Cyberpunk fiction often depicts large corporations as more powerful than governments themselves, with a wide scope of capabilities and very little consequence to their gross misconduct. Human lives are reduced to a question of profit and loss, as was the case with the Tyrell Corporation in Blade Runner.
Table of Contents
This dystopian perspective is truly not that removed from the real world. Capitalism itself relies heavily on the question of prioritization: to prioritize anything outside of generating revenue immediately risks the very foundation of a multitude of organizations. It's why Disney treats animators terribly, and why the niche marketplaces of webcomics or galleries severely underpay and mistreat their content creators.
The American military-industrial complex, which includes defense contractors, government agencies, politians, and soldiers quite literally infiltrate every single level of international society (Weber 2019). Ghost in the Shell serves as wonderful propaganda, arguably, in favor of the militarization of technology; the line between military and civilian life dissolves completely, as facial recognition and drone tech are as heavily utilized in the media as they are in the modern world.
Everyone's Favorite Military
Glancing Over Numbers
Lockheed Martin, one of the largest defense contractors in the United States, perfectly depicts the blend of corporate profit and national defense.
In the year 2020, Lockheed recieved over $75 billion in Pentagon contracts, a figure that was somehow more than the entire budget of the State Department and USAID combined (Hartung & Semler 2025). In spite of critiques for the F-35 fighter jet being overpriced and underperforming, Lockheed continues recieving massive funding with little to no governmental oversight, mirroring the Tyrell Corporation's prioritization of technological dominance over all ethical obligations.
The military-industrial complex thrives on constant conflict, which directly impacts the quality of life worldwide and the national budget. In 2023, the budget for the military reached $1.14 trillion dollars; for contrast, the budget for public health that same year was $100 billion. The budget for education, just to further the point, was $84 billion.
The Department of Homeland Security recieved more than seven times the funding for the Centers for Disease control over the past seven years. The Congressional Budget Office found that the U.S. military could save $100 billion without changing the country's national security strategy, and a Department of Defense study found $125 billion in unnecessary back-office expenses could easily be trimmed. Instead, recent years have found an increase in military budget, cutting even more funding from healthcare, education, public transportation, energy, and housing (National Priorities Project 2023).
Glancing Over Policies
The military industrial complex does not merely include manufacturing weapons. It shapes foreign policy, surveillance practices, and domestic policing. Defense contractors lobby Congress, fund think tanks, and advocate for contracts that continue their powerful hold on global politics, much like cyberpunk's themes of surveillance capitalism.
Globally, the military destabilizes various countries by promoting military solutions over diplomatic ones. There are a plethora of examples: currently, America's seige on Iran stems from America's military support of an ongoing genocide, and the American support for Middle Eastern suffering stems from American interests in natural resources and political alliances.
America's bombing of a girl's school in Iran served no political interests, offered no economic benefit, and established no military strategy outside of maximizing harm and grief to leverage against American enemies, the vast majority of whom are merely civilians.
Glimpsing Our Future
The unchecked growth, lack of transparency, and prioritization of profit absolutely indicates that cyberpunk was right. Corporations influence foreign policy more than diplomats. Surveillance is privatized. War is automated; people have been expecting a so-called "World War III" for nearly a decade. Profit literally dictates what matters more, fear tactics or a school's worth of elementary lives.
Works Cited
Hartung W.D. & Semler S. (2025). Profits of War: Top Beneficiaries of Pentagon Spending, 2020 – 2024 (2020) Costs of War | Brown University. Available at: https://costsofwar.watson.brown.edu/paper/profits-war-top-beneficiaries-pentagon-spending-2020-2024.
National Priorities Project. (2023). The Warfare State: How Funding for Militarism Compromises Our Welfare. National Priorities Project. https://www.nationalpriorities.org/analysis/2023/warfare-state-how-funding-militarism-compromises-our-welfare/
Weber, R. N. (2019). Military-industrial complex. In Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/topic/military-industrial-complex
AI attestation: No AI was used in the creation of this post. Genuinely none; I'm far too passionate about how horrifying America's military industrial complex is to rely on some computer telling me what I know. I know this was very late in being written, and I'm truly so sorry.
