A visit I took to the Minnesota Zoo over the weekend is a perfect example. In the bear exhibit, I shot video of two magnificent grizzlies tussling in front of spectators. The animals were just playing with each other, nobody was in any danger, but their roughhousing happened in close proximity, just on the other side of protective glass, and the baring of teeth, hostile sideways glances and sudden lunges through the water all contributed to an enticing illustration of their impressive size, fearsome power and potential danger. It was the kind of moment that makes reputable zoos worth keeping around. When or where else would most of us get a chance to see something like this up close, without grave risk?
In and of itself, this isn't a big deal. I don't care at all that I don't have some exclusive. But the suddenness with which I was enlisted into that impromptu press corps, all of us simultaneously hoisting cameras up and filming these fantastic animals, started me thinking about overexposure, and the death of wonderment, of mystery, of intrigue. In a world that was already struggling to keep reading and imagination alive, it seems there's hardly a reason to do much of either these days. Videos like these, on just about any subject, are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, pouring in from all over the world. In real time.
And frankly, 'bears in a zoo' is pretty lame. There is far more compelling video to be found out there. What about wild bears charging across a stream in Alaska, disturbing a fishing camp? Or bison bumping heads with SUVs as a herd of them cross the road in Yellowstone? Or close encounters with sharks off Hawaii? Or crossing the equator in an S&S 34? Or rough seas? Or rough landings? How about flying over the North Pole on the way to Singapore? People have cameras with them constantly now, and are pulling them out at opportune moments and capturing fantastic, or simply cool, images and/or video, all day every day. Nobody is ever more than a Google search away from all of it - the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The effect that the 'bad' and the 'ugly' have is obvious. There's no shortage of horrible things to witness on-line - a visual cacophony of the violent, cruel and vulgar, the childish, churlish and asinine. What were once off-color jokes that never achieved greater than nudge-nudge/wink-wink status, or fears that lurked only in the dark, musty closet of our imagination, are now readily available for viewing, and for some qualify as bona fide entertainment. At worst, they corrode the fabric of society, desensitize us, our children, by doing away with boundaries and sensibilities, making short work of both the illusion of hope and our sense of outrage when that hope seems threatened.
At best, they are just a waste of precious time.
But too much of the 'good' has a detrimental effect as well. People post every little 'special moment' in their lives - from their babies doing cute things to the smile on their dog's face, from the deer that strolled through their back yard to the train that passed in the night, from the thunderstorm that woke them up to the birds at their feeder in the morning - until there is no longer anything special about simple joys. Overexposure cheapens the good moments, trivializes them. My cat chasing a laser pointer pales a little - a lot, actually - if I know there are 50,000 videos of other people's cats chasing laser pointers on YouTube. And some people who have put their videos to music.
I have always been very moved by beauty in nature. It has influenced my moods, my writing, my ambition to write. Our natural world is astonishingly, astonishingly, complex, and yet perfectly ordered, with reassuring signs everywhere, for me anyway, that someone - something - had a hand in creating it, that this was not some cosmic accident.
But the next time I see a double rainbow, I don't want to be stuck thinking about this guy:
Don't get me wrong, I have no doubt this was a stellar moment. Had I been there, standing next to Paul Vasquez (the man filming), when it happened, I can't say I would not have been moved to tears myself. But while this video went viral shortly after being posted by Vasquez in 2010, and wound up with 37 million views, it was not on account of the rainbow. The camera really doesn't do the moment any justice. You get a sense of what he's seeing, but you're not going to feel it by watching this video, really feel it; it's essentially no different than being stuck watching someone's vacation slides. What turned this video into a meme was Vasquez's ridiculous over-reaction, forever linking a stunning affirmation of the beauty that exists in Nature, whether you believe in a divine Creator or not, with his sobbing like a mental patient.
Something cannot help but get lost in translation, and now I will never again see a double rainbow without thinking of 'double rainbow guy'.
As if the overexposure in our video world wasn't enough, every video post has to be accompanied by everyone's two cents in the user comment section. Seriously, 'user comments' have reduced the value of our two cents to about a sixpence. They are an abrasive reminder of how stupid 'people' are; how quick to trivialize or laugh inappropriately, how bent on instigating an argument without really knowing what's going on, how tribal and willing to perpetuate ignorance in the name of their tribe they allow themselves to become.
I know, you're supposed to ignore, dismiss or laugh off the user comments. But I'm a writer who believes it's impossible to write effectively without some faith in humanity, a belief if nothing else that everyone has something to say, something to contribute, a story to tell.
User comments refute this, proving that a lot of people - most people? - have nothing good to say. User comments are my kryptonite, and reason enough to tear off down the highway, straight into the horizon, steering with my knees so I may clamp my hands protectively over my ears.
