Media & Messaging: I Don’t Want to Set the World on Fire

One Man’s Story is Another Man’s Truth

 

[NOTE: This post was originally written on Aug 20, 2017. Sadly, not much has changed]

This past week, events occurred that, once again, caused many around the world to reflect and react — not necessarily in that order — and share their values and beliefs all over the Internet.

These terrible incidents, the Neo-Nazi fascist marches in Charlotteville, VI; a Daesh-supporting terrorist driving into, and over, dozens of tourists in Barcelona; and the supposed “leader of the free world” seemingly supporting and denouncing (then supporting and denouncing again) terrorists (depending entirely on the race and creed of the protagonists), shook the world and challenged our ideologies and values.

For many, these horrific, frightening, frustrating, and maddening (there are many more adjectives to use here, but I am limited to 500 words) events were received via Twiter in 140 characters or less. From a personal standpoint, I learned of both tragedies/terrorist actions (Charlottesville and Barcelona) this way. And it makes sense, world events about commerce, politics, religion, and culture are often trending on Twitter hours, or at very least half-hours, before any world press outlet gets enough information to post to their websites. Media is obligated, much as we have been told otherwise of late, to present the truth and the full story as best as possible, which takes time.

What I realized this week, is that in the gaping yawn between incident and “official news”, Twitter becomes the de facto people’s press.

Capital, Victor Deni, 1919

According to the red text at the bottom of this famous anti-Capitalist poster – also by Viktor Deni – “Anyone who tears down this poster or covers it up is performing a counter-revolutionary act.”via http://listverse.com/2012/12/08/15-revolutionary-posters-of-the-soviet-union/

These ground zero “reporters” are sharing information as it happens, and the world is privy to a first hand account of the action. But these “Tweeters” aren’t necessarily reporters; one should assume that as witnesses they are posting to Twitter through the lens of, or at the very least are influenced by, fear, confusion, shock, anger, or horror. They aren’t reporting on a story, they are the story.

The More Things Change…

Recently, in PCOM 530 we looked at the Gutenberg press and the telegraph as seminal instruments in the evolution of communication and the resulting influence their integration into society had, not only on how we communicated and shared complex data across wide areas, but also how these advances in communication affected global commerce, politics, religion, and culture. (Carey, 2009)

An interesting observation of Carey’s about the telegraph, a communication tool developed in the 1830s, was that “This new technology enters American discussions not as a mundane fact but as divinely inspired for the purposes of spreading the Christian message farther and faster, eclipsing time and transcending space, saving heathen, bringing closer and making more probable the day of salvation”. (Carey, Page 159)

With regards to the incidents over the last week, social media (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and even Snapchat) exploded with secular posts, observations, preachings and teachings, analysis, and satire. To make a connection between social media and the telegraph as a means to communicate beliefs (religious or otherwise) is not difficult. However, where social media excels today and the telegraph fell short is in their abilities to use satire and humour as a means to communicate politics and religion.

If the same story were to be understood in the same way from Maine to California, language had to be flattened out and standardized. The telegraph, therefore, led to the disappearance of forms of speech and styles of journalism and story telling—the tall story, the hoax, much humor, irony, and satire…

(Carey, Page 162.)

via Andy Marlette @marlettecartoons, August 18, 2017.

It is interesting to observe that almost 200 years later our “new technology” (which coincidently was also used in its early days to play chess across great distances*) has also been co-opted to share political and secular information. Only now we can laugh through the pain, and cry in our sheet cake.

Tina Fey Devoured A Sheet Cake Whilst Giving A Scathing Speech About Trump’s Comments On Charlottesville

*http://www.historymuseum.ca/blog/the-forerunner-of-text-messaging-the-telegraph/