Media is as elemental to human consciousness as the weather. An associative logic manifesting as a concordance of social and historic points in our minds just like a computer program. The symbiosis manifests internally and externally, in ways specific to the individual percipient, and interpersonally, too, when media products are associated with loved ones and past history and unexpected insights. A recent example: I’ve just written a book that portrays an alternate reality. It’s the kind of book I never thought I’d write and it reminds me of someone recommending a book years ago that does approximately the same thing as mine (with the exception of times having passed and changed, elevating some societal points particulars while lowering others, all the while retaining the same essential core, of what people do when in society together). “A favorite of mine. Enjoy!”
All of American society is currently expecting UFOs to appear sooner or later as iterated by media since the Roswell crash or possibly sooner, as distinct from fairies or goblins (as iterated in media of previous times). How much attention is paid by the media to which reports determines which ones get the masses’ attention. The worldwide swarm of UAPs explained as “drones” continues but has been replaced in people’s attention by the wildfires in Los Angeles and the controversial new president’s inauguration and first efforts at governance. In an age where we don’t know what’s important and have to step back from the news and find out what’s important for ourselves however we can. Most reality TV is fake and everyone knows it and still calls it that.
I was a huge fan of the Beatles as a child. The first time I went to a planetarium was for a Beatles laser show. All Together Now was one of the songs, described years later in the Memoirs of Billy Shears as a step-by-step song about McCartney’s alleged replacement by Aleister Crowley’s son in 1966. Of course, I didn’t know that as a kid, but the established use of doubles for popular figures throughout history proves how easily our attention may be diverted by media, especially concerning popular figures. My own latest Paul is Dead never died discovery is a Scottish band called Famous Groupies with a bass playing member named Faul Mackenzie who never shows his face and a double-album full of references to the switch called Black Apple (after the Beatles’ Apple Records). Am I playing a game of myself using media or is everyone under the same spell in different ways?
Media helped me understand love and spirituality and grieve each parent’s loss by way of this concordance. All the moments of emotional poignancy became triggers–Jim’s receipt of a trunkful of memories bequeathed by his late father on TAXI and a million more. Based on something I’ve recently observed about my own consumption and processing of media stimuli, it may be that, even when self-directed, every individual’s consumption of media is reflective to some degree of their perception of the whole. I’ve been watching a lot of game shows and episodes of COPS since Trump won his second term and it wasn’t a conscious decision, more of a passive reflection. Most reality TV is fake, and everyone knows it and calls it that anyway.
The influence of social media, and not just the Facebook memories function, displaying memories from years past on a specific date, have made the association of media and neurologic patterning all the more obvious. I say this because I’ve always just been thinking about whoever’s anniversary it turns out to be. Has it happened to you?
Writing about Neal Cassady’s youth in Denver while in contact with his children felt like channeling a statement from Neal, whole sections of the Denver Beat Scene felt transcribed more than authored, but all my writing feels that way to me, so that’s not really saying much. Hearing Doors songs in public while working for Al Graham who was in conversation with his brother-in-law Jim Morrison’s ghost felt completely unique, as if I were being tracked by the same ghost, and the same caveat would apply—that the remarkable is unremarkable to this unobjective witness, but I remember being in the thrift store thinking about editing Al’s memoir when “Tell All the People” started playing.
I scrolled to a picture of actor Jeff Daniels with white hair on the Facebook feed and saw he would play the older Brian Wilson in a movie someday. Something else about Facebook: your opinions are no longer private. Even news articles posted without comment may be read as indicators of where you stand on social or political issues. Your consciousness has become performative, sharing your thoughts is an audition for acceptance.
Media is a powerful weapon of influence whenever required as such by the powerful. I’m not saying everything’s there to control or direct you, but some of it certainly is, and not being able to know which is what makes it an excellent trap. They’ve been working on it ever since, unless we’ve learned our lesson now and no longer do anything deceptive. Get confused. Figure it out. Stay in Your Own Movie where you are the Director and the Star and have more success avoiding captivation by alien orders. There are more ways of going about this than I’ve yet tried on, but a good one I know is devoting the best of yourself to something important you love and making that the lodestone rather than your dislikes or discomforts, where it’s only the moment that matters, and the moment is where you make your future, so every moment matters. Where meaning makes thoughts into matter.
Comedian and genius director Jordan Peele has spoken of his extreme admiration for polarizing figure Corey Feldman, even gone as far as making public displays of it. At first I thought it must have been a prank, taking into account their respective roles and reputations, but Peele was completely sincere in his admiration. So these were the elements: I’ve never met Corey Feldman, but now have some installed opinion about him to the degree I got a little short circuit when another unmet media figure I also had a sense of went against my expectations (with regard to Feldman). In short, the whole experience was more proof of the naturalized symbiosis between the media and our instincts anymore.
It’s not just the result of intrusion, this symbiosis is a symptom of social evolution. We’re in a bottleneck where many possibilities or variations face the threat of elimination, A.I. threatens to replace creativity, and each individual has to consider whether we will be stubborn outliers, Organicists with a will to the known, or Technologists with another view of nature, trusting the unknown. “You get to decide whether you’re valuable or replaceable,” to quote Heather Crank. We’re on the horns of that dilemma. Both have their points, to be sure, since the known can be trusted while refinement means progress, and the two sides will be synthesized in different ways for each of us. We’ve all heard about the chip by now, installation of which will computerize our every wish at the cost of surrender to the way things seem to be trending, and we won’t know if we got through smoothly or not until we’re out the other side. Don’t stop now.
