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I have a theory- you guys ever heard of an "extinction burst"? Simply put it's a burst of energy (often frantic and distressed) you experience when a conditioned idea stops working. The classic example is in a broken elevator, you push a button but nothing happens. So you push it again, and still nothing happens. Then, as the idea of "push button to make elevator go" dies, your brain goes into extinction burst, as you mash the button a whole bunch of times and grunt like a psychotic monkey. My theory is that social media, and specifically people using it without any sort of business purpose in mind, is the extinction burst of our social conditioning about fame. Not that long ago you had to be actually notable in some way for people around the world to be aware of you (with occasional exceptions that merely prompted people to note that fame was "fickle". Think the elevator that you only have to push the button twice sometimes). This meant there was an association, even a tenuous one, between fame and accomplishment. But now literally anybody can plaster their face all over literally the entire planet, so the connection between fame and accomplishment is stressed to the point of breaking, and everybody is having a giant flurry of frantic panicky energy about it as they hoard friends/subscribers/followers and gnaw feebly on the long-stripped bones of fame. A whole generation grew up dreaming of being some kind of radio/TV/movie/rock/whatever star, a status symbol that is swiftly dying in a more connected world. That realization that the fame elevator doesn't work anymore makes for a lot of screaming monkey button-mashing. TLDR
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Jun 22, 2017 16:29
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| # ¿ May 4, 2024 00:19 |
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My favorite part of the phenomena being mentioned here is the immediate "well they said the same thing about television/telephones/telegraphs/trains/whatever" response. As if the speed and disruption of the industrial revolution are how things always were. We've been on this path a while but that's very different than saying it's the "correct" path. George Washington never traveled via any method Julius Caesar did not. Think about that. |
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Jul 5, 2017 21:21
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