Information!

The past few days, I've been listening to a good many TED talks. One stuck out to me today- I think because it linked something that I love with something that causes me much stress! Mr. Rangaswami links food and information in this TED talk. 

Too often I realize my disconnected-ness and I start checking the BBC daily. Shortly thereafter, I get so overwhelmed by all the information from all over the world I slump back into ignorance. One of my co-workers is brainstorming with friends on the concept of a positive-only newscast. Only stories of hope, perseverance and positive ideas would make the cut for information being broadcast to the general public. I think it may be an extreme idea, but one that would counter the extreme media most of us encounter. 

Most of us are also at our computers for a large portion of the day. It makes it impossible not to browse the web, looking for who-knows-what just to pass the time. They've even created a website where people can re-post things to simply look at. It involves nothing they've created, discovered or necessarily intend to participate in- just more information and pictures to consume. 

This is what made this TED talk so intriguing to me. In our society, we tend to consume without thought. That is evident in our consumption of food, products and entertainment thrown at us daily by marketing companies. Our filters don't exist- or perhaps we just ignore them. What Mr. Rangaswami suggests is that we do the same with our information. He states that the problem is not information overload. Rather, it's a filter failure. We should think of our information intake the same way many dieters think of their calorie intake. Exercise of the mind is just as important as exercise of the body- intaking information that is important and good for our selves. Consumption control [or what some people might consider a diet] is just as important- to regulate what we think about, see and internalize.

I like this concept, because it creates a middle ground for the extremes most of us bounce back and forth between. On the one end, I'm  too caught up in every bit of news from around the world, all the latest movies and books and music, and blogs with new spins on old ideas. On the other, I find myself lost in solitude and avoidance of anything happening outside of what immediately affects me. Most of the time I think I'd rather be in that extreme. Living in a sort of Mary Oliver poem:

The dream of my life
Is to lie down by a slow river
And stare at the light in the trees-
To learn something by being nothing
A little while but the rich
Lens of attention. 

But as the poem ends (Entering the Kingdom- read it!), the crows come and we're taken back into normal society. We return to begin our reconciling of the extremes again, and I think Mr. Rangaswami is stepping in the right direction.

Hunger.Games.

I definitely jumped on the Hunger Games bandwagon this month. After waiting so long to read Harry Potter [because everyone else was reading it] and then thoroughly enjoying it, I decided not to wait until the fuss was over this time. Just jumped right in. 

I was shocked that I became so quickly engrossed in the plot- I read each book in a matter of days and found myself cancelling plans so I could stay home to read it. It was like I had entered into a new world and the 'cliff hangers' at the end of each chapter begged the reader to keep going. 

Many people had strong opinions about which book was the best, how they would've written the 'love triangle' to end up, the way the war would play out, etc. What struck me most was the obvious comparison between the Capitol residents and citizens of the United States. The people in the Capitol were blissfully ignorant of the suffering outside of their district, obsessed about their looks, had so much food that they would throw up just to keep enjoying the process of eating more, and loved watching the Hunger Games [children slaughtering one another for entertainment]. In the last book, most of us were rooting for the Capitol to be overtaken. Once that happened, though, we realized that the new group of people were going to rule in the same, violent way. They also wanted a Hunger Games event, but with the oppressors becoming the oppressed. This concept alone disturbed me beyond all others in the book, I think because it was most realistic. So often we, as a nation, believe that we know what is best for all other nations and people groups. Usually this ends with us joining or starting a violent war, claiming that we're killing to stop the killing. It begs the questions, 'When does violence ever lead to peace?' and 'How does one group killing to get what they want stop another group from killing to get what they want?' I'm not sure what logic has led us to these conclusions [other than ethnocentrism], but these parallels were easily drawn in the book. This sad fact was enough to outweigh any hope the book brought. 

The one glimmer of hope though, was that the main character was able to move beyond her fears and trauma to function in normal society. She was able to love someone, to have a family and to live in some kind of peace, even though she fully remembered and continued to wrestle with the trauma she had experienced. This is what we hope for with our refugee clients- that they are able to cope with their trauma and past and use that to integrate with the new self they are creating in this culture. It's too easy to try and forget our pasts. To reconcile the hard past with our present selves is such a beautiful concept- and I think the author portrayed it in a very realistic way.

As I think about the citizens of the Capitol, I am sickened to realize that most of them were drawn to the Hunger Games each year because of their love for drama, violence and romance. It dawned on me that probably I was the exact same- that those characteristics were exactly what drew me to this book trilogy and kept me hooked until the end. Yikes.

Such heavy concepts for a book written for such a young audience! Middle school English classes, watch out!