Monday

Bad things I see (2013)


A slack, lumpen confederacy of the powerless, tweeting madly.

A diet that's one-quarter sugar.

We are suspicious & cynical of media, and yet we're *in* media 24/7. Cat videos and Downfall memes. The meme is now what we used to call 'culture'.

Lied to and manipulated, yet very nearly entertained to death. I see politicians using shiny-bauble arguments to distract us from real human issues.

Major (ongoing) human disasters & slaughters sit right next to glossy food pron.

We have all the information but no meaning. Content is a con - and mostly a commercial way to sell something.

You are not your brand or your social media presence or your gadgets or your likes. Or suckers for hype.

If there was a coherent rallying-cry we'd realise that we've been lost for a long time.

'Society' is being rewritten by the digital. Rights and civic awareness and citizenship are trumped by consumerism and the sale of privacy and spying.

There are few counterbalancing forces against the cynicism and suspicion - but they are mostly offline.

I want to see greater accountability, and greater awareness of responsibility; which makes me sound incredibly old.

I want more art, more beauty in our lives; and more coherent humanity. I want to defuse my default cynical reaction to so much these days: I hope this cynicism is the flipside of a sincere hunger for change.

4 comments:

  1. There are so many things trending badly that it's overwhelming. I think many of mine are down to the "content" delivered to us needing to be wholly-owned by the purveyors. So we don't see the Tchaikovsky competition, we see American Idol. We don't see chess or go tournaments, we see game shows.

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  2. cheers notagain. Thing is: the more you look, the grimmer the picture gets, and grays out the good things that do bind & cohere. A balancing typecast will come soon.

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  3. I very much know how you feel.

    I'm feeling awfully bitter about the state of play of our political situation at the moment. The inhumanity of the people that suppose to represent us, is incredible. I feel sadly bitter about so much that I'm seeing at the moment.

    I try... try to create things. I try to make the beauty I want in this world, and really - that's all I can do in the long run.

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Nice comments are welcome!