The feed of our future

            Given the choice that we can elaborate on class discussions, I wish to write more about Feed and its clear forewarnings for our future.  We discussed Feed for the whole class time today. It was really weird to read this book and consider that that’s where this generation is headed. The slang is completely different from today's slang. The generation in this book gets lazy, and uses sentences like “what is doing” instead of “what are you doing”. They also have the knowledge of the world inside their minds. This gives them every reason not to retain and use information that’s actually really useful. This ties into a previous class discussion on the importance of learning things that don’t tie into our future careers. I think this book makes a perfect example of how beneficial it is to have a general knowledge of history, science, math, art, and other subjects. By having the feed, no person really learns about what history has to offer. When Titus goes to school, he mentions only learning about using the feed. I couldn’t imagine not learning about some of the genuinely interesting things that I do learn every day in class. The elimination of practical knowledge leaves room for things like trends, and fashion. Characters Kalista, Loga, and Quendy spend their time worrying about “lesions” or how to wear their hair. This so called “feed” is completely increasing Narcissism. Not to mention the synthetic world described in the book. They live in the air, and travel by air tubes. Every single thing natural is owned, including the Sun and Clouds. In one part of the book, Titus and Violet take a trip to “Meat country”. These farms are actually growing pieces of meat, by attaching tubes that bring blood and nutrients to the meat. There are no cows, chickens, or pigs. They condense all these processes for the cheapest, quickest way to make profit.  This book provides excellent scenery for what the ultimate control of today’s corporations would look like.

The dumbest Generation? Not even close.

Reading both articles the other day based off of Mark Bauerlein's book The Dumbest Generation proved to be both beneficial and insightful. It was interesting to see the different opinions of two people over 30 who could supposedly be “trusted”, according to Bauerlein. I have to agree more with the article written by Sharon Begley. She makes some good contradicting points by informing the audience that maybe it’s our generations ignorance, not lack of intelligence, that makes us seem indifferent to history. I don’t believe that our generation is “dumber” but our culture is evolving and adapting to different things and technology that wasn’t useful to our parent’s generation. Sharon states, “He is a little late to this party of course. The old have been wringing their hands about the young’s cultural wastelands and ignorance of history…” She’s right in every aspect. Since the beginning of time, our society has gone through a vicious cycle of criticizing the new ideas formed by the newer generations. A girl in class yesterday made a good point that Seniors in high school despise the freshman but can’t even pull a good explanation as to why. Our generation isn’t becoming more stupid; we’re simply changing. According to studies, any country that uses an IQ test, including America, has had increasing scores since the 1930’s. Our thinking capacity is still hard at work, and helps us everyday in thinking logically but we are simply becoming more interested in the social aspects that technology has to offer, instead of studying ancient history. But we shouldn’t let our ignorance get the best of us. Although we see no point to certain classes, a point was made yesterday, that we may never know when we will use information learned in High school or college. It could, in fact come in handy some day. But again, does this really make us stupid? Or does it mean we just need a priority check?

Meet me half-way

After watching the video shown in class, and reading the excerpts from Culture jam, I was exposed to a different world I had never really even knew existed.  This world was far different from my life here on earth. This world took place in different worlds, different times, with Dragons, villages, and renaissance themed clothing. People became wizards, goblins, and faeries. This, was the world of MMO Gamers. People sat idly at computer screens, absorbed into a different dimension, not even moving sometimes to use the restroom. Now, as someone who is incredibly social, and active, this type of behavior is mind-boggling to me. I could never sit in front of a computer screen for 6-7 hours a day. But, I also am not shy, and fit in easily at school. These people, these “gamers” come from the other side of the playing field. They use this different world, as an escape from whatever holds them down in reality. In these games, they recreate themselves without all the traits that before, had disabled them from fitting into our society. Many of the people interviewed in the video mentioned this. They appreciated the choice to make their own identity, the choice they don’t have in real life. Now, as much as I disagree with the idea of a “New virtual frontier”, I have to keep these people in mind. To them it’s real, fun, enjoyable; something they choose, and like to do. While we don’t value these identities, other people do and will continue to.  

 In the documentary, they introduce a man named Dan. Unlike these other people we hear about, that are freed by gaming, Dan’s story takes an unfortunate turn for the worse. He became obsessed, and addicted to World of Warcraft. This leads to depression, the loss of his job, distance from his friends, a foreclosure on his house, weight gain, and suicidal thoughts. He made his gaming experience his first priority, and tried to become the character he was playing on his game.  This is the type of thing that worries me, when people talk about the “new virtual frontier”. Although, most people don’t develop such an excessive addiction, it still happens and will linger into the future. I think that instead of, in Lasn’s words, “meeting machine halfway’; we need to meet each other half way. Our society needs to be more acceptable and less judgmental. This would greatly reduce the need for these people to escape the harassing and constant judgment of being different from what’s “acceptable”. The truth is, every single person on this earth is different, and should be entitled to live any way they want.  

Media Messages

Last night, I spent the majority of my evening watching Friends.  During class discussions on Tuesday, we talked a great deal about how people in America are wasteful, and never satisfied. There was also a discussion on how the media has transformed us into a conformity telling us to like the same things, buy the same things and be the same. Anyone who was different wasn’t cool. As adults, this becomes less evident, but as teens and kids, we are brutal towards anyone we deem as different. Last night I really focused on what all these big wig corporations were conveying through the Television.  I was very surprised to see how bad it really was. Constant commercials using lust, sex, and beautiful unrealistic looking women to sell perfume, jeans, or shoes. Commercials were showing how cool people were dressed in the latest fashions, surrounded by their equally fashionable friends, all laughing in slow motion. Look around you! Who in this world always looks like that? Absolutely no one. Models are air brushed; their waists’ trimmed on Photo Shop.  These corporations are constantly trying to convey that you should be beautiful, skinny, and wear all the right clothes with all the right accessories. There are no commercials about the other problems looming in our future, like global warming, or other countries in need of our help. I saw at least 3 commercials from McDonalds, and the people in the commercials were all healthy, with perfect smiles. They happily served their families, what we know now, as practically a heart attack on a bun. People need to stop relying so much on fitting in and focus on their individual personalities. The messages being sent to people explain the high rates of suicide and depression, along with anxiety. People are constantly being told that they won’t fit in if they don’t buy whatever the trend is for the week. Also, there’s an obvious message that if you don’t buy all these products, you won’t be happy. That if you don’t buy the next best thing, you’ll be outdated and left behind. This needs to change!