25 Points In Defense of Memes 14-19 (Changing from Installments to Numbers for convenience)
15. Now to turn to cultural transmission, from which we should be situated to fruitfully explore the specifics of internet memes. Cullen’s cultural virus theory offers us a way in. He notes that we now think of viruses in two ways-the microbes that affect living organisms and the electronic kind that affect digital systems. He then argues that the application of the term “virus” to the latter is apropos because “[v]iruses can be broadly defined as phenomena which belong to a grey area in between organic and inorganic fields of enquiry, somewhere between the living and the dead. They are not living in the sense that organisms which breathe, metabolise [sic, Br. spelling], and reproduce are living, since, while outside their hosts, they carry out none of these basic processes” (CI 135-36). This appropriate terminology fascinates me, obviously, as the fact that the meme as a concept originally socioculturally-biological and now applied to digital culture is what started this whole endeavor. That brings up a tangent that I will entertain briefly in the next point. But back to the matter at hand. Like viruses (in the original sense), cultural phenomena (or memes, though he is here not using that terminology) cannot replicate themselves, but must have a host to do so. So “da da da dum” left alone and never heard is powerless to reproduce. But once having penetrated the human brain, it takes on something like a life of its own (penetration leading to the creation of life. . .sound familiar?). But there’s also the problem of connotation. That is, we think of viruses, whether biological or electronic, as “bad”, even though we know that there are “good” viruses too. Still, in biology, the virus is the thing we are still powerless against. In the digital world, an elaborate virus is a looming threat which drives an entire industry devoted to protecting digital privacy and utility. Again, the concepts of good and bad in this context are predicated on the myth of purpose and centrality of humanness. So if a virus is a threat to life as we know it, whether biological or technological, well that sucks, doesn’t it? But viruses operate independently of human purpose. The same holds true for cultural viruses. Drawing a good/bad binary here is even more problematic. To my way of thinking, the widespread latching onto a Britney Spears tune is decidedly bad, but only because it appeals to no aesthetic I find worthwhile and is more a marker of my own elitism than of a value distinction. The point is not whether they are good or bad, but rather that they simply are.
16. My tangent: several times now in this journey I have stumbled upon the notion of technological advancements as simulacra of biological ones. This speaks to a wide range of concerns, not the least of which is the rise of science fiction from a cult phenomenon to something that appeals to a broader spectrum of the population, and this is so, I think, because suddenly science fiction seems to be about 60% science and 40% fiction as opposed to the other way around. This notion of technology copying (imitating) biology and eventually merging with biology and even further down the road subsuming biology altogether is fascinating and is a central concern of posthumanist theories. (See Donna Haraway, Kim Toffoletti, Mervyn F. Bendle, to name a few.) In the last decade or two, we have seen not only the rigorous application of biological terms to technological phenomenon, but also the reschematizing of our perceptions of the human body in technological terms. We now think nothing of metaphorizing our brain as a computer. If we get stuck in a pattern of thought and can’t go further, we might say we need to reboot. When I go to a conference or some other intensive intellectual experience, I say I need to download for a minute. Hell, even our idea of self is mediated so much through technology that the generation coming up now will have no concept of having lived without a facebook page, a virtual identity. As Haraway argues, we are already cyborgs, even if we still retain bodies that are entirely biological. This development, while slightly tangential, I think helps us think about internet memes in a set of parameters that will be useful shortly. {also, UJ, there is a chapter in Toffoletti’s _Cyborgs and Barbie Dolls: Feminism, Popular Culture, and the Posthuman Body_ that deals with Marilyn Manson as a prototypical posthuman. Interesting stuff}
17. The posthumanist stuff is so interesting that I want to keep talking about it, but we still have to address the central concern: internet memes. And I only have 9 points left in which to do it. Turning back to Wikipedia, its entry for “internet memes” is barely more than a stub and needs citation and verification, but the basics are there. It discusses the concept of the internet meme, broadly defined, as anything that gets replicated and spread (in a very virus-like fashion) to a broad spectrum of the population. So being Rickrolled counts, as does Chocolate Rain, Star Wars kid, and laughing baby. Not to mention dramatic hamster. Even urban legends and chain letter pleas would count. And strictly speaking, they are memes. They replicate very quickly and then spawn imitations and ironic references, embedding themselves in cultural memory, if only a cultural short-term memory, which is a byproduct of the speed of transmission made possible by the information revolution. But these are not the memes that originally led me to do the Defense. The first time I heard the term meme was through livejournal, which I have used since 2004. Memes there were in the same vein as the 25 things meme. That is, they are about the self. Put a space in the middle of the word “meme” and you have a nice little commentary on this kind of meme. And if we return to the word Dawkins thought of first, an even better phonetic pun: My me, me. And so we have returned to the problem of narcissism. And what better narcissism-driven cultural artifact to discuss than the revitalized Mac, where every product begins with “i”?
