A Better Way to Communicate

Pundits (or a better term would be “talking heads”) are always in competition with each other at who can come up with the best one liner or a phrase that will forever remain in cultural consciousness, and will be used as a frame of reference in many contexts. But these phrases are quickly forgotten because they either have no substance or because people really are oversaturated with information. Truth and real thought provoking reflections get lost and they have no impact. People are extremely impatient and examination of one's life is not on their priority list. Give me the next information. More, more, more!

Social media feeds are like this. Not only are they in constant change of information, literally second by second, they are feeding the mind of the people and it is junk food. Recent debates about Facebook selecting what they put on their news feed and how it is biased toward liberalism are a perfect example of what constitutes news.

It is true – they are certainly more liberal than conservative. You won't find a National Review link on its feed. However, if you look closely, most of what Facebook deems news is celebrity gossip. In this way, you could say, that they are selectively choosing to not report on real issues, and because of that the Facebook is participating in a mild form of censorship.

Somehow, we have to seek the articles and essays that give us information, but most of all, a glimpse of the universal human questions. Let's get to the heart of the matter, and not constantly engage in ad hominem attacks and insults that masquerade as intellectual analysis. It does not take any effort, self-reflection, or careful thought to throw insults around. This is just another instance of dehumanizing one's opponent. It's one thing to be witty, funny, and satirical. It's another to be utterly humorless and quite simply, cruel. Smugness of the so-called intellectual elite is tyrannical and does not permit any deviation from their linguistically and euphemistically formed metaphysics, where good is evil, and evil is good.

Artists, philosophers, intellectuals – they all have to find a way to be heard in the noise of meaningless opinions. But how do you do that? I must admit, it's a depressing world out there. But you have to remain strong. The intellectual thrust has to be even more aggressive and powerful than what artists and thinkers have experienced in the past. But, to paraphrase, Andrei Tarkovsky, without disorder and pressure, an artist would have no reason to create. All of art and thought is borne out of some kind of struggle.

How to rescue art from politics? Do we respond to and analyze the loud and obnoxious and gyrating culture of beyonces, taylor swifts, lena dunhams, etc.? If we speak about them, we give them attention. If we remain silent, they continue to deconstruct that which is beautiful. In the meantime, they are the true capitalists, who through cultural and historical appropriation masquerade as social justice warriors. I would say that someone like Beyonce is wearing a metaphysical mask, but maybe there is no face underneath the disguise.

Look, let's face, it's about the money. Whatever gets more attention from the people, whatever creates more “controversy” is more profitable. Be it beyonces or professional activists, they are making money. What they are saying hardly even matters. But the words and twisted meanings of them do spread. And suddenly, it all becomes a really bad telephone game. The unfortunate aspect of this game is that the message was a lie to begin with.

Artists and philosophers and true intellectuals need to keep forging ahead. They need to annihilate the mediocrity that calls itself “art” and “thought.” Quite simply, standards need to be raised. Commenting on the dryness and depression that comes from an artist’s struggles as an actor, John Cassavetes said: “If you don’t get any good parts, you have to keep preparing. You can’t go slumming. You can’t ever slum.”