5 minutes ago, I was re-reading my last post (How arrogant of me, I know. I'm sure some famous author somewhere--probably Oscar Wilde or someone like him--has said that a writer should never read their own material; it's bad form: “My dear Mr. Wilde, do you remember that piece you wrote last year on the English parliament? It struck me as so delightful at the time!” Oscar takes a sip of his sherry before replying “Alas Madam, I cannot consume my own work. It sets the bar too high and sours the enjoyment of any subsequent reading.” But I digress...where was I? Oh yes, breaking the rule...) and came across this sentence: "We humans need inspiration like we need respiration."
Think about that for a minute. Separate the words from their context and ignore the rhyme: "We humans need inspiration like we need respiration." Is that really true? That last essay extolled the necessity of being inspired. This one tries to decide if my generation's need for novelty is healthy or hurtful (and, as a secondary goal, tries to use fewer semi-colons—it’s a bad habit).
I was in Ontario last month for "MySummit 2010," the youth-focused portion of the G8/G20 Country Summits. (How I happened to be there is a longer story we’ll leave alone for now.) During the final day of the G8 Summit in Muskoka, we met with the Governor-General of Canada, Michaelle Jean. I won’t bother you with the details leading up to the event—they consist of hitch-hiking from Montreal to Toronto, sleeping 12 hours in 6 days, hearing the Queen of Jordan (whom I have a slight crush on) speak, and meeting a hundred amazing people from all over the world—but instead picture with me a square room which....well never mind, just look at the photos.
Keeping in mind the fact that this post now has 4 paragraphs and very little content, let us leave off from literary devices for a moment—I only have 10 minutes left.
Her Excellency Michaelle Jean came into the room after 15 minutes of waiting expectantly (and sweating—it was a sauna in there!). As she followed Minister Tony Clement through the entrance, the room rose with a roar of applause and relief—like I said, it was hot. Once at the podium, she waited for silence before beginning: “How are you?” I won’t relay the whole speech (if you’d like to read it you can find it here), but it was simplistic and sincere, and impressed everyone present. What’s interesting, though, is that she didn’t speak for long. She finished by saying “I am very interested in hearing your perspectives on the ways we can all work together to tackle key global challenges.
I would like to hear some of the solutions you have identified."
Well, what could we do? We “young professionals” are frightfully proficient at complaining that no one ever listens to our opinions. “We want to change the world!” we whine, while we waste our weeks on Facebook and wonder why our opinion holds no weight. Here was someone—someone important!—offering to spend hours doing just that: listening to the opinions and complaints of young world citizens.
So we talked. A microphone was produced, and 60 young people from Russia, Canada, Germany, Japan, Italy, France, the U.K., and the U.S.A. took turns sharing their thoughts on the world’s strengths & shortcomings; problems & potential; woes & wonders. We made ourselves frightfully vulnerable to criticism, but there were no critics—only curious, open minds with few preconceptions. In short, it was fantastic. We fed off each others’ enthusiasm and left the session with our day’s appetite for inspiration fulfilled.
The next day, (Saturday) we boarded our coaches at 6:00am in anticipation of terrible traffic on the trip to Toronto. Some of the wiser Delegates among us slept for the entire 3-hour ride. Having just gulped down a hasty cup of Earl Grey in the hotel, and with another one steeped perfectly for the road (obtained while being shouted at by various people to “hurry up, we’re leaving without you!”), I suddenly realized that all of my books were packed, and that my laptop battery was dead. Not one to be put off, I pestered the rows around me until a life-saver from North Carolina produced the latest copy of the Economist. Alas, It wasn’t as interesting as I had hoped, and I soon wandered up to the front of the bus to talk to Kimberly Mosher (Whose wonderful blog you can find here), an old friend and fellow ‘attempted thinker’ who can always be depended on for a good conversation. We talked about the amazing time we were having, the great people we were meeting, the sleep we weren't getting, and the wonderful things we were hearing. Something was bothering me though: during the past three days we had heard somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 speeches, all of them inspiring and well-thought out, given by various leaders, politicians, and public figures. In almost every single speech, the person lecturing told us emphatically to "Remember this: you aren't just the leaders of tomorrow, you're the leaders of today!"
"Now, that sounds really nice to say," I told Kim as we crawled through traffic toward the outskirts of Toronto "but let's be honest. Are we REALLY the leaders of today? We don't do nearly the amazing things that our parents' generation did--we TALK. We're a generation of pithy quotes and cute thoughts, but do we have anything to back it up? We watch TED talks every day and carry funky notebooks to write down our deepest musings, but do we DO anything?