18. The success of the Mac marketing campaign can be explained rather easily, I think. To do so, however, I have to return ever so briefly to Blackmore. In the chapter that discusses the foray of memes into the internet, she actually hits the crux of her argument. Memes, like genes, are driven to make copies. That is their “purpose.” (I use that term only b/c I can’t think of a better one. It is hard for me, and I think for lots of people, though probably not those of you who have been hardcore science people all your lives, to think of “being driven” and “having a purpose” in terms other than quasi-metaphysical ones.) The cultural selective process, analogous to the biological one, leads to more efficient copying, faster delivery of cultural artifacts. She asks us to think about the many different times writing has been invented and the evolutionary process that languages go through, some dying out, some living. She is, however, careful not to equate the successful languages with the superior ones; rather it is a selective process that is dependent on a variety of factors and cultural pressures. Language is not the last copying device, though. Print technology, technologies that support faster delivery of the products of print technology television/radio technology , and now, in the last few decades, digital technology, all are advancements in meme copying efficiency. This whole line of thinking almost necessarily leads to the destruction of an independent consciousness. To make the point as poignantly as Blackmore does, I simply have to quote a whole paragraph: “As I write this book I think of my mind as a battleground of ideas. There are far more of them than can possibly find their way on to the final printed pages. ‘I’ am not an independent conscious entity creating the ideas out of nowhere. Rather, this brain has picked up millions of memes from all its education, science, reading, and long hours of thinking, and they are all fermenting in there as the fingers type. After this internal selective process is over and the manuscript is sent off there will be more selection, by the readers chosen by the publisher, and ultimately by the reviewers, bookshops, and readers out there in the world. Whether the book sells a few hundred copies or a few thousand copies will depend entirely on that selective process” (TMM 210). Thus, the utter destruction of the “I”.
19. But without the “I” we lose desire. So says Freud. So says Jesus. So says Buddha. So say many others in a variety of slightly different variations on the same meme. In order to continue copying and catalyzing the evolutionary process to whatever end it takes us (b/c we are still married to the idea of an inevitable end of SOME kind. Fire, ice, whimper, bang, it doesn’t matter; we are incapable of imagining no end at all), we have to work within the cultural forces that allow for these technologies to exist. And that means that, for better or for worse, global capitalism is a huge player in the game of cultural selection. And capitalism won’t run without desire. Capitalism won’t run without the “I”. And that’s where Mac comes in. Good ole Mac saves the day by selling us the dream again, but even here we see a diminished respect for the “I” in the dropping of capitalization. The “i” is there, and it comforts us, but it is paired with a product whose visual representation supercedes it. We can have our “I” back, but only in the position of subordination to the consumer product. We have, in every way imaginable, sold our souls. Our complicatedly manufactured, artfully programmed souls, each of which, despite its reliance on the same cultural reproduction that other brains rely on, is intricately individual and amazing to behold. Remember Lyotard’s reflection: “You're not done living because you chalk it up to artifice."
