Out of Touch

Our world is changing at an exponential rate. Personal interactions are increasingly filtered by technology and more and more of the products we use on a daily basis are created without ever being touched by human hands.

The industrial revolution changed our work patterns drastically. Most of our jobs today are far removed from the cottage industries and farms of the past, from a sense of self-sufficiency and knowing that the work of our hands is real and life-giving. We are smaller cogs in a bigger machine. We don't seems to build the same strong interdependent relationships with our communities and our sense of civic responsibility seems to have diminished accordingly. 

The information age is now upon us, and a new revolution is brewing. It seems we no longer need to actually learn anything or retain information, because we can always "Google" it; and besides, there is just too much information out there for our tiny human brains to handle. Clutter has become virtual as well as tangible. The information we do retain seems to have moved away from broad spectrum knowledge and critical thinking towards extremely specialized expertise that may or may not connect to anything else; towards a polarized focus on trivia and the minute details of our own psyches and away from larger world views and physical involvement in social justice issues—other than social media clicks and shares, which mostly cost us nothing and require no sacrifice of our time or resources.

But a counter-culture movement towards the personal, the human, the handmade and heartfelt is also growing. William Morris, one of my favourite designers of the Arts and Crafts movement, is quoted as saying "Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful." A second Arts and Crafts movement seems to be upon us, with the booming growth of sites like Etsy and small homegrown family businesses like one of my favourites, Tanis Fiber Arts. A burgeoning interest in organic and locally grown food has seeded the expansion of farm stands and food markets in recent years; and—although no one seems to have time to volunteer anymore—identifying ourselves with social causes and charitable foundations seems to have become an important element of our corporate and personal identities on sites like LinkedIn and social media campaigns like last year's wildly successful ALS Ice Bucket Challenge.

So, are we out of touch? Or are we more in touch than ever, but in a new way? I guess only time will tell.

Spin

We are living in the Information Age... although I am beginning to think of it as the Great Inundation. Every day, I feel the need to learn new techniques to keep my head above water, to keep myself from getting swept away. The daily flow of information has changed from a brook trickling through town, to a raging torrent sweeping through cities, towards a scenario like that in the movie Waterworld where a giant ocean covers the earth and only the strong survive.

There's nothing wrong with great bodies of water if you know how to navigate them. Any canoe or kayak enthusiast will tell you that there are techniques to riding the current, knowing which waves to follow and which to ignore. Any pleasure craft operator has to learn the rules of navigation to be licensed; any ship's pilot or captain can explain the intricacies of moving a great ship across lakes and oceans, through the deeps and over the shallows. In all of those cases, the experts "keep a weathered eye on the horizon" for signs of danger.

But we also live in the age of "spin"... of people trying to manipulate the flow or direction of information for the purpose of persuasion, despite any warning signs. That spin can turn into a great vortex, dragging down the ship (as in the movie Pirates of the Caribbean... although with less likelihood of success) or it can whip up a calm surface into colossal waves (Perfect Storm).

I don't think we need the water to be perfectly calm in order to move forward; a little challenge is a good thing, and racing the rapids can be exhilarating if we've trained ourselves. But let's not tempt fate by trying to train the water beyond reason, by forcibly directing the natural flow into an unnatural direction to suit our own purposes, despite internal and external signs of danger to ourselves and others. Wouldn't it be great if we could all learn to navigate with integrity and keep the water clean? Maybe we would actually be able to see all the way to the bottom of the ocean... to truly fathom the life that flows beneath the surface.