"Looking at all of our resumes, you would think we were God's gift to Generation-Y, but how many of us still live with our parents?"
I realized I was ranting, and decided to cut it short--especially since we were pulling into the University of Toronto campus: "Our parents' hard work and drive has bred in us an addiction to the clever, the temporary, and the meaningless. Not one of the things that we've talked so eloquently about during the last two days will actually change unless we all go home and can be driven....but most of us won't."
And with that upbeat comment, our conversation ended. But not in my mind. In my mind I kept turning it over and over and over, adding to it the experiences of the next few days--meeting young people from 20 different countries, hearing more speeches, watching young people flirt with each other and with the ecstasy of being one of the chosen few to represent the youth of the world at this Summit--and the summation of all of that can be expressed with this:
"But I still haven't found
What I'm looking for."
Just a humble opinion.
-TD
Monday, September 27, 2010
A Generation with an Addiction to Inspiration
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2 comments:
Hey Thomas.
Your stated goal: "This one tries to decide if my generation's need for novelty is healthy or hurtful"
And eventual conclusion: "Our parents' hard work and drive has bred in us an addiction to the clever, the temporary, and the meaningless. Not one of the things that we've talked so eloquently about during the last two days will actually change unless we all go home and can be driven....but most of us won't."
So can we sum this up as a realization that, in a consumer culture, anything can become a commodity? Any material good surely can, as can the phenomenon of inspiration -- the TED people seem to have done a fine job of reducing potentially groundbreaking an important research (doubtless the product of years of slow effort) to the smallest ratio of novelty and whiz-bang per minute of viewing time. Thus "10 speeches, all of them inspiring and well-thought out, given by various leaders, politicians, and public figures" become ten consumable units which are fulfilled or completed in the hearing, or consuming. We need not act upon them so long as we consume them. This, I think, lines up with what you say.
Just as literary critics will reduce anything in creation to a text to be read and interpreted, so will consumer culture reduce anything to commodity. But then what? How do we break out of such a system?
Your conclusion can be taken as potentially realistic or cynical: "...but most of us won't." How can one "be driven" to do good?, and does this put you outside of the consumer system, or just make you an exemplary and high-achieving member of it? I don't know. I am frustrated that my actions, thoughts, and motivations are shaped by a ethos of consumerism, becoming to me like water to a fish.
[continued below]
Let me digress for a moment and invoke your earlier post on coolness (hoping that the dead will keep their peace this time). I was thinking of this a while back while watching people on campus... and how one can almost typify social groups by dress, as though social circles had uniforms. One knows what a jock looks like, or a punk, or an emo, or hipster, or a pretentious prep, or what have you. If one can summon the image of the rebellious type, the self-proclaimed dweller of alternative-culture, I think one can also see that, in the context of a consumer culture, such counter-culture aesthetes are not counter-cultural at all. In fact, so far as their clothes and accessories are signifiers of rebellion and individuality, they can also be seen as mere shopping choices. Rather than spend your money at Walmart or Gap or whatever, one goes to American Apparel or wherever else, and still spends the money. Have you seen the occasional hippie-throwback selling hemp clothes in the arts tunnel? Last month someone was selling ostensibly ethically produced clothing, proceeds from the sales of which supported some fund that worked towards the Free Tibet cause. The point of buying the shirts was to support, by proxy, a fashionable cause while declaring one's solidarity with said cause by wearing the shirt -- emblazoned with the common "Free Tibet" slogan.
The idea that I can be an agent of change for a good cause through my shopping choices is the principal fallacy within a consumerist culture. Of course, given the choice between two similar products one wants to make an ethical choice, but the idea that I can somehow aid in the freeing of Tibet through 1) allowing a fraction of the proceeds of an overpriced t-shirt to go to some 3rd party or 2) declaring my solidarity with the cause by wearing the shirt, is clearly absurd. By the same logic I can feel good about myself because by buying Starbucks coffee I'm building bridges and schools for the families in the growing areas. Absurd.
Bringing this back to your discussion and how it pertains to consumption and doing good... having consumed ten eloquent and inspiring speeches, we intuitively feel that the consumption itself is action on our part, don't we? By listening to an inspiring speech and feeling inspired I become an agent of change. But this is also absurd, I think. But we're so locked into the way of thinking that it's incredibly difficult to absent ourselves from it.
Which brings me back to my earlier question... how do we get out of the consumer mindset? I think the question of how to "be driven" and change society for the good is related to this question.
Lemme know your thoughts.
jon
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