The horror, the horror

I am listening to Bach - the Goldberg Variations. It comes from a time when music was a rare thing. So rare that only the very rich could have music on tap. Patrons kept artists alive so they may ply their craft and the artists in turn produced what they had to. They were the content creators of their day and only those who had a certain degree of skill - the ability to read music and play and instrument were able to access that content.

Fast forward some 300 years and this music is everywhere at anytime of day if you have smart phone and wifi connection.In a digital democracy this means that everyone should have access to it. However, instead of being a rare and fragile thing, this music is no longer a jewel set in the ring of time, the setting designed to emphasise and celebrate the stone's beauty, instead it is part of a neverending smogasbrod of sounds, images, sometimes both, or not a very edifying quality. A quick excursion on TikTok will make you realise that the Laws of Diminishing Return also applies to the digital natives.

There is content where people purposely make objects filthy to clean them up. Where people are paid to overeat. Where people pretend to cook and end up destroying food. Where people watch others watching others watching others... the serpent's has well and truly swallowed its own tail. 

And that's just the least disturbing of that content. 

Human beings are shaped by the tools which they have. Our brains and abilities developed along with the ability to knit, hammer, light a fire, write with a pen. Using a tool is a refining process. Playing a musical instrument or painting does the same thing. You have to wonder what these digital tools are doing to the minds of people. 

What exactly is the refining process that is taking place there? What is the madness, the fire which is being lit in the brain? Recently Will Smith's slap has returned with the Oscars. 

What exactly happened to Will Smith's brain that he thought that was ok? Will Smith is a content creator even off the big screen - it feels like some part of him has a psychotic break. It was short but it was powerful. Is this the world which we are creating?

As the months go pass the word - well-being is used more and more frequently. As usual, human beings do not address the source, which I think is the ever present screentime and the lack of real contact time which includes the complete lack of boundaries. Instead, we just dance around the edges, unwilling to give up our addictions.

We kid ourselves that it is only a few people, only a few individuals which are unable to cope. In truth, we are all starting to be unable to cope. 

There is one solution - coming back to the real, tear the self away from the virtual. The fantasy.