WP2 (340): From Tik-Tok to Cultural Medium
(Note: Media is the plural of Medium hence these two terms are used interchangeably in this writing.)
Personally, I have always hated current fast-moving cultural entertainments but never know the specific reasons except for that they are “low” and “meaningless”. Therefore, I researched through modern cultural theories and found solid knowledge to explain my aversion towards Tik-Tok. Using these theories, I want to write this passage to the teenagers who are obsessed with Tik-Tok, Instagram, or other social media platforms. While you enjoy the new content after refreshing the page each time, you gradually become the slave of these applications. Although the applications’ contents are worth some profound discussions as well, this passage will focus on the media, the way information is transmitted. In other words, this writing project aims to disclose that media determines the information, and teenagers who grow up under the Internet era should reflect their entangled role with the online platforms to gain independence and meaningful lives.
To begin with, “the medium is the message”, but we usually cannot realize it (McLuhan and Lapham 1994: 7). On the contrary, in most times, we tend to merely focus on the meaning the medium carries. For example, when receiving a text message, one usually focuses on the “content”, as well as when reading an e-mail or newspaper. However, what if the same message is handwritten through a letter? Do you feel the same if someone says “I Love You” through both an e-mail and written words? Most likely not, but the content is exactly the same. Therefore, such a difference is generated through the change in medium, which is “any extension of ourselves” or “any new technology”, perceptible or not, that allows the delivery of information and improves communication (ibid: 7).
In a more radical but credible example, McLuhan demonstrated how light bulbs completely altered our daily communication as a medium. Despite a light bulb was incapable of conveying any information as television could, it provided brightness that enabled people to expel darkness and better communicate. In McLuhan’s words,
“It could be argued that [brain surgery and night baseball] are in some way the “content” of the electric light, since they could not exist without the electric light. This fact merely underlines the point that “the medium is the message” because it is the medium that shapes and controls the scale and form of human association and action” (ibid: 9).
In such a way where media deeply influenced society and people’s life, McLuhan concluded that it was the medium that actually determined the message and worried that the evolving dominant mode of media would define the civilization and its social relations, eventually enabling superior media to enslave people and result in prevalent conflicts. It turned out McLuhan was right, as Tik-Tok has attracted over two billion users globally through its viral spread, its “never-ending nature of the For You page means these bite-sized chunks of dopamine keep coming one after the other until users are left with the attention span of a chimpanzee” (McGowan 2020).
As we have presented the significance of the medium itself as the important message, how specifically does Tik-Tok affect us? Surprisingly, I discovered that the German philosopher Theodor Adorno pointed out the problem of the current cultural industry 77 years ago in Dialectic of Enlightenment (1944). Specifically, Adorno argued that a key characteristic of modern culture is repetitiveness, its homogenization, which perfectly echoes Tik-Tok’s feature of fast-moving consumption and provision of “similar” personalized videos. As users are immersed in numerous 15-second videos, they repeatedly refresh and slide the page for more similar content they are interested in. In Adorno’s theory, these users are labeled with different categories to meet one generalized need, which is the sameness and flattening of culture:
“Amusement always means putting things out of mind, forgetting suffering, even when it is on display. At its root is powerlessness. … As customers they are regaled, whether on the screen or in the press, with human interest stories demonstrating freedom of choice and the charm of not belonging to the system. In both cases they remain objects” (1944: 57–58).
As a result, Adorno reckons that cultural entertainment has become amusement under such repetition which provides users with an illusory space to escape from reality. People will then merely concentrate on the cultural works and become objects of industrial production instead of pursuing authentic joy in real life. Eventually, users are amused by culture rather than reflect on it, and the “true” culture will no longer exist, which explains my concern about current teenagers’ use of Tik-Tok.
To ensure I am not too radical or extreme in this passage, I interviewed my father, a philosophy professor, and my girlfriend who majors in both Economics and Sociology at UC Berkeley. After several heated discussions, we together propose the following three recommendations:
1. Be wary of the information cocoon and do more “difficult” things.
In the age of advanced Internet, it seems that people have become closer, but it actually pushes us farther and farther because everyone is in their information cocoon, absorbing the content they like, enjoying the repetitive “fast” leisure, and ignoring the virtue of real life. Consequently, our consensus with others and the world has become less, and there will be more conflicts in values. Therefore, escaping from this production line, or going the opposite “difficult” way rather than immersing in leisure, is the fastest way to save ourselves and become independent individuals.
2. Exercise the ability to eliminate boredom.
Admittedly, what really ruins the users is not the applications themselves but the fact that most of us cannot find a meaningful way to live a valuable life. Every click we made is actually categorizing ourselves and creating value for the social apps, therefore we are not consumers but parts of the Internet production chain, whose time costs are harvested. The stronger we are, the less we will succumb to instincts, but will rationally create positive feedback for ourselves. Hence, we should learn to enjoy boredom to develop more encouraging responses thereby enhancing our happiness level and positioning our life on track.
3. Be clear about the meaning of everything we do.
The difference between whether we are being pushed away or actively moving forward is whether we know the meaning of everything we are doing. For instance, some people watch short videos all day to discover the pattern of creating fortune and become a cultural leader; while some others watch them to escape from reality, vent their emotions, and indulge in the Internet. Therefore, based on our understanding of media, we should clearly understand the mechanism of the Internet world and find out the life we want to live, which requires us to do meaningful things as well as understand these meanings to become independent individuals.
References:
Adorno, Theodor. 1944. Dialectic of Enlightenment. New York: Herder and Herder.
McGowan, Luke. 2020. “How TikTok is Influencing Minds and Changing Culture”. Medium. Retrieved from: https://medium.com/the-innovation/how-tiktok-is-influencing-minds-and-changing-culture-123c532a764b
McLuhan, Marshall, and Lewis H. Lapham. 1994. Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. Cambridge: The MIT Press.
