What’s so bad and dangerous about the internet and social media
and screen-mediated ‘reality’
is that we
(all of us who use smartphones and social media and watch TV, etc.,
so a fair number I suppose)
can’t help
but believe in
the representations
of other people and the world
that these productions and performances show…
It’s only our minds
(or mostly our minds)
and not anything we see and live
in the flesh,
in face-to-face
heart-fluttering
soul-vulnerable reality,
with people we see and whose presence we feel,
where there are real stakes
and life is really lived,
but actors playing pre-arranged market-determined roles
generally made up to conform to some consumer-set
(probably to be ‘written’
or programmed
more and more
by artificial-Intelligence
(and not the human kind
of intelligence,
that,
at best,
has a heart that’s lived
and worked and hoped and suffered
behind it;
not the eternally old and new
intelligence of humanity…
but I suppose it’s pretty difficult anyway…
and financially less viable, alas!) —
flattering and playing to ready-made biases and prejudices
unable to be seriously challenged or questioned
(tho’ inevitably and predictably praised
for weakly and superficially doing such things),
because made to sell
and make a profit
and what sells but sex
(the easy and convient and agreeable and effortless and going of itself…).
But…
Life is bleak and lifeless
when not lived
by choice
and real effort,
but pre-determined
by an exploiting
and profit-seeking
algorithm
that goes
not by our highest instincts
(love, courage, fidelity, effort,
trust and persistence and faith
over time,
in what lasts)
but our lowest
(fear, pride, hate, resentment, cruelty,
superficiality, shallowness,
us versus them,
eye for an eye,
if you can’t beat them cheat them worldview),
lust for superficial success
(model career, model partner, model apartment/house,
model family, model body,
model products,
model life,
etc. etc.)…
The only way out is
alone,
personal,
and not easy
but difficult,
and against our instinct
for easy pleasure
and the flattering
and the effortless.
But when I say this
I cringe
and hesitate a little
because the path I seek
is not austere
or stupid-serious
but beautiful
and full
and infinitely valuable
(because my own,
because free,
because already in me).
But I lose myself here already a little,
and am getting too vague.
I know what I mean though.
I am as susceptible as anyone else,
and can’t pretend (and don’t want to or mean to)
to being unaffected by
or not very often tempted by
or innocent
of indulgence
and real fun
(albeit like cake
or candy,
tending to induce
indigestion
and bad thoughts
and feelings
after)
in the rot and slop
of the internet.
Anyway.
Keep on!
