The English language is in decline and I can only assume that other languages are following the same path all over Earf. As a yooth this conserned me becos I felt like peeple were getting stupider. I was like "Drone, your loosing you're mind and u don't even know it." But then I realized something, people weren't getting progressively stupider, our language was just evolving.
As a species, we have had our artistic run. As I've previously mentioned, we were once amazed by the crafting of words and the emotions that they would elicit. However, somewhere along the way we lost interest in being patient and imagining things and instead focused on science and technology. It is difficult to teach someone the value of understanding a math problem when there are apps to solve them for us. In addition, what is the point of toiling away looking for an answer when the internet can provide it for us instantly?
Our lives used to have poetic tempo filled with grand journeys and deeps swells of emotion and longing. But, as I've also previously mentioned, there is little to be conquered and much of what we might have called living has already been lived. If there are no great things to achieve and no great things to discover without years of corporation backed research and development, just what the hell are we supposed to do with all our time? The answer, Do it faster. If we can't live one life well, perhaps we can live many lives all at once.
Our lives are no longer measured in the quality of connections but rather by the quantity. As a blogger, I am superficially aware of how many people are following me and I desire to have more no matter how good the 1 or 2 or 3 comments are that I might get. 1 on 1 conversations are a liability. Anytime that I only talk to one person I am missing my opportunity to expose and market myself to a larger group. In addition the more specialized my blog posts are, the more people I alienate from wanting to follow my blog. The only solution then is to create generalized blog posts that don't interest anyone absolutely but kinda interest a large number of people.
If we take the above idea it can be applied to life and the way that we are all starting to communicate. I'm sure that many of you who are reading this have been out with a group of people and 1 or 2 people within the group continue to text with someone who is not there physically. As they text they will type in short form and use common/familiar sayings. Rarely if ever does one of the texters use complex language unless one of them is trying to "out nerd" the other one. Most conversations that occur revolve around ones exterior appearance and the increasing/decreasing level of their attractiveness. People in groups will also talk about places they came from, places they are going or things that they did. Most of the things that these people do/think/talk about are common to the people of their geographical area. Occasionally, "the funny one" of the group might find an opportunity to regurgitate a line from a favorite television show or movie at an opportune time.
When we email each other it is the same LOLcat, Fail videos, Best pictures of the year, panda's after the earth quake pictures. Usually the cycle of receiving the same images is just long enough so that we spend the same 20-30 seconds re-familiarizing ourselves with the content every time before deleting the email. We don't really talk about anything interesting or unique anymore. As narcissistic beings we'd like to believe that it is a bad thing but I think streamlining our species into a homogeneous hump is progress.
When cars were first invented they were considered luxuries and pieces of art. It didn't take long however for the necessity of vehicles to eclipse their artistic value. Now cars are pumped out by the millions in a factory. Recently we have tried to inject some of the passion back into the design but the best we can muster is a cheap callback to a past generation. Over the past couple of decades we have tried to experience the depth of human emotion and psychological problems but only long enough to develop a medication to combat the problem so that everyone keeps steadily marching in line.
Computers have created a generation of agoraphobic shoe gazer's who only venture out into the world to ascertain groceries. They/we/me don't want to expose ourselves to the light of day because the prospect of having a frightening and unpredictable conversation with a stranger is just too much to bear. We may not be self reliant creatures but we are increasingly becoming less reliant on each other and more reliant on our machines. Because of this, it would seem silly if we didn't expect our language to evolve in order to reflect our needs.
We don't need to court people and win their love with poetry or song. If we travel to the other side of the earth we don't need to send a letter, we'll send a quick text and be back in 2 days. Relationships are less and less about two people growing and living together for the rest of their lives and more and more like a business contract. Both parties live in the same house and share the illusion that they live together, but they live two separate lives, together.
It is no big stretch then to assume that over the next ten years we will gradually talk/type less and less to each other. Like Stephen Hawking we will just scroll through a smaller catalog of phrases that will be updated every 2 months to coincide with the latest batch of popular culture phrases. We'll probably have some LED's installed in our clothing that light up to reveal attraction/rejection.If it can't be found in the LOLCats catalog it can't be said. We will speak in many images at first, then fewer, then perhaps none at all.