16. My tangent: several times now in this journey I have stumbled upon the notion of technological advancements as simulacra of biological ones. This speaks to a wide range of concerns, not the least of which is the rise of science fiction from a cult phenomenon to something that appeals to a broader spectrum of the population, and this is so, I think, because suddenly science fiction seems to be about 60% science and 40% fiction as opposed to the other way around. This notion of technology copying (imitating) biology and eventually merging with biology and even further down the road subsuming biology altogether is fascinating and is a central concern of posthumanist theories. (See Donna Haraway, Kim Toffoletti, Mervyn F. Bendle, to name a few.) In the last decade or two, we have seen not only the rigorous application of biological terms to technological phenomenon, but also the reschematizing of our perceptions of the human body in technological terms. We now think nothing of metaphorizing our brain as a computer. If we get stuck in a pattern of thought and can’t go further, we might say we need to reboot. When I go to a conference or some other intensive intellectual experience, I say I need to download for a minute. Hell, even our idea of self is mediated so much through technology that the generation coming up now will have no concept of having lived without a facebook page, a virtual identity. As Haraway argues, we are already cyborgs, even if we still retain bodies that are entirely biological. This development, while slightly tangential, I think helps us think about internet memes in a set of parameters that will be useful shortly. {also, UJ, there is a chapter in Toffoletti’s _Cyborgs and Barbie Dolls: Feminism, Popular Culture, and the Posthuman Body_ that deals with Marilyn Manson as a prototypical posthuman. Interesting stuff}
17. The posthumanist stuff is so interesting that I want to keep talking about it, but we still have to address the central concern: internet memes. And I only have 9 points left in which to do it. Turning back to Wikipedia, its entry for “internet memes” is barely more than a stub and needs citation and verification, but the basics are there. It discusses the concept of the internet meme, broadly defined, as anything that gets replicated and spread (in a very virus-like fashion) to a broad spectrum of the population. So being Rickrolled counts, as does Chocolate Rain, Star Wars kid, and laughing baby. Not to mention dramatic hamster. Even urban legends and chain letter pleas would count. And strictly speaking, they are memes. They replicate very quickly and then spawn imitations and ironic references, embedding themselves in cultural memory, if only a cultural short-term memory, which is a byproduct of the speed of transmission made possible by the information revolution. But these are not the memes that originally led me to do the Defense. The first time I heard the term meme was through livejournal, which I have used since 2004. Memes there were in the same vein as the 25 things meme. That is, they are about the self. Put a space in the middle of the word “meme” and you have a nice little commentary on this kind of meme. And if we return to the word Dawkins thought of first, an even better phonetic pun: My me, me. And so we have returned to the problem of narcissism. And what better narcissism-driven cultural artifact to discuss than the revitalized Mac, where every product begins with “i”?
18. The success of the Mac marketing campaign can be explained rather easily, I think. To do so, however, I have to return ever so briefly to Blackmore. In the chapter that discusses the foray of memes into the internet, she actually hits the crux of her argument. Memes, like genes, are driven to make copies. That is their “purpose.” (I use that term only b/c I can’t think of a better one. It is hard for me, and I think for lots of people, though probably not those of you who have been hardcore science people all your lives, to think of “being driven” and “having a purpose” in terms other than quasi-metaphysical ones.) The cultural selective process, analogous to the biological one, leads to more efficient copying, faster delivery of cultural artifacts. She asks us to think about the many different times writing has been invented and the evolutionary process that languages go through, some dying out, some living. She is, however, careful not to equate the successful languages with the superior ones; rather it is a selective process that is dependent on a variety of factors and cultural pressures. Language is not the last copying device, though. Print technology, technologies that support faster delivery of the products of print technology television/radio technology , and now, in the last few decades, digital technology, all are advancements in meme copying efficiency. This whole line of thinking almost necessarily leads to the destruction of an independent consciousness. To make the point as poignantly as Blackmore does, I simply have to quote a whole paragraph: “As I write this book I think of my mind as a battleground of ideas. There are far more of them than can possibly find their way on to the final printed pages. ‘I’ am not an independent conscious entity creating the ideas out of nowhere. Rather, this brain has picked up millions of memes from all its education, science, reading, and long hours of thinking, and they are all fermenting in there as the fingers type. After this internal selective process is over and the manuscript is sent off there will be more selection, by the readers chosen by the publisher, and ultimately by the reviewers, bookshops, and readers out there in the world. Whether the book sells a few hundred copies or a few thousand copies will depend entirely on that selective process” (TMM 210). Thus, the utter destruction of the “I”.
19. But without the “I” we lose desire. So says Freud. So says Jesus. So says Buddha. So say many others in a variety of slightly different variations on the same meme. In order to continue copying and catalyzing the evolutionary process to whatever end it takes us (b/c we are still married to the idea of an inevitable end of SOME kind. Fire, ice, whimper, bang, it doesn’t matter; we are incapable of imagining no end at all), we have to work within the cultural forces that allow for these technologies to exist. And that means that, for better or for worse, global capitalism is a huge player in the game of cultural selection. And capitalism won’t run without desire. Capitalism won’t run without the “I”. And that’s where Mac comes in. Good ole Mac saves the day by selling us the dream again, but even here we see a diminished respect for the “I” in the dropping of capitalization. The “i” is there, and it comforts us, but it is paired with a product whose visual representation supercedes it. We can have our “I” back, but only in the position of subordination to the consumer product. We have, in every way imaginable, sold our souls. Our complicatedly manufactured, artfully programmed souls, each of which, despite its reliance on the same cultural reproduction that other brains rely on, is intricately individual and amazing to behold. Remember Lyotard’s reflection: “You're not done living because you chalk it up to artifice."