Slouching Toward Signifiance
Often times, living in the digital age feels akin to being lodged in a cubicle of Jello.
Jello’s sweet and entertainingly colored, but thick, quivering, and not exactly a proponent of easy gestures. It’s hard to see through, too much intake will deprive us of happier nutrients, and in a world of other deserts like the venerable Boston Cream Pie, Jello is the Wal-Mart of deserts.
We may be empowered with a rapidly advancing ability to connect, share, exchange, and friend the world around us, but the volume of Jello-y goodness out there pushes the other courses out of view; often the meat and potatoes are just around the corner, just under the twenty open browser pages, and we’re lucky to get to it before the expiration date pushes it beyond reach.
Since the dawn of the 24-news network, it’s this humble Hoosier’s feeling that the ratio of available information to non-information is compellingly misshapen and what’s worse is that the real stories out there are rarely given room to breathe until they are shoved out of the way for a commentator or sponsor’s commercial. There is a rush as if every story is the most important story and the line between fact and feeling is dimmed.
There is so much stuff out there, many are compelled to seek out the stories that are just around the corner, beyond the expiration date, and under the nooks and crashing in crannies. The downfall is those who aren’t compelled to seek out the punctuation at the end of a sentence and the digital age encourages this lethargy.
Journalism’s change has not been congruent to the path of its audience. Information is wolfed down without chewing. And chewing is the only opportunity you get the real taste.
Citizen Journalism is one step closer to the real story, bombarded not by sponsorship or slant, but by the visceral human story that echoes around inside individuals and among people. It’s the smasher of abundant bottles and the isolator of otherwise compelling material. It’s advocacy for feeling without the absence of fact.
In the digital age, it’s the YouTube moderator in a room full of redundant uploads. We’re digging in this mess to not bury the bone, but unearth its DNA.
-Kelly Lynch