It is rare for people to change. It is even rarer for people to change preemptively in order to avoid catastrophic danger. How many relationships have been saved by making a long lasting extreme personal change? Not that many. Moreover, how many cheating and/or abusive husbands have corrected their behavior without the threat of imminent divorce looming over their head? Even fewer. So it comes as no surprise then that people (as a whole) are not moved to change when multiple ambiguous problems threaten to drastically alter or end our lives.
From a Darwinian perspective , this is the way that human life has always been. Our ancestors assembled and mobilized both north and south. Many of them perished because of the harsh winters and scarcity of food while others dried out in burning barren deserts. Ultimately, their fate was decided by external forces. A strange coincidence associated with the mass death of our ancestors was that the remaining moderates who remained alive made great intellectual leaps while the human population was greatly decreased. If the people of the past were able to predict and record the weather, perhaps millions of lives could be saved. It could however be argued that the millions who died would have still stubbornly persisted toward their imminent death. The reason they would have done this is the same reason a man refuses to read a map or ask for directions. Pride and selfishness often dictate our actions whether or not a more logical counter argument exists.
Unfortunately these days, too many do-gooders exist. The problem with do-gooders is that they are generally loud and proud and they want results. Even more problematic is that many of these do-gooders also have money so that they can publicize their cause. The biggest problem with them unfortunately is that they are small percentage of society and as such have no real impact.
You might be thinking "Perhaps they aren't revolutionizing the world but they are making an impression." Certainly they are however, the long lasting effects are like taking a garden hose to a forest fire. All of their attempts are realistically just prolonging the inevitable. I was under the impression that a do-gooders intention was to save the world not to plan an "I told you so" moment in the future. These worldly problems started long long ago, then it turned into a snowball which started gathering momentum and rolled downhill. Consequently that snowball melted due to global warming (ahem, climate change) and turned into a swampy, bug infested skin cancer party.
Another problem with that whole pride thing I mentioned earlier is that some people refuse to call it quits and pull the plug. It is a strange contradiction because if you and I as individuals had a little more forethought and persistence in the beginning we wouldn't have to fight so hard and for so long at the end. But let's face it, the masses don't enjoy exercising, the masses don't enjoy eating vegetables, the masses don't enjoy staying sober and refraining from recreational drugs. All of these things rob our strength and vitality and if we are not able to change ourselves for the better in our own lives what is the likelihood that we are going to change to benefit the lives and futures of the faceless masses?
But, there is a solution and the solution is just as simple as many people's position toward politics, apathy. In the immortal words of Paul McCartney "Let it be." Of course his intention was one of peace and harmony but it still applies to today. On the small scale think of a show like Jersey Shore. You may find the characters to be abhorrent and a pathetic excuse for television programming. Your first instinct might be to complain and tell everyone you hate it. Or, you might become super aggressive and lobby to get it yanked off the air. The problem with that big idea is that you would create controversy and ultimately shine the light of recognition onto a show that might have quickly faded into obscurity. By taking issue with it you end up prolonging its life and even worse you probably end up watching the show weekly in order to criticize it. All it takes is a few million people to gasp in disgust on a regular basis to keep it on the air. However, if you simply ignore it and allow it to reach its point of saturation eventually it will go away and leave no lasting impact on our culture.
I know the world is dying and I know that you, a free thinking bleeding heart are sad to see it being stripped away bit by bit. Whether it takes 2 days or 20 years our civilization has ended. Spare me the application of band-aids on gaping wounds and allow the world to succumb. Whether it manifests in floods, meteor showers, nuclear war or world wide zombie plague just let it happen. I'm not even pushing this from a selfish perspective. I don't own a gun so if I survive the apocalypse I will probably be herded into slave labor by a motorcycle gang. I don't think that we(self included) as a people respect the threat of our dying earth and as such, the only way out is through experiencing it.