Hi guys! GRWM to build my personal brand! If you're new here, welcome to my channel! I’m Modesola, and this is a day in the life of someone who is also their own product.
Table of Contents
Scroll through any social media platform, and you will see it immediately: people are sharing content and at the same time becoming it. The rise of the creator economy has turned identity into something hybrid, fluid, and performative. A creator today exists as a person, a brand, a data profile, and a set of metrics tracked by an algorithm. Through Donna Haraway’s cyborg theory and Janelle Monáe’s android persona in The ArchAndroid, this hybrid identity reads as a cyborg self that carries both new forms of liberation and new forms of control.
Becoming the Brand Self
The creator economy has opened real pathways for people to shape their own public identities and income streams. Recent reporting on the “Creator Economy 3.0” describes creators building direct relationships with audiences and operating as independent brand entities rather than relying on traditional corporate gatekeepers (Malik, 2024). This shift gives individuals space to define their own voice, aesthetic, and narrative. Haraway’s cyborg rejects fixed categories and stable boundaries, and in this sense, the creator becomes a hybrid subject who moves between worker, artist, entrepreneur, and persona. Monáe’s android identity in The ArchAndroid offers a parallel example. Her persona crosses lines between human and machine, performance and self, using hybridity as a form of expression and resistance. In the creator economy, people construct public selves that can challenge expectations around gender, race, class, and profession.
When the Algorithm Edits the Self
At the same time, the systems that enable visibility also shape how identity appears. One account of creator labor describes how the most popular posts are often the least honest ones because they align more closely with platform incentives and audience expectations (Glass, 2024). This points to a subtle shift. Identity becomes something that is adjusted, curated, and optimized for reach. The algorithm does not simply distribute content. It rewards certain forms of self-presentation and discourages others. Haraway’s idea of the informatics of domination helps explain this dynamic. Technological systems organize social relations and influence what kinds of identities gain visibility. In this environment, the self is expressive and strategic at the same time, shaped by both personal intention and platform logic.
Freedom with a Cost
The pressure created by these systems has real effects on creators’ lives. Reports on influencer burnout describe constant expectations to produce, maintain engagement, and remain visible, which often lead to exhaustion and reduced creative autonomy (“Invisible influencer burnout,” 2024). The boundary between personal identity and labor becomes difficult to separate. The hybrid self that once felt empowering can begin to feel like a responsibility that never turns off. The creator gains independence from traditional workplaces, yet becomes accountable to an ongoing stream of metrics and performance signals. This reflects the tension at the center of both Haraway’s cyborg and Monáe’s android. Hybridity opens space for new identities and new freedoms, while still operating within systems of power that shape how those identities are expressed and valued.
Designing the Self in the Next Generation
Looking ahead, this hybrid identity will likely become even more complex. Over the next 20 to 30 years, creators may manage multiple digital selves across different platforms, supported by AI tools that help generate content, analyze audiences, and even perform parts of identity. Virtual influencers and avatar-based personas may become more common, allowing people to design forms of selfhood that are not tied to a single physical body. This could expand opportunities for expression and allow marginalized voices to build identities outside restrictive social categories. At the same time, these identities may be more deeply shaped by platform governance, data ownership, and algorithmic visibility. The future of the creator economy may involve both expanded freedom to construct identity and more sophisticated systems that guide and evaluate those constructions.
So maybe the real shift is not just about becoming cyborgs. It is about learning how to live inside identities that we are constantly building, editing, and negotiating in public. Every post is a small decision about who we are and how we want to be seen, even when those choices are shaped by systems we do not fully control. Haraway’s cyborg and Monáe’s android remind us that hybrid identity can still be a site of creativity and resistance. The challenge is figuring out how to move within these systems without giving up ownership of the selves we are trying to create.
