What happens when everything becomes Memecoin?

By Kyla Scanlon

Compiled by: Vernacular Blockchain

Tragedy of the Commons

In economics, the tragedy of the commons occurs when a shared resource—like farmland, fisheries, or clean air—is overexploited and eventually collapses. Today, we’re experiencing a modern version of the tragedy of the commons, not just in physical resources but also in the basic infrastructure of our society:

Social public resources: trust, relationships, and community.

The epistemic commons: Curiosity, education, and critical thinking.

Economic public resources: stable markets, shared prosperity, and trust in institutions.

Information commons: language, reality, and basic consensus.

Unlike traditional commons, which collapse due to physical exhaustion, these intangible resources gradually disintegrate due to systemic incentives that reward isolation, compliance, instability, and fragmentation.

It may be a little bold, but I think we are moving towards a social operating system of "incelism" - no longer just an online subculture, but the default mode of society. "Incelism" refers to a group of people who believe they can't find a romantic partner, often expressing emotions such as "resentment, hatred, self-pity, racism, misogyny and world-weariness". This mentality is eroding public resources: isolation, outsourced cognition, flattened identities and performative resentment have become the profitable norm. Governance and culture are dominated by memes, resentment and algorithm-driven anger.

Social public resources

A stable society begins with stable relationships—friends, neighbors, co-workers, family. These connections form the basis on which abstract concepts like democracy or economic growth can function.

But the status quo is not optimistic. Many people have discussed this, such as Derek Thompson, who brilliantly described how we are alienated from each other in his cover article "The Antisocial Century" in The Atlantic Monthly. Meaningful connections between gender, class, and politics seem to be collapsing. The social infrastructure after the epidemic has been bent and deformed, and we have lost shared norms and collective rituals. What replaces them? Transactional connections, platformized loneliness, and false sense of belonging provided by algorithmic tribes - these are nothing more than reflecting your preferences back to you. Social interactions (from friendship to love) are increasingly being economized, optimized, ranked, and gamified. (Of course, there are good sides to the Internet and dating apps, but negative trends seem to prevail.)

A society built on transactional interactions and shallow connections is inherently fragile. People who can’t trust each other in their daily lives won’t suddenly trust each other at the polls. People who can’t sustain friendships or partnerships may also have trouble engaging in democratic institutions or civic engagement. Without a solid foundation of relationships, a society cannot sustain a stable democracy.

Without real community bonds, civic engagement declines and, as Guy Debord warned, politics becomes a matter of show rather than substance.

Cognitive Public Resources

We no longer teach people to think—we teach people to obey.

Curiosity is now seen as risky or inefficient.

It’s a pattern: No one wants to take a chance. Not elected officials, not 19-year-olds choosing college majors. Because in this economy, everything becomes compliance. As the Italian philosopher Umberto Eco warned in “Proto-Fascism,” social systems don’t collapse overnight but erode through small compromises, through the gradual normalization of compliance as a civic virtue.

Take Cluely, for example. This product, which lets you “cheat” on dates by wearing glasses, is part marketing gimmick (how to earn clicks by irritating people) and partly reflects the current ethos of cognitive commons. The rise of AI companies has made us rethink what it means to be human, and their answer is “efficiency and optimization.” Maybe this is the answer.

Cluely’s manifesto proclaims: “We built it so you never have to think alone again.” AI is no longer a tool to assist thinking; it’s trying to replace it. Critical thinking, ambiguity, creativity—the beautiful things that define being human—are replaced by optimized instant answers.

This is everywhere. In politics, nuance has become dangerous, and Congress is afraid to stand up to President Trump. Even in leisure time, hobbies are measured by their “side hustle potential.” Anne Helen Petersen writes in a brilliant essay: “The logic we have internalized is pernicious and persistent: if you spend time doing something, and that thing has the potential to make money, it would be financially irresponsible not to do it.” The obsessive pursuit and monetization of hobbies is not just escapism, but a response to educational burnout, economic instability, and performative living. It is a way for people to assert identity and agency within structural constraints. Optimize, efficiency, monetize, repeat!

Without curiosity and critical thinking, we are easily manipulated, susceptible to polarized narratives, and ultimately lose the ability to exercise independent judgment—which is essential to democratic citizenship.

Economic public resources

Policy is a projection of emotion—when those who despise the system become the system itself.

The economy depends on trust—not just in money or policy, but in the reliable rules and institutions surrounding money and policy. Today, that trust is evaporating. Why? Because economic policy has become an arena for personal grudges, emotional reactions, and political theatrics. I’ve written about the problem of trust many times. Take tariffs, for example. They were supposed to be a strategic tool, but lately they have been anything but. Rates have been arbitrarily adjusted, supply chains have been disrupted, and businesses have been at a loss.

According to Bloomberg, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent privately acknowledged this instability at a closed-door investor meeting arranged by JPMorgan, saying that the current 145% tariff status quo on China is unsustainable. He hinted that it would soon be cooled (although negotiations have not yet begun), and pointed out that container bookings between China and the United States have fallen 64%, according to Eamon Javers. He made it clear that "the goal is not to decouple", but to push China towards a consumer society and the United States towards a manufacturing society.