Before I start today's extensive complaint let us first do away with one or more myths about books. The act of : a) purchasing a book or (b) holding the aforementioned purchased book does not make the information within the book magically go into your brain. Secondly, by telling your friends that you are going to: a) read a book or (b) that you have read a book it does not imply that you are any more intellectually capable, soulful or artistic than you were before reading the book. Unless of course the book that you just read was "How to appear more intellectually capable, soulful and artistic."
Originally books were collections of information compiled so that they be passed down from generation to generation. That information was used and revised as new information came to light. Eventually humans developed the ability and desire to express themselves in other ways and they found out that they could do that in word form. Writing at that time evolved from a way to relay information and transformed into what would come to be known as art. Individuals who were able to craft imagery and emotion in a superior way to other people became known as writers. These "writers" would create strings of words to captivate and inspire other people to live their dreams, mentally evolve or emotionally change something within themselves. These writers created the potential for other people to think.
It would naturally follow then that people whose desire it was to be educated would seek out books. They would seek out books that spoke to their area of interest written by scholars who had a level of expertise higher than their own. Also, books written in the past were expensive to write and reproduce for others to read. As such, there was a general unspoken rule that only books of quality would be produced for mass consumption. People who owned and read books then generally had an interest in knowledge and a thirst for understanding.
Within my life I have witnessed the progression of books from tool of experience and inspiration to tool of recreation and affectation. When I was a child reading a book was a bad thing. Reading suggested that you had knowledge, sought knowledge or at the very least chose to associate yourself with knowledgeable things. As a way for stupid people to compensate for their stupidity they would routinely label someone in possession of a book as a nerd or a dork. As you should know by now, the act of thinking is uncool and as such should be ridiculed. Then one day something happened that would change the face of bookdom forever.
That something was when a Hollywood business type realized that there was an untapped market and that untapped market was books. In a time of television and instant gratification books remained to be challenging things. They were challenging because they required the reader to give of themselves and put time into reading and understanding the message within a book. Even worse, rarely if ever did a book explain something with blunt and direct language. What this meant is that the reader would have to infer meaning. If there is one thing that cool and stupid people don't like to do it is infer. Because of this, books were able to remain somewhat untainted while the rest of the world continued moving forward.
Unfortunately, someone eventually cracked the code. The hole in the dyke was small at first, only a few celebrity autobiographies written by ghostwriters slipped through. But then the walls came crashing down. A deluge of self help books alerted an unaware audience that many of their common everyday problems were unique and important. Even better, for the low-low price of $19.99 these problems could be solved through an easy to follow five step process. The direct language and ease of use of books like "How To Use A Computer Keyboard For Dummies" got people enthusiastic about reading. The simplistic nature of what they were reading made them feel intelligent, it didn't matter that they were reading list upon list of basic instructions and common sense toward living.
Eventually people starting writing fantasy books intended for children and adults started reading them. These adults convinced themselves that the kids books somehow transcended the children's genre and were in fact very adult. In their minds, humans were not devolving by consuming books that were straightforward and easy to digest. In fact, they decided that writing was evolving because the level of children's literature had been elevated to new heights. Further, as more and more people came out of the closet and admitted to liking a series of children's books the more people became interested in reading them. Much like their children who had not done a lot of reading in their lives, adults got a positive charge out of finishing a book.
What followed next was that celebrities did away with their ghostwriters. No longer did they have to feel ashamed by their lack of diction and grammar. If other people could write stream of conscious first person narrative why couldn't they? Writing didn't have to be meaningful OR technically proficient. All that a person needed to do in order to be considered a writer was...write. This was great news for Hilary Duff who I am certain is at this moment penning her second fiction novel.
So what does this all mean? As I said in an earlier essay, computers were for a time the refuge of the freaks and nutters. Yet, with the invention of Facebook/text messaging the world made it easy for cool and dumb people to make use of the internet and technology. In this same way books have "evolved" to welcome the creative inspiration of cool and dumb people. Books have done away with the stigma associated with them, that being that they are filled with useful information and are difficult to understand. Better still books have maintained their pretentious affectation so you can still talk loudly in a crowded coffee shop about the existential implications of Chelsea Handler's latest musing on life.
