This author seems a tad obsessed. 15 times they threw the word fascist around. DHH certainly has some controversial views that many (including myself) find distasteful, but the idea that he will use his funding to suppress and take funding from politically opposed founders and push fascism is nothing short of conspiracy theory.
Use Omarchy if you like the OS. Don't use it if you don't like it. A political analysis of the founders and leadership behind every product you use must be an exhausting way to live your life
He's on the record supporting Tommy Robinson, who is one of the most prominent fascists in England. He's on the record calling for "remigration" (which is a specific word with specific meaning and context, it's not just synonym for deportation, it's a fascist dog whistle).
I think that's plenty evidence, I'm not waiting for him to tatoo "I am a fascist" on his forehead.
Also, a minimum awareness of the politics of the people producing the stuff you use is actually pretty necessary when fascism is on the rise all around the world. Might be exhausting, sure, but it's better than the alternative
Robinson being fascist is dubious. If you look at the wikipedia on him it doesn't say he is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tommy_Robinson It has "Tommy Robinson, is a British far-right, anti-Islam activist", he was a member of the BNP briefly and called Islam fascist.
A bit disingenuous to say "he was a member of the BNP briefly" - that almost makes it sound like he left the BNP by choice!
In reality, he was kicked out because he insisted on prioritising violence over politics (contradicting the BNP's "political soldier" leadership, who said that both should have equal weight). It was this disagreement that led to him coming to prominence in the first place, and he's traded on his "too violent for the mainstream fascists" image ever since.
Accusations of fascism are rarely made in good faith either. As I pointed out in response to @undeveloped, Merrian-Webster's definition doesn't seem applicable to DHH.
or Fascist, plural Fascists : a person who advocates or works to further the aims of fascism : an adherent of or participant in a populist political philosophy, movement, or regime that exalts nation and often race above the individual, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and forcible suppression of opposition
As far as I can tell, the only thing DHH has that is consistent with this definition is racism/nationalism, but:
1. He hasn't spoused actual collectivist beliefs, like "nothing out of the state, everything within the state" kind of BS (YET), just intra-race and national solidarity, so "exalts nation and often race above the individual" is argueable;
2. I don't see him promoting a supreme leader style of leadership, so "that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader" is not applicable;
3. I also don't see him pushing for stronger state control over the economy. If anything, he probably wants a more developmentists/startup culture economy given point 2 and 3 in (https://world.hey.com/dhh/three-sacred-cows-that-must-die-so...), so "severe economic and social regimentation and forcible suppression of opposition" is out.
Overall, he just seems like a white supremacist atm. Not every white supremacist is fascist.
Central autocratic government, run by a cult of personality leader, seeking loyal disciples willing to subsume themselves into the project. Proud claims to heritidge. Obsession with a veneer of beauty...
I don't know why people are finding this so hard to pin down. Maybe not nationalistic facsism but it sure dresses the same, walks the same, barks the same.
>Europe’s first fascist leader, Benito Mussolini, took the name of his party from the Latin word fasces, which referred to a bundle of elm or birch rods (usually containing an ax) used as a symbol of penal authority in ancient Rome. Although fascist parties and movements differed significantly from one another, they had many characteristics in common, including extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the rule of elites, and the desire to create a Volksgemeinschaft (German: “people’s community”), in which individual interests would be subordinated to the good of the nation.
If you think him getting money from Jack Dorsey and Michael Dell has no political implications, I have a bridge in Brooklyn and a tower in Paris to sell you. This isn't conspiracy theory, this is following incentives.
We should be aware of the motivations of the software we use. This is why we've had licensing fights for decades.
>If you think him getting money from Jack Dorsey and Michael Dell has no political implications,
And the device you type this on is made by which company? Apple? Google? Microsoft? They all involved in politics and lobbying. And it's powered by which ASICS? Apple? Intel? AMD? Nvidia? All of them are involved in politics and lobbying you might disagree with. And yet you still use them.
