Reading Response

The Medium is the Massage

p. 60-82

            When I initially read this text I’d assumed it had been written recently; everything about it seemed so applicable to modern day. I was shocked to find out that it was actually written in 1967. Was MacHulan able to predict the future? Have times not changed from when this was written? Or is The Medium is the Massage more applicable today then ever before? MacHulan continually writes with incredible insight. One point he makes is that “We used to need to invent new ways of labor saving. Now we don’t need to invent, we need to adjust, not to invent. We need to find the environments in which it will be possible to live with out new inventions” (64). We used to search for better ways to get information out into the world and more efficient ways to find that information, now we struggle to keep up with the information spreading technology we’ve acquired. Many of the classes we take now are not about learning information but learning the best mode of gaining information. We are taught how to manipulate media and how to properly search the Internet. This quote leads me to think about my Dad who cannot for the life of him figure out how to use a computer. He struggles in today’s market because he doesn’t know how to write an email or build a website. He knows how to do his job, but he doesn’t know how to get his skills out there. Back when this text was written, he would have had no problem using the technologies around him, but today he has a problem. If MacHulan wrote in 1967 that we are struggling to keep up with our technology, what would he say about modern day? What would he think about the Internet? Time has made his words truer than ever.

            MacHulan discusses the transformation of war over the years. He says that “It’s no longer convenient, or suitable, to use the latest technologies for fighting our wars, because the latest technologies have rendered war meaningless” (71). MacHulan is writing during the height of the cold war, when everyone was terrified of the weapons they had created. This issue is applicable once again today because of the problems we have in Syria. Syria has crossed the line and used the advanced weapons we don’t want to touch, so now we need to decide if we want to step in. If we do, we could start a new war, which would be more dangerous today then ever before. This is not a new issue, it was definitely true back when The Medium is the Massage was published, but I can’t pretend that it isn’t a huge coincidence that this issue is rising again as I write this.

            Continuing the discussion of war tactics, MacHulan explains that we can’t use technological weapons anymore because they are too dangerous. Rather than using physical weapons, we now use propaganda as a weapon. The world is manipulated through the media. MacHulan claims that the “…Press, movies and radio are mere packaging devices for consumers. In television, images are projected at you. You are the screen. The images wrap around you” (64). If we aren’t just watching TV, but living what we are watching on TV then we can be brainwashed to do what those controlling the TV want us to do. Ideology is more reinforced now because media surrounds us now more than ever. Once again, there was TV back when MacHulan wrote these words, and that could definitely be used to manipulate people, but today media is much more prominent then it was back then. More people have TVs and watch them more often then they did in the 1960s; plus we now have computers (another outlet for media). Media is a far more dangerous weapon today then it was back then, because it is so much more accessible today. Here we have another example of The Medium is the Massage becoming truer with time. Media is more dangerous weapon today then it was when MacHulan wrote this text.

MacHulan said “It is the business of the future to be dangerous” (82). He couldn’t possibly have known that the Internet was going to come about. He couldn’t have envisioned what the future was going to look like, but I believe he did know that technology was going to progress with time. He may have guessed that communication would expand, weapons would become stronger, and media would become more prominent. With this is mind, he may have had some idea that his ideas would grow more relevant over the years. He couldn’t have known how or why, but he may have had a hunch that his book would become truer as time passed.

How Laura Poitras Helped Snowden Spill His Secrets

And

The Art of Peeping: Photography at the Limits of Privacy

I realize that the connection we’re supposed to draw between these two articles is surveillance, but they are two entirely different types of surveillance. The Laura Poitras article discusses how the government is listening in and keeping tabs on us to try and track down terrorists while the art of peeping is about an artist trying to make a statement by invading people’s privacy. One is done for the sake of safety- the other is done for the sake of art. I’m not saying art isn’t important, but I hardly think the situation of the second article is comparable to the first. Therefore, I’m going to discuss them separately.

I don’t have much of an opinion on the Snowden scandal because (even after having read this article) I feel like I don’t know enough to hold a legitimate opinion. Then again, isn’t the point of the story that we all don’t know enough? This entire situation is a mystery to the public; only Snowden, Poitras, Greenwald and the government know the full story. If we don’t know everything, whose to say who is right? Personally, I don’t mind being surveyed if it’s keeping me safe from attack, but I don’t have anything to hide. Poitras had sensitive information to hide and felt suffocated by how thoroughly the government was watching her (even though she was in no way a threat). It’s a fine line and I don’t feel like I have the enough of the story to give a well-informed opinion.

On the other hand, I definitely have an opinion on Arne Svenson’s photography. I grew up in a New York City apartment so I know how the people who sued Svenson feel, and I also consider myself an artist so I can relate to Svenson’s craving for freedom of expression. It’s one thing to live in a glass house and keep your window’s open, but an entirely different situation to be living in an apartment with glass windows. In a house you’re on the first floor, standing at the same level of the public, and it’s expected that those who walk by can clearly see you. When you live in an apartment, you’re high up in the air where it’s expected that people who walk the streets cannot clearly see you. If someone in the building across from you can see out their window into yours, you have a silent contract with them that because you have similar situations you will give each other privacy. Especially if you live in a pre-war building such as mine, the lighting is incredibly week so keeping your shades open is a necessity if you want to be able to see anything. I fully understand how these people could feel violated. From within an apartment you expect privacy. On the other hand, the pictures where perfectly decent (nothing personal or pervy was captured) and he tried to keep crisp faces out of the images. I completely understand the message of his exhibit and find it interesting, but I believe his mistake was displaying the images in the same neighborhood where they were taken. If he really wanted to successfully show his art without getting in trouble he should have just brought his exhibit to another city. I would see no issue in that because personally, if someone did take a mundane blurry image of me through a window and showed it somewhere else (where no one that would recognize me could view it) then I really wouldn’t mind. And if he really had to display the images in the neighborhood where they were taken to get a point across, then he should have just asked for permission from the people he was photographing. No, I believe he took none of the precautionary steps because he wanted to create a stir and get in trouble. The controversy was all part of the art, and because he was just looking for attention I completely understand how these people could feel violated and used by Svenson.