Our Collective ADD

Emile Durkheim argued for the existence of a “conscience collective” (when you read that phrase, do it with a French accent), a collective representation each society has of it’s shared beliefs and values that exists exogenously from it’s component human members. Once it’s created by the humans of a society, it exerts an external pressure (usually moral in nature) upon them apart from their own thoughts and actions.

I think our conscience collective has been radically changed by our rapid pace of technological advancement. In this day and age, our conscience collective has the attention span of a 4-year-old at a church sermon. Everything has become a meme.

The proliferation of internet-based technology combined with the 24-hour news cycle has seriously impeded our ability to focus on any one thing as a society for more than a minute.

We jump from celebrity story to celebrity story, from viral video to viral video, often reacting viscerally initially, but soon losing interest. The 24-hour news cycle seeks news to report news 24 hours a day (no shit) even when there is no news to report. This results in stupid meaningless stories being reported as news in an attempt to drive up ratings (Casey Anthony, Snooki’s pregnancy, etc.). Even when the story has important things in or surrounding it, it becomes an only once-thought-about meme. Remember those Jesus hates religion but loves god videos? Kony 2012? Those were reported by CNN as actual news and could have sparked nationwide debate about serious topics, but they haven’t. Even with massive events like the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Initially the whole country had a lazer-like focus on them. Over time however, people simply stopped caring.

In previous epochs without the technology we currently have, entire populaces were more able to concentrate because of the lack of information. Only the most important issues or news could be spread by word of mouth or by the headlines of a daily newspaper. That ensured the focus of the conscience collective.

Nations can only be mobilized to great achievement when the entire populace is focused on a goal. Germany in the 1930’s, America, Britain, and Russia in the 1940’s, Athens in the (albeit failed) conquest of Sicily, Rome in the conquest of Gaul, etc. etc. Unity and a clear focus on a goal are required. Both are being retarded by our current level of technology.