I'm the type of poor person that has to buy toilet paper two rolls at a time. The paper isn't that fancy two ply either. My T.P. is gas station quality, the transparent kind that dissolves on contact with water. I'm the type of poor that Taco Bell seems like fine dining I am financially challenged not to the point where I go starving but to the point where I have to cook food in bulk and eat the same thing over the course of 12 days. I'm not planning on going on a whining rant about how poor I am and how you should feel bad for me, rather I am setting the scene to relay a short story that I think is funny. Dark funny.
A couple of years ago my wife (then girlfriend) got a phone call that her uncle had a seizure, fell on his head and was on life support in the hospital presumed to die imminently.(are you laughing yet?) We got in our car, filled it with it's daily dose of oil and transmission fluid, and drove down the road en route to meet up with my soon to be mother in law. When we arrived at her house it was decided in advance that we were going to take her car because our car had bad rear shocks (read none) so that if anyone sat in the back seat the tires would rub on the wheel wells until the tires blew up.
Cue rain, heavy rain. After we loaded up the luggage into mom's car we shot off like a bat out of hell all the way to the gas station. We pooled our dollars, nickels and dimes and were able to fill the tank. As soon as we went to make our getaway from the gas station every device that used electric current died on the car. The window defroster had always been broken so the only way to see out the windshield while driving on a rainy day was to drive with the windows open. However, on this occasion the window wipers died and stuck at a 45 degree angle against the window. After we popped the hood and pointed at things that could be broken, we collectively agreed that we all didn't know shit about car repair and that unplugging and replugging fuses was probably a bad idea in the pouring rain.
We didn't have the money to rent a car but my wife's aunt's house was on the way. Her aunt had a previous engagement that prevented her from visiting with her dying brother. She did assure us though that if we could make it to her house that we could borrow one of her cars. We decided out of desperation that we would chance driving our car. The ultimate destination of Bakersfield otherwise known as the ass hole of California was about a 5 hour drive but my wife's aunt was only 40 minutes away. So we all piled into the car and clunked along. Every bump in the road slowed the car down about 10 miles per hour and helped contribute to bald spots in our tires but we ultimately made it to my wife's aunt's house.
Upon arriving there we were told that my aunt didn't feel comfortable with lending us her car (i.e. she didn't want my mother in law to drive it) We invited her to come along with us but she refused and instead offered up the option of renting a car for us. My wife's aunt is in a position to do this because they are well off and I suspect my mother in law likes taking advantage of this whenever she can. All money matters have to go through my wife's uncle though who is the bread winner of the house. He is typically tight on spending because his wife is not.
Off we went to the car rental place where my mother in law and my uncle in law did a strange dance of opposing perspective. She attempted to get the largest most luxurious vehicle available while he tried to find the bridge between frugal and compassion. They eventually agreed on a mid sized sedan, a Pontiac G6. After a little more deliberation on what kind of insurance we needed we squared everything away and got on the road in our shiny red Pontiac.
At some point on the trip I started to have a sick feeling. At first I couldn't figure it out but eventually I realized in some perverse way that it was joy. Why joy you ask? This was the first time in months we had gone anywhere. We were driving in a car that had decent performance, 4 doors with working power windows. The cabin was airy and comfortable, it even had cup holders that worked. I began to romanticize what kind of person lives the G6 life? When they buy groceries do they get brand names? Do they know the luxury of filling a gas tank until it's full? Do they have enough money to wash their underwear and their shirts the same week? Better yet, do they own their own property?
When we stopped at a rest stop I asked my wife to take picture of me behind the wheel of the car. I needed to document the fact that I had once driven a mighty newish sedan. Better yet, in Bakersfield there was a suite at the Motel 6 with promises of HBO, extra towels and free coffee in the lobby. FREE COFFEE!!! We were living like kings and it was all because someone was probably going to die. A death sentence for one man became a vacation for us.
