Peace reigns in the little city of Tammisaari. Nothing in this idyllic corner of the world brings to mind George Orwell’s iconic novel 1984. Yet my thoughts drift to it.

Orwell was far ahead of his time, but not far enough. He imagined a world ruled by totalitarian superpowers; a world full of mass surveillance; a world where history was rewritten, alternative facts were introduced as truths, and cults were built around leaders. We saw all of these trends escalating, when the Terrifying Triplets, Trump, Putin and Xi Jinping (identical in mindset, if not parentage), were in charge of the world’s superpowers. Two out of the three still remain in office, and the third is frantically scrambling to get back into the game using every imaginable – and most probably some unimaginable – means.

The Chinese have taken Orwell a step further. Especially those, who subscribe to the Chinese cultural concept Tianxia and envision a world with only one center from which the rulers of different areas derive their power. While the Western world plays around with concepts like ‘back to the 60’s, 80’s, or whatever’, the Chinese play around with the concept of ‘back to a worldwide rule similar to that of the Emperor of China’. The latter lasted for thousands of years.

But even Orwell and the Chinese have yet to imagine a metaversum – a virtual world above and beyond our present one. Talk about thinking out of the box – straight into the Matrix. Kudos to Zuckerberg and those faceless entities behind him. They really think big. Why bother with physical wars, states and borders, treaties and laws. Just take the world population and virtually shift it to the metaversum ruled by you.

And yes, I do understand that the metaverse in itself is nothing new, hence the term metaversum to distinguish between the underlying technology and the content.

My favourite newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, recently ran an article on the rise of companies like Atai Life Sciences, Mind Medicine and Compass Pathways. All of these companies engage in research of psychedelics and the use of them to fight e.g. mental illness. At first glance, this has nothing to do with the topic above. However, the ownership and direction of a company can easily change.

These seemingly separate issues took on a whole new life during a lively family discussion about potential combinations of the metaversum and psychedelics. As the family library used to contain hundreds of science fiction books before its remove to Kindle, some pretty scary alternatives were envisioned. The potential for the trip of a lifetime – in more ways than one – was clear.

As you can see, I am jumping all over the place, combining issues with a free hand. There is a common thread, however. I wonder when we will confess to ourselves that things are slowly, but surely, spinning out of the national and international controls we have set up so far. Even though it is hard to notice in slumbering cities like Tammisaari.

I know climate change is a big issue, and I support every effort to save Planet Earth. But what about its people? Are we doing enough to ensure that they will be free to enjoy the planet we – hopefully – save; or will the world fall on its own digital sword one way or another, while we just watch from the sides and blog about it?

I keep coming back to the totalitarian mantra from 1984: “War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength”. It seems the world is intent on building on said strength. A foundation similar to quicksand.

I feel as overwhelmed as Orwell’s main character, Winston. Democracy seems to be slipping away. Not only due to actions of the Terrifying Triplets and like-minded leaders but also due to actions of multinational companies seemingly beyond democratic controI.

Call me suspicious, but I have stayed out of Facebook aka Meta and I will definitely stay out of the metaversum. Most of my cheerfully facebooking friends will probably not even notice that they entered it.