Anyway, that’s it for today, guys! Don’t forget to like, comment, subscribe, and think about which version of yourself you want the world to see next.
References
(2025, December 26). Invisible influencer burnout: When algorithm trumps creativity. CE Noticias Financieras English. https://advance.lexis.com/api/document?collection=news&id=urn%3acontentItem%3a6HHM-YF73-RXGV-T2TV-00000-00&context=1519360&identityprofileid=NZ9N7751352
Glass, M. (2026, February 2). I finally understood why my most liked posts are the least honest ones. DMNews. https://advance.lexis.com/api/document?collection=news&id=urn%3acontentItem%3a6HTK-P7F3-S2G4-M42J-00000-00&context=1519360&identityprofileid=NZ9N7751352
Malik, S. (2026, February 16). Creator Economy 3.0: From Sponsored Posts to Brand Co. Agency Reporter. https://advance.lexis.com/api/document?collection=news&id=urn%3acontentItem%3a6HXY-R0G3-RRV5-908X-00000-00&context=1519360&identityprofileid=NZ9N7751352
AI Attestation
The content of this post is my own, and AI was used only to assist with planning and editing.
The creator economy has opened real pathways for people to shape their own public identities and income streams. Recent reporting on the “Creator Economy 3.0” describes creators building direct relationships with audiences and operating as independent brand entities rather than relying on traditional corporate gatekeepers (Malik, 2024). This shift gives individuals space to define their own voice, aesthetic, and narrative. Haraway’s cyborg rejects fixed categories and stable boundaries, and in this sense, the creator becomes a hybrid subject who moves between worker, artist, entrepreneur, and persona. Monáe’s android identity in The ArchAndroid offers a parallel example. Her persona crosses lines between human and machine, performance and self, using hybridity as a form of expression and resistance. In the creator economy, people construct public selves that can challenge expectations around gender, race, class, and profession.
At the same time, the systems that enable visibility also shape how identity appears. One account of creator labor describes how the most popular posts are often the least honest ones because they align more closely with platform incentives and audience expectations (Glass, 2024). This points to a subtle shift. Identity becomes something that is adjusted, curated, and optimized for reach. The algorithm does not simply distribute content. It rewards certain forms of self-presentation and discourages others. Haraway’s idea of the informatics of domination helps explain this dynamic. Technological systems organize social relations and influence what kinds of identities gain visibility. In this environment, the self is expressive and strategic at the same time, shaped by both personal intention and platform logic.
The pressure created by these systems has real effects on creators’ lives. Reports on influencer burnout describe constant expectations to produce, maintain engagement, and remain visible, which often lead to exhaustion and reduced creative autonomy (“Invisible influencer burnout,” 2024). The boundary between personal identity and labor becomes difficult to separate. The hybrid self that once felt empowering can begin to feel like a responsibility that never turns off. The creator gains independence from traditional workplaces, yet becomes accountable to an ongoing stream of metrics and performance signals. This reflects the tension at the center of both Haraway’s cyborg and Monáe’s android. Hybridity opens space for new identities and new freedoms, while still operating within systems of power that shape how those identities are expressed and valued.
Looking ahead, this hybrid identity will likely become even more complex. Over the next 20 to 30 years, creators may manage multiple digital selves across different platforms, supported by AI tools that help generate content, analyze audiences, and even perform parts of identity. Virtual influencers and avatar-based personas may become more common, allowing people to design forms of selfhood that are not tied to a single physical body. This could expand opportunities for expression and allow marginalized voices to build identities outside restrictive social categories. At the same time, these identities may be more deeply shaped by platform governance, data ownership, and algorithmic visibility. The future of the creator economy may involve both expanded freedom to construct identity and more sophisticated systems that guide and evaluate those constructions.