Paul Graham moved back to the UK years ago. He hasn't run Y Combinator since 2014. Of course he still has many social and professional connections to the bay area, but he doesn't have to worry about what some activists in SF will do.
Is there a single instance of a hundred millionaire/billionaire having a "real job"? With "real job" defined as doing something you'd otherwise not do if it wasn't for the pressure of having a place to live and food to eat.
Those Girard books that Peter Thiel wants you to buy because (1) Thiel got a commission and (2) Thiel doesn't know anything academic that didn't happen at Stanford.
Girard seemed to think that the great cultural problem of the world was "The Court of Versailles" where nobles who have no real problems just compete to be the same as each other. It's a compelling problem if you're a vendor who makes fancy stuff for the palace (e.g. one of those mirror makers who got assassinated to protect the secret of making mirrors) but for the 99% of people who grow rice, wheat, corn whatever it is that supports the life of most people and the vendors who serve the palace, it is just designed to erase your perception of your own life and make it a pale shadow of someone else's narcissism.
Sorry, I meant the decoder of what you feel he's really trying to say through some obfuscated means. I suppose you've attributed some ideas to him, otherwise why the talk about the "smackdown from LGBT activists", but you just alluded to it instead of writing "he says this, this, and that, but he's using the following code: ..."
That's hardly useful, because it's more mysticism, and there's no testing your opinion, and so it also can't be rejected .
