make is a political one. It’s your entitlement that blinds you from seeing it”.

What did she know about entitlement in India? He wasn’t even a Brahmin; he was a Kshatriya. His parents had to work really hard. It helped that they had ancestral land up and down North India and that his grandfather was a zamindaar. Some property was taken back at independence and they were left with the indignity of only less than 10- acres of land total. The college seniors at IIT had looked down on him. “He probably won’t set up something of his own or make it to Silicon Valley” they had whispered. The joke was on them now.  He had tried to reach out but none of those seniors had responded to him

Techbro idly wonders what Fat Girl with the piercing green eyes must be upto now. She was obviously not from the Business School. Probably the School of Government. One of those social justice warriors who were really the worst of the wonks. Which explained her choice of clothing and absolute lack of makeup in their 8 am class. He wonders if she still dresses like that.

He looks her up on Linkedin between sets. She’s leading the Global Practice on Indigenous Rights at the Save The World Foundation from Washington DC. Her feed full of articles that make his eyes glaze over.

The fundamental problem with the policy wonks was they spent too much time pontifying. The wasted so much of their time on nuance, going over all the things that may or may not go wrong. He didn’t understand their need for contingency. How could they not know what the problem was or spend so much time on caveats when it was so clear.

Why didn’t they just try something? They were just incompetent. The world doesn’t need bleeding hearts. It needs action. Solutions. People who can sell the glass while the wonks debate whether it’s half empty or half full. No wonder countries continue to lag behind on all SDGs. Who thought it was a good idea to put the wonks in-charge?

The trainer asks whether he can push off to his next client. Techbro nods imperially and dismisses him.

Techbro checks his messages on the screen hovering above the treadmill. The discord channel with the PR team has a new notification. The award results are in. He is #5 on the top disruptors list that they will formally release tonight. The PR team wants confirmation he will be attending. He sends a thumbs up emoji.

#5 doesn’t really mean anything. Especially since he had to lobby to get on the list. It does not have the same ring as #1.

He needed a project. If X was singlehandedly safeguarding speech, he could pick up a cause too. One that was audacious. Made a statement. A problem that affected billions across the world. That by design needed scalability and therefore tech.

He ramps up the speed on the treadmill to 10. And pumps up the volume of his generic dark techno. Beads of sweat drip off his face. He moves the speed upto 12.  A Bold Idea with a tech solution.

“STOP” . The machine responds to his order.  

CALL SHABNAM, EA July 2024 he commands as he steps off. Dark techno is replaced by the sound of the phone ringing. 4 rings later he disconnects. It’s 6:25 am. Shabnam should be up and available. This will not do. He will have to bring this up at their weekly performance review. One more strike and she’s out the door. The new generation has zero work ethic or drive. He remembers his mindfulness practice. Takes 7 deep breathes and finishes what’s left of his protein shake.

6:28 am. He calls her again. No response. He doesn’t have time to wait for her to call back. He leaves a voice note. 

“We need to create a foundation by the end of the week. I’ll donate 1% of my net worth to this. Give me 3 name alternatives for foundations.  Have a draft press release out by the end of the day. Then let’s start rounding up competent people from corporate to form my A team. Only MBAs and IITians. Doesn’t matter if they have zero experience in subject matter. They have the rigour and they’ve been trained to be systematic problem solvers.. In 21 days, we’ll launch a scalable solution to poverty.”

Next month, he’ll reach out to Fat Girl with Green eyes. That will show her.

Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash