culture

The Layer of Madness

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com, Steve’s Tumblr, and Pillowfort.  Find out more at my newsletter, and all my social media at my linktr.ee)

I’ve written before how many of our leaders seem, well, insane. I’ve also discussed at annoying length about how we’re often unseriousness and irresponsible as a culture, while also plugging Ted Gioia and The Unaccountability Machine. Lately I’ve been speculating on the architecture of this madness, namely how do so many – maybe all – of our so-called leaders become completely nuts.

You know what I’m talking about even if we’re talking about different people. People with bizarre beliefs that you can’t imagine any sane person holding – and they’re in charge. So-called adults acting like aspiring teenage Instagram Influencers who have nuclear weapons. It all seems like acting, and bad acting at that – and we can’t even blame Regan anymore (well, as much).

I’m not saying leaders haven’t been completely bonkers over the aeons. I mean, we still discuss the Hapsburgs. But as I’ve done my various historical readings, it seems we’ve managed the madness without the genetic damage and a particularly pathetic kind of madness at that. I think it’s because our leaders are so abstract.

It’s like everyone is so far away. You can’t be aware of how the world works, of the impact of your work. It’s because of layers.

Think of society as layers. There’s layers of work on extraction – farming, raw materials. Layers of crafting. Layers of communications. Layers of medical work. These different layers connect and support each others, but it’s easy to forget them. For instance, I work in medical technology, but I have to recall things like where drug raw materials come from or how shipping affects us.

As we pile layers upon layers to manage society – layers of banking and politics and the likes. Each layer ads more ability to coordinate, to administer, to process – but also more ways to get abstracted or distant. That may sound like a problem, but some people like that – they don’t want to be responsible or deal with complexity.

I’m musing now that our society’s layers have become so abstract that we’ve got some “upper layers” of media and politics so merged and so abstract the people in them are entirely out of touch unless they want to be otherwise. People raised or trapped entirely in a mix of low-brow politicking, media-spheres, and whatever science fiction they consumed 30 years ago. Everyone echoing each other like a pathological message board.

We may not have the Hapsburg inbreeding, but we’ve got people living on some airy layer of our culture, totally abstract from us, mentally inbred. It’s hard not to go mad even if you don’t want to, and if you do lose your mind as a politician or media star, people will just decide you’re sane. Which of course makes you more mad.

Plus you’re so far away you’re free of responsibility and surrounded by yes-people they can insulate you from reality – but not the rest of us.

I’m not against our modern society, but I think we have to ask if all the different layers have created a unique form of “royalty” even more out of touch than legendary royalty of the past. We don’t see it as our system of media and politics amplifies their madness – and tells them what madness of ours they can take advantage of.

We need to find a way to change how the layers of our complex world connect, else we’ll keep dealing with the insanity.

Steven Savage

Six Further Thoughts On Not Being Serious

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com, Steve’s Tumblr, and Pillowfort.  Find out more at my newsletter, and all my social media at my linktr.ee)

I’m still processing my thoughts over Ted Giola’s post about how the US and maybe Western society isn’t serious anymore. It’s all watered down, performative, targeted, and just weirdly empty. When I posted my own blog post on the subject, my friends and readers had feedback. I figure I’d round that up – and these might become columns on their own.

So to reiterate, Giola felt our culture lacked seriousness, and I agreed – we’re doing things that aren’t what they say we are, in a performative existence. Combined with capitalism which rewards knowing how to Push The Money Button, and it’s a toxic mix.

So here’s a few things I wanted to explore after hearing from people:

Good Unseriousness: Is it always good to be serious, can’t we be funny or have fun? I’d say that you can be funny and serious (George Carlin, Terry Pratchett), and sometimes the best funny is one with a grounding that is serious and all-too real. I’d also add that FUN might not be serious but it’s also not a lack of seriousness – what Giola targets is a deliberate unseriousness.

Lack of Agency: How often do we lack Agency, so why be serious in the first place? This is a fascinating thought because I “get it” instinctively – and I think there’s something true here. If you feel helpless, all the “serious people” are screwing around and lying, does anything matter? Then you end up with a kind of toxic, spreading, unseriousness.

Curation: We’re not trained in curating, checking facts, and so on. This leaves us to an onslaught of bullshit from politicians, mediocre media, and more. Even if we want to deal with things seriously, it’s hard to sort it out – and exhausting. Which leads to Lack of Agency . . .

Speed: Our culture and time move so fast that it’s hard to keep up with anything. We’ve not just got a lot of media and news, it’s all coming fast. It’s easy to get caught up in something unserious, it keeps us from cultivating, and maybe at some point we just give up. It’s also hard to pay attention to what’s right in front of us.

Misuse of Unseriousness: We’re also used to a very bullying culture that chides people for not being able to take jokes that are just disguised abuse. “Can’t you take a joke” is endemic in our culture, and horrible things can be both serious and not at the same time. This just distorts what’s serious and not – and maybe even the manipulators aren’t sure anymore. The Serious and Unserious become harder to separate.

Fear: This is a conclusion of my own – unseriousness for all its problems also can be due to fear. People are afraid to confront our climate issues. A second generation millionaire faces the fact they might only be there due to birth, not any skill. Politics is insanely complex. Confronting the world we live in is hard and unseriousness is both a tool to cover up your failings but also a possible reaction. Many a political figure has a crackling fear running beneath their worlds, you can feel it, but it seems they can’t.

So those are a few thoughts from some great dialog with friends and readers – and hopefully food for thought for you. I honestly do think we’re in a crisis of seriousness in the world, and its making everything worse. But it’s not as simple as it may seem, so exploring it, well, is serious business.

Steven Savage

Channeling Innovation

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(This column is posted at www.StevenSavage.com, Steve’s Tumblr, and Pillowfort.  Find out more at my newsletter, and all my social media at my linktr.ee)

I came across this fascinating paper that suggests innovation is the result of collective interaction (shared knowledge, exchange of ideas, etc.). Think of it this way – we’ve got all this stored knowledge, cultural interactions, kind of a shared brain, that leads to innovation. People may carry it out, but it doesn’t come from them – a bit like channeling or “being ridden” in spiritual terminology.

Having worked in everything from medical research to tech to writing, I find the paper compelling not just for its citations, but how it fits my own experiences. I’ve watched creatives – including myself – “come up” with ideas that are the results of inputs and experiences, evolving into something. I’ve seen tech changed over the years, watching interaction across time and space result in great – and stupid – things that can’t be really traced to a single “cause.” The ideas may appear in people, but it doesn’t arise from anyone, but the time itself.

I’ve often been skeptical of people who think they’re some kind of linchpin of history. I know what goes on in my own head when I get inspired, and so much “isn’t me.” I know many people get where they are due to wealth, luck, the time, and so on. I know where my own luck and privilege has benefited me.

We may be the carriers of innovation, or where it finally manifests, but we’re not its owners – nor its masters as many a person possessed by an idea knows.

With this idea in mind (ha!), I’d like to take a look at something I’ve oft complained about – the lack of innovation and anything interesting in the tech industry in, well, the last ten or fifteen years.

Consider what happens if we believe that some Great Innovators are the source or all good things. We will seek these Great Innovators, pay attention to them, and then rely on them even if they aren’t producing good ideas. Because we seek them, anyone who fits the idea in their head is someone we listen to and assume they know what they’re doing. This of course leaves room for plenty of liars and grifters – maybe most of them.

Do that long enough and you not only lack innovation, you have a kind of anti-innovation. People with fame and money are not innovating, but now have the fame, money, and regard to propagate non-innovative ideas. The non-innovators can buy technology and access and even crush places where innovation originates.

Meanwhile, we’re not working on a culture and a world that increases innovation. We’re too busy looking for the Big Heroic Idea Person as opposed to a society where innovation can be realized. Everything becomes about finding heroes – which don’t exist – and things get less innovative and interesting.

It seems awful familiar, doesn’t it?

Steven Savage