I think your average geek used to be like, somewhat academic and erudite and into arcane knowledge and had some level of good faith of wanting to engage in discussion
Now it’s all frauds and absolutely braindead elon stans and crypto dipshits and conservative freaks and people who enjoy and defend watching big tech destroy everything.
Nothing happened to them. Those guys are still exactly the same.
The difference is that there’s a ton of money in that sector now so a bunch of greedy assholes moved in and now look like they’re the folks actually doing tech stuff.
Oh also, there’s always been a fair amount of legitimately crazy among tech people (we’re strange folk) and those voices get more amplification due to the idiots at the top.
It’s been true for a while now that if you speak with confidence people will listen to you.