Commentary

Real Media Riffs - Monday, Jan 3, 2005

THE GLOBAL POND AND ITS RIPPLE EFFECTS - The Riff has plenty of New Year's resolutions to contend with - and ultimately break - but handling topics in a more tactful manner is not one of them. We dished out more than our share of bad taste in 2004, and we're not about to change that as we head into 2005. And that's created a dilemma for us as we compose this first column of the New Year, whose subject requires utmost compassion: the South Asian tsunami and its tragic human toll. But as much as it is a story of nature's wrath, devastation and human suffering, it also is a media story like no other we have experienced. We have witnessed snippets of other significant natural disasters - earthquakes, hurricanes, tornados and floods - and their effects on humanity, but we can't recall any to crash over us so powerfully, and with such immediacy and ferocity as this wave did.

Baring live - or, in the age of TiVo, "near-live" - witness to the suffering of Southeast Asians was a stark reminder that all we hold dear could be but a tremble on the ocean floor away. That, but for the grace of God, or the forces of nature, go we. It had its ripple effects. Not just on the ocean floor, or in the reshaping of a continent and its populace. But also on the media world watching in the comfort and safety of our homes. At first, in shock and awe. Then with immense frustration, we shared their grief and sense of helplessness all with the immediacy of electronic media. It was so Biblical. So existential. So Kosinski. It was almost like being there. And since we could not, at least not physically. We did the only thing digital age volunteers can do to speed relief to disaster victims. We dived into our electronic wallets and gave to the Web site of one of the big relief organizations. We even used a special link that explicitly earmarked our contribution for the tsunami victims.

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The whole thing was incredibly efficient, and quite convenient. And somehow, also incredibly wrong. Not the giving. Not the wanting to give. But the detached, remote nature of how we gave. It demonstrated how instantaneous, global electronic media can at the same time be both incredibly enlightening, yet amazingly soul-stripping conduits for the real thing. And for the first time we think we really understood what John Lennon meant by "instant karma." Reaching to the other side of the world via a high-speed cable access and an American Express account. Membership may have its privileges, but will it guarantee you a slot inside the pearly gates, or a slice of nirvana? Or maybe we're just being Luddites, reacting the way we do to every new digital media experience that seems to uproot our sense of self and transform who we are. After all, isn't this ultimately what McLuhan meant by the "global village?" The ability to connect with our neighbors around the planet, even if only electronically and somewhat vicariously? And if they need, to help out in whatever ways we can?

We've never been to Southeastern India, Sri Lanka, or Thailand. We don't know if we ever will. They still seem like such exotic, remote places to us. But for the past week we've felt their loss, shared their grief and can almost swear we felt some of their soul rolling in on our shores. If there is a lesson to the media story of the Southeast Asian tsunami, it that we're all really just living in a global pond and when a pebble drops, we all feel its effects. What we choose to do about them is what determines how human we are. As for us, we will give what we can. We will pray what we can. We will wish good thoughts for all our neighbors in this pond for yet another year. And so we don't forget about the pond, we'll leave you with a few memorable lyrics, courtesy of Robert Hunter and the Grateful Dead.


Reach out your hand if your cup be empty,
If your cup is full may it be again,
Let it be known there is a fountain,
That was not made by the hands of men.


There is a road, no simple highway,
Between the dawn and the dark of night,
And if you go no one may follow,
That path is for your steps alone.


Ripple in still water,
When there is no pebble tossed,
Nor wind to blow.


But if you fall you fall alone,
If you should stand then who's to guide you?
If I knew the way I would take you home.

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