Do yourself a favor – read this book.

I would like to recommend a book: Amusing Ourselves to Death – Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by Neil Postman.  Those of you who have been around me at all in recent days have probably heard me talk about it.  I’ve read it twice in the past month, and I’ll more than likely pick it up again in the near future.  Although much has changed since it was first published in 1985, it is still relevant to, and even prophetic about the days we live in now.

The basic premise of the book is that the television has replaced the printed word as the dominant means of public discourse in American society, and that television does a significantly inferior job of presenting important information in a coherent, intelligent way than the printed word does.  Furthermore, all media have biases to which they lend themselves to being used for.  Television’s bias is to present all subject matter as entertainment, which is dangerous when the subject matter being presented is of any importance.  Postman explains how serious subject matter – specifically religion, politics and education – are cheapened when presented on television because the subject matter must be entertaining in order for an audience to have any interest in watching it.

This book is too good for you not to read it.  Just like all cigarette cartons come with the Surgeon General’s warning that cigarettes cause cancer, I think all televisions should come with this book.

Here are some quotes to whet your appetite even further:

Introduce speed of light transmission of images and you make a cultural revolution…..Here is ideology without words, and all the more powerful for their absence.  All that is required to make it stick is a population that devoutly believes in the inevitability of progress.

In television teaching, perplexity is a superhighway to low ratings.  A perplexed learner is a learner who will turn to another station.  This means that there must be nothing that has to be remembered, studied, applied or, worst of all, endured.  It is assumed that any information, story or idea can be made immediately accessible, since the contentment, not the growth, of the learner is paramount.

And in an election year, I find this quote to be particularly relevant:

Show business is not entirely without an idea of excellence, but its main business is to please the crowd, and its principal instrument is artifice.  If politics is like show business, then the idea is not to pursue excellence, clarity or honesty but to appear as if you are, which is another matter altogether.  And what the other matter is can be expressed in one word: advertising.

In this election year, if you are considering donating money to a candidate’s campaign, I would ask you to reconsider.  Instead, why don’t you use that money to buy multiple copies of Amusing Ourselves to Death and give them to your friends.  Why?  Because when you donate to a political candidate, your money is more than likely going to be used to fund the proliferation of your candidate’s image, (including production of expensive television advertisements) which is ultimately irrelevant to the direction of our country and its relationship to the rest of the world.   If the American public realized how their beloved televisions have turned political discussion into the incoherent freak show that it is, we might have enough angry citizens to actually get some real progress made.  (Whatever that means.)

But seriously.  Do yourself a favor and read this book.  You can borrow mine.  Heck, I might even buy one for you.

When I was your age….

Toys these days are just way too technologically complex.  Forget those new-fangled video games.  Here’s what I suggest children play with:

Better Off

I just started reading a book. Better Off by Eric Brende. It’s the story of a real life experiment where the author and his wife moved to a remote community to see if life is really better with all of today’s technological amenities. Here’s a quote from Chapter 1:

The conviction was growing in me that the besetting problem was our culture’s blindness to the distinction between the tool and the automatic machine. Everyone tended to treat them alike, as neutral agents of human intention. But machines clearly were not neutral or inert objects. They were complex fuel-consuming entities with certain definite proclivities and needs. Besides often depriving their users of skills and physical exercise, they created new and artificial demands-for fuel, space, money and time. These in turn crowded out other important human pursuits, like the involvement in family and community, or even the process of thinking itself. The very act of accepting the machine was becoming automatic. [Italics added]

The part I italicized really struck me. In some ways we are governed by the technology we use. I lived in Shanghai for 8 months without a car and getting around was no less convenient than it is in the US, where I have my own car. In many ways it was better – I didn’t have to pay for gas, insurance, oil changes, inspections or repairs. My car demands that I budget money for it out of my paycheck.

What about computers? A year and a half ago I purchased a new laptop because my “old” computer (which I bought in 2001) had slowed down significantly, and couldn’t handle newer software that needed more memory and a faster processor. My software demanded that I upgrade my hardware. My old computer was in perfect working order.

In many ways the internet demands my time. I must check and respond to email in a timely manner. Events and activities are organized online these days, and I need to keep track of things that are going on. I bank online and must check my balance and pay bills. (I should note that I did this in order to save a few trees from becoming bank statements that get mailed to my home.) I lack the self discipline to close my laptop when there is so much interesting stuff to check out on the internet – blogs, facebook news feeds, friends’ photo albums, news articles, wikipedia, etc. Sure it’s my own fault, but why not? I’m staying “informed” aren’t I? That’s important, right??

My goal is to figure out ways to separate the things about technology that are helpful from those that are distractions. I’ve got some ideas, but I have a feeling that it’s going to make things a little uncomfortable for me at first. I don’t think I need to do anything as drastic as Eric Brende did, but certainly some changes need to be made.

Another blog?? Really?? Come on.

So I’m on this “anti-technology” kick right now. (Which is funny, because I started a blog right in the middle of it!) Well, maybe it’s more of a “technology caution” kick. During the last couple of days I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how TV and the internet have radically transformed our culture, lifestyle, and the way we gather and transmit information. I have been re-evaluating the role of technology in my daily life. I think this has been a long time coming for me, and should anyone choose to read this, I hope they will find encouragement and exhortation to do some re-evaluating of their own. We do this kind of probing and shifting in other aspects of life all the time – in our diet, friendships, opposite-sex relationships, and so on. So why not do the same with technology?

I have never given much thought to technology. It has always just been there. I don’t think it would be a stretch to believe that most people will never question the influence that certain technologies have on their life, positive or negative. So that’s simply what I’m doing: asking some questions about myself regarding
technology and the role it plays in my life, for better or worse. I hope my reflections will be helpful to some who read this blog, which was my reason for starting it.