Are TED’s “ideas worth spreading” really spreading?
For some reason, I thought most people in America would know about TED. As an attendee of TEDWomen2016, I was excited to see all the TED buzz in the city. …only to find that there wasn’t really one.
The first day of TEDWomen2016 was filled with ice-breaker activities. I joined the cable car tour to do some sightseeing around San Francisco. (We got one whole cable car all to ourselves- which was awesome!)
After a few minutes of riding the cable car, the driver (a very perky woman in her 30s or so) asked us the following question:
So, what group are you guys?
My fellow TED Translator and I pointed at our TED nametag and said, “We’re all attending the TED event.”
Then, the driver responded:
TED? What’s TED?
…Oh the look of shock on my face.
I wasn’t expecting such an answer, probably because I had believed for some strange reason that TED was very famous in America (especially in California) where it all began. And she wasn’t the only one; there were many other passerby’s who looked at our TED badge and went, “What’s TED?”. Then came the reality check: I had forgotten all about the great disparities that exist in American society.
And then Trump won. (And came another look of shock on my face.)
It felt so strange when Trump’s victory became apparent and real, especially after attending TEDWomen2016, where no one seemed to be for him. (Then again I was at a conference where the theme was women and the attendees consisted of powerful independent women, so… great bias there.)
Seeing the election result got me wondering: So many on the east and west coast voted for Hillary, and the rest Trump. Is this a show of just some geographical divide, or more of another factor… such as an educational divide that exists in the country?
This election result reminded me of the lady driving the cable car and of all the others who went, “What’s TED?”. Most of us who are familiar with TED have probably seen it somewhere online when someone shared it, or from a teacher who used it in their class. But if they haven’t heard about it from someone, or if they never really come across it in their daily lives, they would never find out about TED.
Which got me thinking about education: Access to education seems to be spreading, as we now have e-learning and other tools, but the stark reality is that it’s not just about making education available online for people to access anytime and anywhere — it’s about giving them the opportunity to access it.
This then brought me to the thought: Are the “Ideas Worth Spreading” introduced by TED really spreading? Or is it spreading within a limited audience who already have the means to access it?
So many of the TED videos have been shared with many worldwide, and I believe the ideas have spread to a great extent. Yet, we live in a tremendously vast world — we still have a long way to go.
Perhaps now we don’t interact much with those from other parts of society. Perhaps we naturally come together with people who share similar values. Perhaps this happens without us knowing, or perhaps we consciously choose to do so. It may be both.
If the ideas worth spreading are truly meant to be spread, then we need to engage those from various backgrounds and values to initiate meaningful dialogue. The TED talks are definitely a useful tool to do so — but how to spread them is up to us. It’s up to us, who already had the chance to access them, to pass it on to others and deepen the debate over these yet unresolved challenges we all face in society.
Well that sounds cool, I guess I better watch one of those videos right when I get home today.
I hope the cable car lady had a chance to do just that.
Originally published at tabilogue.wordpress.com on November 18, 2016.
