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Ocean's Ele7en |
Technophilia
In case you forgot, I am a bit, shall we say, leery of technology. It takes many guises and forms, much like the Devil. Truthfully, I do not hate it, despite the bile I spew here about it. Technology rocks. When it is being used as a means to an end. You know, the way it was meant to be when it was invented. This - more than the confusing interfaces, illogical commands, and general aura of hipster smugness - is probably what I most loath about Mac: it is about loving technology for its own sake, a cult that fetishizes devices for being devices, rather than for any particular thing they can do. I suspect some of these people would actually have sex with their iPad if they could. Is there an app for that?
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If only that port was a little bit larger . . . |
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Coming soon: Christopher Nolan's visionary adaptation, Angry Birds Rising. |
A recent example just blew my mind: there were people complaining about how Twitter spoiled the Olympics, because it revealed the results before they were televised. Do you know how I learned this? Enough people were griping about it that CNN had to run a news story on it. Well, here's a real newsflash for you, fucktwits - don't follow those Tweets. Better yet, don't follow any Twitter accounts, because they are the definition of mindless self-indulgence. How can you complain about this when you are the one choosing to look at the results ahead of their airing? You're ruining the surprise for yourself, as you did when you peaked at your Christmas presents under the bed before they were wrapped. Nobody is holding a gun to your head.
Shit, that's not what I meant, oh, Christ on a stick, no-
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Better question: is this a real article? |
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No, CNN, no, they shouldn't. And you are stupid for asking that question. |
Self-Victimization
I am a big critic of this one, in all its varied permutations. You may recall me illustrating my contempt here and here. "I was bullied to death!" "I'm allergic to plants! All of them!" "He's not a dickhead kid, he has Advanced Mutant Godchild Syndrome!" "Waaah, waaah, woe is me!" Suck. It. The Fuck. Up. You are not special and misunderstood, you are not a tragic victim, your "struggle" isn't an inspiration to anyone, and you did nothing to earn the attention you are so desperately seeking. And even if you did, stop it. You are insulting those who really are suffering in some legitimate way outside of their control, ear-raping the rest of us with your miniature orchestra of nothing but tiny, self-pitying violins. You know what nobody in the Bible said? "God helps those who help themselves." The real Most Interesting Man in the World and all-around renaissance pimp Benjamin Franklin actually coined this proverb, but given how many ignorant Americans persist in believing it is in fact Holy Writ, it's staggering how few take it to heart.
With all the personal empowerment seminars and self-actualization workshops clogging our hotel conference centers, I am baffled that most people aren't under the impression they can not only overcome any temporal obstacle - be it disease, oppression, or the entire cast of The Expendables 1 and 2 - but reverse the time-stream by flying backward around Earth via positive thinking. Channel your inner spirit mongoose, realign your paradigm, whatever it takes, just knock off the hypochondriact.
Overexposure
The obsession with technology is directly related to this one, because the purpose of most modern consumer tech, aside from dulling our minds to facilitate the impending Reptoid invasion, is to help you lie to yourself and others. It provides the illusion of importance, a false sense of celebrity to every 'Tard, Douche, and Whorey. (You see what I did there? Wordplay, motherfuckers). Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, Pintrest, FourSquare, and Jewish God knows what else all revolve around the conceit that the world revolves around you. Your every waking moment is a memory for everyone you know to treasure, your every thought or opinion worthy of digital enshrinement for the masses to ponder. "Everybody knows everything about all of us! That's too much knowledge!" the incomparable Shatner once quipped on a spoken-word track with Beck. It has progressed so far that the populace is operating under the mass delusion that everyone should and wants to know everything about everyone else.
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Hey, by the way, I like Batman a little bit. |
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You know this asshole. |
Speaking of STDs . . .
So you have a kid. Congratulations. You managed to get yourself knocked up/did some knocking up. I hear that is quite an accomplishment. And the result is a miracle, no doubt, and in no way am I belittling your precious little crotch-dumpling (okay, maybe I am, just a bit). But posting a new picture of said infant every 25 minutes on your Facebook wall is annoying as hell to the rest of society. No, we don't have to look at it, but neither do you have to post it. Before the advent of Facebook and Imgur and Photobucket and Instagram, you would never have been under the impression everyone, from closest kin to random netizens, needed to see your offspring's first successful shit. You wouldn't walk down 5th Avenue decked out in a sandwich-board sign bearing your progeny's cherubic image (your word of the day, readers). Remember the clichéd joke about the relative who brings over two boxes of slides and proceeds to subject the entire family to a 2-hour show nobody asked for? That's you.
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Everybody meet Zaiden Saber Wilcox! |
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Baby Zaiden, doing his thang . . . being adorable! |
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Aw, love seeing my special lil' guy so happy!!! |
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Flashback to six months ago! Can't believe how much baby Zaiden's grown! |
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Hey, did I mention I love my child? Because I do. Don't all of you? |
Beyond the mere irritation factor, though, some commentators are starting to point out a darker side of this trend as well. Your child has no privacy, from birth onward, no chance to offer permission or consent before they are assimilated, Borg-style. We love to warn our Twilight-addled tweens about the dangers of posting personal information online as we upload their younger sibling's baby pictures by the terabyte. Their life is an open e-book for any stranger to download on a tablet reader; they don't even need to check that box that says I have read and agree to the terms and conditions of this service, which is always a lie anyway. As they grow up alongside the increasingly-SkyNet-like web of technology, these kids will believe it normal to never have a genuine private life, because they never knew a world where that was thing you could have.
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"No Facebook? Right, Mom, and I bet the bogeyman and Vanilla Ice are real, too. I'm not a noob anymore." |
This has also led to strange, unforeseen side effects outside of the technological realm, because people cannot separate areas of their lives anymore. Reality is meaningless, so people start letting the behaviors learned online leak into their actual lives. I am talking about this bullshit:
When I first saw this, I went all vigilante on the driver and performed a citizen's arrest, right after the less-exercised citizen's high-speed, massive-collateral-damage vehicle chase, on the assumption he was a psychopath proudly proclaiming his kill-count. Once we straightened that minor misunderstanding out, I was even more confused.
This is, for the record, fucking weird. And I cannot believe I am the only one who seems to think so. Why are you advertising the size of your family? Or the contents of your automobile? Am I supposed to feel jealous? Intimidated? This may come as an ugly shock to you, but I really do not give a damn about your family. I don't know you. I have even seen rear windows that feature the name of each family member above their stick-person counterpart. At this point, you are basically making a checklist for creepy stalkers and serial killers such as the one I thwarted. Five years ago, I don't think anyone would have dreamed of doing this, but technology has brainwashed us into thinking we need to share this kind of information with the world.
It gets even sadder when single people or childless couples decide they have to follow this moronic vogue and start doing the Facebook "furry kids" thing:
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Wow, you have two cats and two dogs? Bet that fills the void for you. |
And now, as God did to Moses in the desert of the Sinai, I'm going to leave you hanging. Don't worry, I will return with Part II soon.
KP, out.
I don't know what is worse, the meaningless facebook status or the people that comment on them with encouraging words and the one douche with occasional song lyrics.
ReplyDeleteHey, I'm that douche with song lyrics! Though I know that's a classic FB dick move, sometimes I cannot resist. I also can't resist naysaying positive affirmations that sound like motivational posters . . .
ReplyDelete