Who are Europe’s modern equivalents of the Night Watch or the Shooters Guild to protect Europe? 🤔🇪🇺
It’s clear we need to protect Europe.
From external forces, like U.S. influence and technological dominance, but also from internal challenges posed by uninspired bureaucrats who still lead without imagination and remain dangerously out of touch with building real solutions.
During the Dutch Golden Age, we had the ‘Shooters Guild,’ or in Dutch, Schutterij, a voluntary civic guard or town watch. It protected towns and served as a defensive military support system for city authorities.
You’ve probably seen them immortalised in the famous ‘Night Watch’ painting by Rembrandt.
The Night Watch by Rembrandt.
Now, I’m curious - who are Europe’s modern equivalents of the Night Watch or the Shooters Guild? Who will protect Europe from the external technological power of the U.S. and China, and the internal stagnation of bureaucratic inertia? Who will push for meaning and important change?
Because let’s face it—it’s certainly not our current leaders.
The modern Shooters Guild would likely be made up of people who are:
Principle-brave: They say what they think, regardless of what’s popular.
Meme Warriors: Instead of bows, crossbows, or guns, they wield modern tools—memes—to influence public opinion and drive change. It’s public opinion hacking for good.
System Breakers: They’ve escaped the suffocating grip of traditional systems to build parallel solutions. Entrepreneurs, refugees, misfits, weirdos—they’re the ones who’ve been rejected but refuse to be silenced.
Technically and digitally savvy: This isn’t about policy papers or economic theory. It’s a digital and technical battlefield, and only the skilled survive.
My picks for the First 11 “European Meme Warriors”. By nr of followers on X.
Pieter Levels – @levelsio (603k followers): Prompting bootstrapping and promoter of EUACC.com.
Daniel Ek – @eldsjal (316k followers): Spotify’s founder, now investing in Europe through Prima Materia.
Harry Stebbings @HarryStebbings (259k followers): Podcaster and with 20VC top investor in Europe.
Fidias Panayiotou @Fidias0 (174k followers): YouTuber turned member of the European Parliament.
Andreas Klinger – @andreasklinger (59k followers): Co-founder of EU-inc.org, and building for Europe’s independence.
Robin Wauters – @robinwauters (56k followers): Europe’s sharpest tech journalist.
Matt Clifford – @matthewclifford (31k followers): Behind the UK’s AI Opportunity Action Plan—one of the few willing to think big.
Aura Salla – @AuraSalla (18k followers): A fighter within the European Parliament, taking the battle to X.
Michael Jackson – @WorkMJ (10k followers): A fearless, principled voice in European tech.
Peter van Sabben – @sabben (7.7k followers): Entrepreneur and tech ecosystem builder.
Yoram Wijngaarde – @yoramdw (3.8k followers): Founder of Dealroom.co provides the data intelligence to push for change.
The Modern Night Watch - “The European Meme Warriors”
Who are the rest of our fighters?
We need warriors, system breakers and principle bravery who speak up.
Fighters who’ll challenge U.S. and Chinese dominance without hesitation and call out Europe’s internal decay + build parallel solutions.
So, who are the other 10 or 20 we should add to this list? Who’s ready to meme, build, and hack their way to Europe’s future? Leave a comment.
Fight for the future. Shape the narrative. Use the memes.
Edit: Fidias Panayiotou, had a great meme post about this as well, 29 Jan 2025:
Milton Friedman’s Revolutionary Idea
“I do not believe that the solution to our problem is simply to elect the right people. The important thing is to establish a political climate of opinion which will make it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing. Unless it is politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing, the right people will not do the right thing either, or it they try, they will shortly be out of office.” -
Milton Friedman.
This is the only way.