You're a pot calling the kettle black here. If you wanna get online and do work, unless you're fabbing chips in your garage, you're gonna be directly or indirectly funding some business involved in politics you might not like. So it's pretty hypocritical and somewhat mental of you to spend so many comments here trying to dunk on people willing to use Omarchy just because the owner has politics you disagree with
DHH is not a fascist, he is an attention seeker with a reality distortion field. An RDF is of no use unless you say edgy things. The author is being played by writing an article like this. Its exactly what DHH wants.
Including people who are violently un-inclusive is just being violently un-inclusive with an extra step.
Like, there are a lot of world views and opinions that can be included without damage the space, but nazis is very clearly not one of them. Fascism and some (many?) forms of communism also fall under this heading.
Like take politics out of it for a sec. You own a bar. There’s one customer who comes in every night and drinks five shots and then sucker-punches a random other person in the bar.
Sure, you’re not violently assaulting one of your customers every night - but functionally, you have created a space where someone gets hurt every night. The first time it happens it’s not your fault, but the 20th time? Come on.
i dont think its actually important if DHH is really, in his heart of hearts, is a fascist --- what he is doing is spreading white supremacist, anti immigrant, nativist literature -- in combination. i think if you think liberalism (as in american revolution, the english bill of rights, modern democracy, etc) is valuable, you should probably oppose fascism, the ideology of those who reject liberalism and would like to go back.
Even the most liberal Nozickean voluntary society existentially requires a mechanism to limit granting of membership to those who genuinely uphold its values, and limit intrusion and abuse by those who do not. The literature you linked shows that DHH is cognizant of Popper's Paradox and is willing to defend liberalism from exploitation.
This is a bunch of drama that's so easy to ignore. Publishing this article is just drawing more people to Omarchy. I don't know anything about it and don't care for yet-another-linux-distro-that-does-whatever. It'll eventually settle outside the big three like all other distros.
It was easy to ignore before it "raised" around 15 million dollars. That's a lot of money to be throwing around a mostly-donation based ecosystem.
I'm already seeing discussions on the mise[0] Github discussions about Omarchy specific changes and designs. I'm not saying anything about these specific changes and they seem mostly distro-agnostic for now, but it goes to show how it can affect other distros/software even if you don't use it.
[0] mise is being sponsored by the Omacon foundation, which is what all this money is technically going to. It also happens to be the only "independent" tool being sponsored by the foundation, as the hyperland dev is essentially contracted by them and the QuickShell dev was hired by DHH.
> I don't even know what hyperland and quickshell are. I don't use mise because it seems to solve problems I solve with containers.
Okay? Your lack of awareness of the tools does not change the fact that 15 millions dollars that is supposed to "support the linux desktop", but right now is mostly funding its own distro.
> 15 millions dollars that is supposed to "support the linux desktop", but right now is mostly funding its own distro.
There is no general destination to support Linux Desktop. Linux Foundation is not that, in addition to having more money than they need, and spending less than 5% of their budget on actual kernel.
The only way to support Linux and its desktop is to support individual project. Be they separate or part of some distro. That's the beauty of Linux and open-source - all the features and efforts are dynamically leaking elsewhere in the ecosystem.
DHH never promised to support outside projects. Omarchy Foundation is supposed to support Linux via developing Omarchy, putting all the money there, not by having a tax-evation foundation with high-paid executives, distributing a tiny percentage of the budget to some general unmeasurable cause.
Even ignoring politics, I’m sure there are more impactful ways to spend $18 million. Many OSS projects are underfunded, why not give some of that to e.g. Bevy (https://bevy.org/sponsorship-pledge/), Unsloth (https://github.com/sponsors/unslothai), or better, many small grants to many small projects?
Would be awesome if people stopped throwing around the word fascist like it's nothing. I wonder if the person who wrote this had any family members who ran into real fascists during the 20th century. While DHH might be a POS at times, that doesn't make him a fascist.
i dont believe tech projects have a right to talk about "heritage is duty" and certainly not when the creator has made a point about being a white supremacists. i wonder when he says unity, if he means the non-white he complains so much about explicitly in his article "as i remember britain"
My point is that opinionated software is a magnet for supremacist types and ideologies. It's a nest for their "vision" or whatever.
