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Our Addiction to JUNK

It was exciting for me to finally see a reference to A Brave New World in Steven Johnson's book Everything Bad is Good For You, because I read this book in high school and it really opened my eyes to the same issues discussed by johnson and Siegel. A point both writers agree on is that people are inevitably attracted to "junk"(180). However, it is the reasons why we are attracted tot his mindless media that are different to Johnson and Siegel.

I agree with Johnson who believes that the only reason junk culture is thriving, is due to the fact that "people are naturally drawn to simple, childish pleasures" (180). He, unlike Siegel, still believes that although our minds are at a state of rest while observing numerous media examples of this junk culture, our brains are still functioning and continuing to seek and obtain knowledge. Johnson states that our minds are constantly searching for "new challenges and experiences" so evidently our minds are never resting and always working.

As a diehard reality TV fanatic, I completely disagree with Siegel who feels that this mindless media is truly empty and cannot give us anything knowledgeable to acquire. He reiterates his feelings to the pointlessness of junk culture with the example to Stephen Colbert. Siegel believes that there is nothing to obtain from information that has been made from "cynicism and sarcasm" (155). This form of satirical humor "depends in information for its effect [therefore it] is just another mode of information" (156). This concludes that there is no new information or opinions to gain to enable us to gain knowledge, it only gives us a since of entertainment. 

Generation SPARKNOTES

While reading "Is Google Making Us Stupid" by Nicholas Carr, I couldn't help but identify with the peoples' inabilities to read an in depth and through manner. When I am assigned to read a large body of literature, "I get fidgety, lose the thread, [and] begin looking for something else to do". My first instinct is to get on the web and search for a summary of what I'm reading.

I am sad to say that I am a perfect example of the youth today that has been negatively effected by the internet. I, like many others, am constantly looking for short cuts when it comes to reading. I tend to feel defeated before even beginning to read when looking at a lengthy article, or hundred page book. This is the result of a bad habit I acquired all the way back in 6th grade, when a website called SPARKNOTES was created. 

SPARKNOTES was supposed to be used as a means of gaining a greater understanding for a complex novel, yet I, and more than 50% of my fellow class mates, abused its services and relied on its chapter summaries for our complete understanding of the book. Not after long I began using SPARKNOTES for literally EVERY reading assignment, and "the more [I] used the Web, the more [I] had to fight to stay focused on long pieces of writing". 

Sadly, I am paying for it now, where I am in a learning environment where I am forced to stop "seeking convenience", and being forced to read and analyze pieces of literature that, to my dismay, cannot be found summarized on the web. Here at SMU I've been given the opportunity to exercise my brain by reading in a way to think and comprehend creatively again, instead of coming to "rely on computers to mediate [my] understandings of [things], it is [my] own intelligence that flattens into artificial intelligence".