This is outrageous because it seems to suggest that we are entering the "Chinese Century." America is giving up the most comfortable seat in the seat. When you look at Chinese manufacturing -- like the Xiaomi factory "making one phone per second, no production employees (only maintenance staff), perspective, running 24 hours a day, lights off" -- you can't help but wonder, what's the point?

Even more disturbing is why this critical information was shared privately at a closed-door investor event at JPMorgan, rather than publicly and transparently? Part of it is that no one dared to question Trump directly - Bessant seems to have leaked a lot of information because it was too politically risky to question him publicly. Another part may be some kind of "handshake-high-five-you are my people-go trade this news" hint.

Meanwhile, in public, both sides oscillate between aggressive posturing and vague promises. Trump publicly said he would not "go hard" with China, suggesting a cooling of the mood, at least for now. He also gave up on the idea of firing Powell. The market certainly rose on the news, but it was just news. The economy will still be in trouble because of these fluctuations.

The market is running purely on "vibe" right now. Who can blame them? Looking at these headlines, it's like someone talking to himself.

China, for its part, says it is willing to negotiate, but only on the basis of mutual respect and reduced threats. Of course they should demand that! By contrast, the United States in its negotiations with Japan seems to be like a child in a toy store: “We don’t know what we want, but we definitely want something.” The result is headline-driven market volatility and diplomatic deadlock.

Martin Wolf hits the nail on the head on Odd Lots: The United States enjoys enormous economic power due to the dollar's reserve currency status, and can easily maintain huge deficits. However, the United States seems determined to squander this advantage through chaotic, emotion-driven policy decisions. Wolf bluntly said: "You are rich and safe - unless you screw up too badly. And now, why do you have to screw up so badly? This is where we are now."

We all know (even the original supporters of the tariffs) that this is a profoundly irrational way of governing, with policies not based on economic logic but shaped by resentment and projection. There was no plan at all - Bessant and Lutnick had to go behind the back of tariff supporter Navarro to convince Trump to remove the tariffs. Look at this!

Meanwhile, ordinary Americans are bracing for an impact. CEOs of Walmart, Target, and Home Depot privately warned Trump that tariffs could lead to supply chain disruptions and empty shelves. Who benefits from the trade war? According to the NBER, it’s government-connected companies! No wonder Tim Cook called personally!

Hiring freezes are spreading across the country, causing grassroots economic pain—a real price to pay for abstract resentment. Goldman Sachs estimates that across-the-board layoffs of federal employees (including contract and funded workers) could be as high as 1.2 million, with a $90 billion loss in the travel and tourism industry, or about 0.3% of GDP. Real price. For what?

We are burning through the economic commons not because it makes sense but because our political leaders are confusing economic policy with personal vendettas. Chaotic markets are flourishing and trust is evaporating.

Information Public Resources

We no longer have a shared reality—only overlapping simulations.

A simple way to tell if a space has a healthy information commons is this: Can you describe reality without immediately sparking debate? Can we agree on a common language, basic facts, and even the meaning of words? Increasingly, the answer is: no. I wrote about this in 2022 as well.

The information commons — language, reality, and basic consensus — are collapsing because we have monetized division. Social media platforms are not built for clarity or understanding, but for engagement, outrage, and polarization. Algorithms don’t reward nuance, but certainty, controversy, and emotional triggers.

What has replaced consensus reality? Loyalty reality, tribal reality, personalized reality! We no longer debate ideas or solutions, but rather whose facts matter, whose feelings matter, whose truth wins. Truth itself becomes a loyalty test rather than a common ground. Without a shared commons of information, collaboration becomes impossible. We don’t solve problems, but rather argue over who gets to define them! Language is weaponized and reality is fragmented.

in conclusion

So, what to do? Bitcoin is rising again. Since “Liberation Day” it has decoupled from the Nasdaq and is up 10% while the S&P 500 is down 6%. Its rise is not optimism but a direct vote for a breakdown in trust (and it has diversified away from the US). The rise of assets like gold, silver, defense stocks and cryptocurrencies reflects the ups and downs of the social, cognitive, economic and informational spheres.

These public resources are eroded, monetized, and exploited. Social trust turns into transactional loneliness. Curiosity is replaced by compliance and cognitive outsourcing. Stable economic governance is replaced by chaotic performance. Shared reality is fragmented into competing tribes and personalized truths.

In other words, we have institutionalized involuntary celibacy—no longer just romantic isolation, but profitable disconnection built into the fabric of society. The market impact is clear: as trust erodes, volatility increases, and traditional safe-haven assets regain dominance. Investors either seek secret information from within their governments or diversify into precious metals, infrastructure, dividend-paying companies, and global portfolios to hedge against domestic policy vagaries.

Social infrastructure is not lost forever. Unlike depleted fisheries or farmland, these intangible resources can be regenerated by choosing connection over transaction, critical thinking over conformity, substance over performance, and shared realities over isolated tribes.