We're already way past the point of pointing out his character flaws. I want to also point out that as long as we keep this exception the post author made of "ah, there's nothing wrong with being opinionated", these types will use that as a means to push their agenda.
I believe we should aim for the messy, "lots of different ways of doing the same thing" as a clear substrate that embraces all kinds of diversity of ideas and rejects the scumbag ideologies inherently.
I have a really cool idea if you’re the type to complain about software you don’t like. You can try this thing called “continuing to not run that software that upsets you.” I do it all the time! It’s quite liberating to not care about nor try to control others!
> And that is why Omarchy matters. Sadly. Not because of its technical merit (even though those fascists love to use the “merit” argument to fight human rights) but because of its leader, his connections and his ability to accumulate financial power. Without anyone in that ecosystem saying anything about how that leader operates and talks. And you might know the saying: If there’s a Nazi and 10 folks sitting together at a table and nobody says and does anything? There’s 11 Nazis at that table.
> Running Omarchy means contributing to this dynamic. It means willingly integrating oneself into a fascist community. Legitimizing it. Supporting it. Omarchy is a fascist project that normalizes fascist thinking for everyone entering that community (even unknowingly). The baseline has to be not to use that system. And as people who believe in human rights and dignity, in community and a tech world that can be better we need to oppose Omarchy. Need to make sure it gets no seat at any table.
The same could be said about your comment. A take you disagree with can be scrolled past, no need to disagree with it vocally. Yet you did. Because you have an opinion and you felt compelled to share it with others.
Anyway, I am currently using omarchy, I installed it knowing only that dhh was known to be a jerk. I assumed that meant a linus-esque “sometimes yells at people in emails” kinda thing. So sharing this kind of post is actually quite helpful. Because of it, I’ll be installing a different arch variant next time I get the itch to try something new.
I do the same but you have to understand that some people just can’t get over the fact somebody else has different opinions, different takes on life or software and decide to chart and walk their own path at their own pace.
Btw ggwp to dhh and omarchy’s team.
Ormarchy/arch is not my cup of tea but kudos to them for doing their own thing.
There is a big difference in the implications behind my post and OP. OP seems to be implying that anybody who doesn’t raise hell about Omarchy is a nazi. I’m just saying it’s easier to “vote with your CPU.” If a particular configuration of instructions make you think you’re a nazi, just don’t run them.
Here’s a non-political example. I don’t run Duckstation because the developer frequently makes it abundantly clear that he hates Linux users and in recent years has done his best to pretty much ban its use on my distro of choice, Arch (btw). It’s a personal decision that other people just don’t need to know about. Feel free to disagree with me on this nuance, but I think it’s actually more “fascistic” to attempt to forcibly compel people to not run software on ideological grounds.
Tl;dr vote with your cpu. If enough people do it, the software will die. Pearl clutching does nothing but raise buzz around the software that you hate
Here's another cool idea: boycott fash technology like any true hacker should. (And pressure companies to redirect some of those millions to more worthwhile open source projects.)
People mention the politics, but this is mainly Ruby (and RoR) whoring out itself to AI because Shopify wants their merchants to vibe code websites. Ruby tries to counteract the declining popularity and in my opinion makes it worse. I was on the point of switching to Ruby before I found out about all this AI boosting.
Digital Ocean contributed? Typical nihilist corporation (2021 pandering to Biden):
59 comments
[ 0.19 ms ] story [ 5.0 ms ] threadUse Omarchy if you like the OS. Don't use it if you don't like it. A political analysis of the founders and leadership behind every product you use must be an exhausting way to live your life
I think that's plenty evidence, I'm not waiting for him to tatoo "I am a fascist" on his forehead.
Also, a minimum awareness of the politics of the people producing the stuff you use is actually pretty necessary when fascism is on the rise all around the world. Might be exhausting, sure, but it's better than the alternative
[1] https://edition.cnn.com/2025/10/19/us/remigrate-dhs-explaine...
