As a fourth element of my language debate is the ideas of anonymity and apathy. The ideas of anonymity and apathy being so easy and simple to carry out is evidenced in our society everyday. Many people would rather build-up their online profiles on social networking sites, than get to meet people face-to-face and interact without a digital middleman. Apathy runs rampant in our society as more people vote for an American Idol winner than for the American President. A friend told me the other day, "I should be one of those people who are not allowed to vote, I don't know anything." These ideas are a plague on the future of our society. These two words represent double trouble for our world.
Apathy is so easy. Yes it is, but how can someone in today's world be apathetic. Apathy is a term drawn from psychology to mean a mental state of indifference. There is no place to be indifferent today or in the future. There is too much at stake, there is too much to lose, there is too much to live for, there is so much to die for. Apathy is a social evil of our time. As Martin Luther King Jr. is quoted as saying, "A man who won't die for something is not fit to live." I would not say that his statement is gender exclusive, and yet his quote speaks to the truest form of apathy. If you are so apathetic as to have nothing that you would die for, then I would agree - you would not be fit to live.
Apathy is so easy. You don't have to think, you don't have to care, you don't have to be motivated, you don't have to feel guilty, you don't have to worry about doing the right thing. All you have to do as is sit in front of your television and be sucked up by the media which represents your live. As an earlier blog noted that more people watch the superbowl than vote. Very likely, since the superbowl has become a world event, where thousands watch (some just for the commercials, like my mom). My high school government teacher once told his class about political participation, "We don't care about the masses of people, we care about the asses of people. We don't get involved in the system! - interrupt Monday night football and then maybe you'll catch their attention, but people really don't give a HOOT or a HOLLER." So true. Nothing more really needs to be said because he sums it up so well. It is almost safe to say that we care more for our entertainment than our lives. Sitting in front of the tv watching sports, someone complains about the Iraq Conflict and how people are dying. People are dying in Iraq in year five now and you don't vote? Apathy is so easy.
Nearly married to apathy is the idea of anonymity. Anonymity is so easy today as well. Look at the person of the year chosen by TIME magazine: it's you. But who is really behind that mirrored cover? No one knows. The birth and explosion of blogging, youtube, video logs, and social networking sites has bred a new type of person - one who you are really not sure you know fully. Look at me, sitting here typing away, blogging, but who am I and what credit do I have for you to even listen to what I have to say? No one knows who I am on the other side of this entry, except maybe my roommate and me and the people who allow me to do this. You may have a profile somewhere out there on the vast expanse that is the internet, but does your profile really reflect who you really are? Many a person has said their profile reflects someone different than who you would meet in person. What do you stand for? Who are you?
How are you influenced by my use of language? How do you relate to my language and what I argue? Are you apathetic and not influenced by my language at all? Is language as powerful when it is from an anonymous source?Anonymity and apathy are so easy.