Elon Musk (2015) and Peter Thiel (2022)
21 July 2024
Slang terms often exist for years before the general public takes notice of them. Broligarchy and broligarch are examples of this. The words are a play on bro + oligarchy. And a broligarchy is small group of men who control a situation or political power structure. It differs from an ordinary oligarchy in that a broligarchy carries with it a connotation of toxic masculinity.
Neither broligarchy nor broligarch appear in any traditionally published media outlets until July 2024, but the word existed in social media and the alternative press, especially Twitter/X for many years before that. The first example of the word that I can find is on Twitter from 7 December 2009, when a user posted:
the broligarchy has spoken. you are cool.
The context of this tweet is unclear
The word makes into the Urbandictionary on 22 May 2011:
Broligarchy
A small cadre of Bros who snatch control of any scenario.
I tried to play beer-pong at that party last night, but that table was such a fuckin' broligarchy.
And the blog The Belle Jar includes the term in a glossary of bro-terms on 19 December 2014:
Broligarchy—A form of power structure in which power effectively rests with a small number of bros, most often distinguished by the power of their bro-ness.
On 3 March 2023, the Arkansas Times, an alternative newspaper, has this in an article on the state legislature:
The Arkansas Legislature, aka the broligarchy, does not believe in the people’s right to the ballot process. This is as disappointing as is it unconstitutional, though the unconstitutionality isn’t stopping the bill’s sponsors.
In the article, the word broligarchy is hyperlinked to an article from two days earlier about how Arkansas has relatively few female legislators, so the implication of toxic masculinity is clear.
But slightly earlier a different, a more specific type of bro with a slightly different connotation appeared. The element of toxic masculinity was still there, but broligarch became linked to Silicon Valley, where the power structure revolves around tech-bros. There is this tweet from 27 May 2018:
Elon Musk is a real life Tony Stark but if Tony Stark just stayed a cunt instead of becoming Iron Man. Give me 1000 journalists @ the top of their game over 1 “fun” Broligarch who shits out a flame thrower, launches his car into space & spends money on efforts to impugn reporters
On 25 February 2024, the politically activist, alternative dance/industrial musical group Consolidated, posted a song to the Bandcamp website titled Serfin’ U.S.A./The Broligarchy. The word appears only in the song’s title, but the lyrics show that the tech-bro sense is clearly intended:
Hey baby baby check it do u wanna free music with me?
Hey baby baby we can kick it and hasten the end of the industry
Hey baby baby hold up ur still clinging to ur fantasy
Where u say ur an artist and ur makin the do re mi
But we all know it's $.03
He's an AssEt, she's a commodity
He's volatile, she's his security
He's a crypto, she's a NFT
He's a merger, she's an acquisition
Together they're a contradiction.. neuz guitar.
And there is this exchange posted to Threads.net on 19 July 2024:
dncndenise: What is TRULY frightening is the Silicon Valley dudes who want Twitler because they want the dollar to DROP in value so they can get CRYPTO to be the "world currency". That screws ALL of us and makes them RICH! Apparently realizing that they were losing their @$$3$ because Crypto is a Ponzi scheme, doesn't matter. They want their money back and they'll be OK destroying the US to get it. Read Mark Cuban's Xitter post on it. I'm SO disgusted.
Pcrritesgood: Tech Broligarchy.
Dncndenise: Yup!
Broligarch would finally hit the mainstream press on 20 July 2024 with Donald Trump’s selection of J. D. Vance as his running mate in the 2024 U.S. presidential election. Vance had long been linked to Silicon Valley entrepreneur and icon of toxic masculinity Peter Thiel. The Guardian newspaper printed an article by Carole Cadwalladr with the headline “Tech Broligarchs Are Lining Up to Court Trump,” and which contained this line:
Thiel is betting—again—on the same phenomenon in America. Betting that he will be first among a new breed of tech bro oligarchs—a new super-class of broligarchs.
The article generated a spike in the use of the term across social media.
It’s too early to tell what will happen with the word. It may be a flash in the pan, as often happens when the mainstream press gets hold of a slang term. Or it may become a staple of political commentary for years to come. In the latter case, the tech-bro sense will probably dominate the more general plain-bro sense. But for now, both the more general and the specific senses are coexisting.
Sources:
Andre (The Wet Gamer) Cole, @coolsl4w. X.com, 7 December 2009.
“The Bromicon.” The Belle Jar (blog), 19 December 2014.
Cadwalladr, Carole. “Tech Broligarchs Are Lining Up to Court Trump. And Vance Is One More Link in the Chain.” Guardian, 20 July 2024.
Consolidated. “Serfin’ U.S.A./The Broligarchy.” Bandcamp.com, 25 February 2024.
“Legislators Try New Tricks to Tank Citizen’s Right to Put Issues on the Ballot.” Arkansas Times (Little Rock), 3 March 2023.
pcrritesgood. Threads.net, 19 July 2024.
Thischarminham, @Thischarminham. X.com, 27 May 2018.
Urbandictionary.com, 22 May 2011, s.v. Broligarchy.
Photo credits: Elon Musk: Steve Jurvetson, 2015; Wikimedia Commons; Flickr.com; licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license. Peter Thiel: Gage Skidmore, 2022; Wikimedia Commons; licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.