In reality, he was kicked out because he insisted on prioritising violence over politics (contradicting the BNP's "political soldier" leadership, who said that both should have equal weight). It was this disagreement that led to him coming to prominence in the first place, and he's traded on his "too violent for the mainstream fascists" image ever since.
And well, DHH is fascist.
noun
fas· cist also ˈfa-shist
or Fascist, plural Fascists : a person who advocates or works to further the aims of fascism : an adherent of or participant in a populist political philosophy, movement, or regime that exalts nation and often race above the individual, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and forcible suppression of opposition
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fascist
1. He hasn't spoused actual collectivist beliefs, like "nothing out of the state, everything within the state" kind of BS (YET), just intra-race and national solidarity, so "exalts nation and often race above the individual" is argueable;
2. I don't see him promoting a supreme leader style of leadership, so "that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader" is not applicable;
3. I also don't see him pushing for stronger state control over the economy. If anything, he probably wants a more developmentists/startup culture economy given point 2 and 3 in (https://world.hey.com/dhh/three-sacred-cows-that-must-die-so...), so "severe economic and social regimentation and forcible suppression of opposition" is out.
Overall, he just seems like a white supremacist atm. Not every white supremacist is fascist.
Just.
I don't know why people are finding this so hard to pin down. Maybe not nationalistic facsism but it sure dresses the same, walks the same, barks the same.
>Europe’s first fascist leader, Benito Mussolini, took the name of his party from the Latin word fasces, which referred to a bundle of elm or birch rods (usually containing an ax) used as a symbol of penal authority in ancient Rome. Although fascist parties and movements differed significantly from one another, they had many characteristics in common, including extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the rule of elites, and the desire to create a Volksgemeinschaft (German: “people’s community”), in which individual interests would be subordinated to the good of the nation.
Not DHH or Robertson really.
We should be aware of the motivations of the software we use. This is why we've had licensing fights for decades.
And the device you type this on is made by which company? Apple? Google? Microsoft? They all involved in politics and lobbying. And it's powered by which ASICS? Apple? Intel? AMD? Nvidia? All of them are involved in politics and lobbying you might disagree with. And yet you still use them.
You're a pot calling the kettle black here. If you wanna get online and do work, unless you're fabbing chips in your garage, you're gonna be directly or indirectly funding some business involved in politics you might not like. So it's pretty hypocritical and somewhat mental of you to spend so many comments here trying to dunk on people willing to use Omarchy just because the owner has politics you disagree with
Its like when a couple of nazis show up at your bar and you dont through them out. Welp, now you're a nazi bar.
The real world requires proactive protection from these people. That's reality of where we are today.
That logic doesn't follow, sorry.
You can be inclusive, yet not become the thing you're inclusive to. That's a mental stretch.
Like, there are a lot of world views and opinions that can be included without damage the space, but nazis is very clearly not one of them. Fascism and some (many?) forms of communism also fall under this heading.
Respectfully, that doesn't make any sense.
Like take politics out of it for a sec. You own a bar. There’s one customer who comes in every night and drinks five shots and then sucker-punches a random other person in the bar.
Sure, you’re not violently assaulting one of your customers every night - but functionally, you have created a space where someone gets hurt every night. The first time it happens it’s not your fault, but the 20th time? Come on.
https://world.hey.com/dhh/wolves-sheep-and-gypsies-ba44af6a
https://world.hey.com/dhh/three-sacred-cows-that-must-die-so...
I'm already seeing discussions on the mise[0] Github discussions about Omarchy specific changes and designs. I'm not saying anything about these specific changes and they seem mostly distro-agnostic for now, but it goes to show how it can affect other distros/software even if you don't use it.
[0] mise is being sponsored by the Omacon foundation, which is what all this money is technically going to. It also happens to be the only "independent" tool being sponsored by the foundation, as the hyperland dev is essentially contracted by them and the QuickShell dev was hired by DHH.
Are the changes Omarchy specific or distro-agnostic? You say both.
I don't even know what hyperland and quickshell are. I don't use mise because it seems to solve problems I solve with containers.
The changes are specifically for Omarchy. They just happen to still be distro-agnostic. There is no guarantee this continues in the future.
