Jack Attack: Fevers and Mirrors

I am CRIME AND PUNISHMENT – Facebook told me so via me telling myself so.

Many of us here in America are infinitely obsessed with technological advancements. Web sites, iPhones, video games, never-ending gadgets etc. This is not Wikipedia-educated rocket science news for anyone. Generally, we like to put the ‘ovation’ in ‘innovation.’

So it goes.

What is the new pastime? Going out (or rather, in) and consuming entertainment based on the loosely-based-algorithm placement of your so-called personality by a Facebook application – “Which classic novel best describes your life;” “Which Office character are you;” anything with the words “pirate” or “ninja” in them. I was hard-pressed to find data to back this up, but it appears Facebook is putting plenty of fortune tellers out of business.

You are what you eat. We are stalling evolution (which, yes, does exist), and consuming and regurgitating this Facebook entertainment until it is embodied and instilled in us all. Admired and desired by us all. Yes, most of us know that quirky quip from Dwight – and it is especially accentuated by your high-thread count American Apparel “Schrute Beet Farm” shirt and your placing of an ironic item in a gelatin mold for your unsuspecting friend. So please, for the love of not-ruining-a-good-series, let’s keep the peanut-gallery-echoed one-liners likened to the prize in Cracker Jack – hidden among the goodness of the intended reason rather than vice-versa.

But we will ride the look-at-me waves with their short-lived peaks and foaming dissonance. Friends will “like this” and use the same application for surprisingly similar results. Each of us rise from whichever virtual bed we are sleeping-in in, saying to ourselves, “how would I like to project myself today with a self-imposed manipulated mirror in the form of a personality-generator application?” And then we satiate our click-click fix, broadcasting it to worker and homework-avoiders worldwide, because everyone sort of gives a damn.

Hey, I take these Facebook quizzes as much as the next person. I have that why-in-the-world amount of friends (966). I’m the hypocrite’s hypocrite. But I may also be the new version of old fashion. Whatever the case may be, we continually toss our desires and supposed-selves into a black-hole oblivion – but damn it, we look good. We toss our constellations into cyberpace, with the stars in our own eyes.