Dear Prof Postman
It’s over thirty years since I read your massively popular Amusing Ourselves to Death. It was the first book of serious criticism I read, the first step of a difficult but worthwhile process of understanding. Young people still read AOD, you might be pleased to know.
I should acknowledge what led me to pick up this book: the Roger Waters album of the same name. Had I not bought that sight unseen I may never have discovered your work. So thanks to you both for showing me a light. I strive to move toward it ever since.
After finishing your book I went on a reading tear for years. I read contemporary works and expanded my awareness of our moment. I read classical works and the bridge between then and now came into view. I read spiritual works and developed a longing for higher realms. AOD opened new worlds for me.
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In AOD you detailed the consolidation of media under a handful of corporatized owners, alongside the elimination of local and independent voices. That’s largely unchanged, although perhaps the dominant media institutions are now absorbed into even larger conglomerated ownership structures. As well, there was the idea that it’s perhaps unwise to invest excessive emotional energies into far away events which are divorced from our senses or any personal connection. Mostly I remember the book’s cover which really says it all: a nuclear family of four, headless and huddled in the dark around a glowing TV set. It’s a striking image and unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, I saw myself in it.
I’m not so sure about the irrelevance of far away events any more, though one could argue either way. The world has shrunk considerably since 1985. Ecocide accelerates everywhere. At the time of your writing there were rumblings about pollution and such but no one knew about things like ocean acidification, the sixth great extinction, GMO mono-cropping, hyper-rational, industrialized animal processing, increasing frequency and fury of floods and fires, microplastics in every cubic inch of water up into the Arctic Ocean, forever chemicals cycling through every living body on earth, and on and on and on. But then, perhaps you are still right about not dwelling on the overextended risk matrix. The most powerful people and institutions on earth can’t do anything about it, even if they wanted to. I almost (almost) envy those who don’t know or who choose to not think about it.
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When I finished AOD I was angry. As a passive receiver of propaganda and decontextualized ‘facts’ my worldview was stunted accordingly. Thousands of hours of advertizing, TV and news added up to a wasted youth and a hole in my head. My picture of the world was a cartoon image. I had thought I was getting a light on reality but it was the narrow focus glare that puts everything else in the dark. “Keeping up with the news” gave me what I thought was a relationship with the world, and only after reading your book did I begin to fathom it was all projection and delusion. The world didn’t love me back. The world, as presented by those who amuse us to death, doesn’t even exist.
Within a year of reading AOD I made significant life improvements. I canceled cable tv. I cut back news to one Saturday paper per week, which I read from then on to study media manipulation methods. I eliminated as much advertizing as possible and ignored the rest. Turning my back on all that amusement was one of the best things I ever did. I began to breathe, to read, to exercise, to develop a spiritual side, and even began to accept that I’d lost so much precious time. I began a quest to understand.
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I read Technopoly soon after. Regrettably, the march to technofeudal totalitarianism continues. There is no political solution. The boot on our faces is as light as a velvety feather, whispering to consumers with baby talk tones, but it’s still a boot. It’s difficult to see any way through except collapse and rebirth. This seems increasingly possible as Technopoly requires a fossil fuel economy to undergird it, and oil gets harder to find and more costly to extract while demand continues to grow. All speculative of course, except for the part about Technopoly marching on, but it’s more than plausible it could fall apart this way.
I began by saying AOD was a first step. For years afterward I intended to take everything I learned to the grave, especially in the beginning when the anger still burned. I was gathering knowledge to arm myself against an unseen monster, to preserve a sacred relationship to life that Technopoly denies. Not wanting to feed the machine makes it difficult to write anything at all, but I push through by disregarding whether anyone will “like” what I say. Though it remains invisible to most people, sometimes by choice, I’ll say it raw: there is a totalizing Technopoly taking shape that would make the dictatorships of the twentieth century seem pleasant by comparison. Most will balk at this, a few see clearly what never stopped slouching toward Bethlehem.
Everyone likes a movie called the Matrix. Everyone thinks they’re Neo. But most of us are asleep in the illusion, disembodied brains floating in vats of conglomerated goo.
Amusing Ourselves to Death opened my eyes, always the first step in getting one’s head on right. The world is a better place because people like you take the effort to make your thoughts accessible to people like me.
Yours Jeff V