The discussions: Using managed tool-stub bundles for Omarchy’s lazy CLI layer: https://github.com/jdx/mise/discussions/12597
Proposal: give every Omarchy user a declarative "my machine" file with mise bootstrap: https://github.com/jdx/mise/discussions/12709
Proposal: give Omarchy dotfiles automatic history, easy restore, and optional sync with mise: https://github.com/jdx/mise/discussions/13022
> I don't even know what hyperland and quickshell are. I don't use mise because it seems to solve problems I solve with containers.
Okay? Your lack of awareness of the tools does not change the fact that 15 millions dollars that is supposed to "support the linux desktop", but right now is mostly funding its own distro.
There is no general destination to support Linux Desktop. Linux Foundation is not that, in addition to having more money than they need, and spending less than 5% of their budget on actual kernel.
The only way to support Linux and its desktop is to support individual project. Be they separate or part of some distro. That's the beauty of Linux and open-source - all the features and efforts are dynamically leaking elsewhere in the ecosystem.
DHH never promised to support outside projects. Omarchy Foundation is supposed to support Linux via developing Omarchy, putting all the money there, not by having a tax-evation foundation with high-paid executives, distributing a tiny percentage of the budget to some general unmeasurable cause.
https://youtu.be/GYx4OBbswTw
Except the fact that it's a breeding chamber for those "unity and identity" types of people/ideologies/projects?
Embracing diversity is messy, and it's also a blessing. There should be lots of ways of doing the same thing, etc.
We're already way past the point of pointing out his character flaws. I want to also point out that as long as we keep this exception the post author made of "ah, there's nothing wrong with being opinionated", these types will use that as a means to push their agenda.
I believe we should aim for the messy, "lots of different ways of doing the same thing" as a clear substrate that embraces all kinds of diversity of ideas and rejects the scumbag ideologies inherently.
> And that is why Omarchy matters. Sadly. Not because of its technical merit (even though those fascists love to use the “merit” argument to fight human rights) but because of its leader, his connections and his ability to accumulate financial power. Without anyone in that ecosystem saying anything about how that leader operates and talks. And you might know the saying: If there’s a Nazi and 10 folks sitting together at a table and nobody says and does anything? There’s 11 Nazis at that table.
> Running Omarchy means contributing to this dynamic. It means willingly integrating oneself into a fascist community. Legitimizing it. Supporting it. Omarchy is a fascist project that normalizes fascist thinking for everyone entering that community (even unknowingly). The baseline has to be not to use that system. And as people who believe in human rights and dignity, in community and a tech world that can be better we need to oppose Omarchy. Need to make sure it gets no seat at any table.
Anyway, I am currently using omarchy, I installed it knowing only that dhh was known to be a jerk. I assumed that meant a linus-esque “sometimes yells at people in emails” kinda thing. So sharing this kind of post is actually quite helpful. Because of it, I’ll be installing a different arch variant next time I get the itch to try something new.
Btw ggwp to dhh and omarchy’s team.
Ormarchy/arch is not my cup of tea but kudos to them for doing their own thing.
Here’s a non-political example. I don’t run Duckstation because the developer frequently makes it abundantly clear that he hates Linux users and in recent years has done his best to pretty much ban its use on my distro of choice, Arch (btw). It’s a personal decision that other people just don’t need to know about. Feel free to disagree with me on this nuance, but I think it’s actually more “fascistic” to attempt to forcibly compel people to not run software on ideological grounds.
Tl;dr vote with your cpu. If enough people do it, the software will die. Pearl clutching does nothing but raise buzz around the software that you hate
Digital Ocean contributed? Typical nihilist corporation (2021 pandering to Biden):
https://www.digitalocean.com/blog/diversity-equity-inclusion...
Alternatively we are transitioning to the bullying stage of:
(1) Shaming (you should be embarrassed for thinking this)
(2) Bullying (you should be afraid for thinking this)
(3) Recruitment (contacting authorities to deal with the wrongthinker through misrepresentation)
(4) Pity (I am hurt by your wrongthink, stop hurting me, everyone please help)