Reality... What A Concept

Topics have a way of converging upon me sometimes. As a trivial example, three recent books I've been reading (The Plot Against America, Unscientific America and Einstein: His Life and Universe) which are not only unrelated to each other but also come to us from three different literary genres (Fiction, Non-fiction and Biographies) nevertheless managed to crossover with each other in terms of characters (Einstein and Charles Lindbergh show up in two of the three but not the same two!) and themes (how difficult it is for laypeople to understand Science, and the plight of the Jewish people). That sort of thing often leads me to imagine that everything's interconnected and life is simply a journey toward finding all of the key connections. Which is probably silly. But maybe not.

The difference between reality and what we project it as is another concept that's cropped up in several places for me over the past few weeks. Following our viewing of 28 Up on the weekend, Vicki, Julie and I (and possibly Tammy, though she might have gone to bed by then) talked about what sort of effect being profiled on a documentary series would have on its subjects. For example, would they become better at manufacturing the storyline for themselves each time director/interviewer Michael Apted returned to film the latest chapter (at seven year intervals)?

I mean, that whole act of constructing "personae" for ourselves is something we all do, every day, to some degree. We often work hard to reinforce self-images that we've become fond of or reliant upon, such as "the funny co-worker", "the problem-solver" or "the long-suffering housewife." But imagine if periodic slices of your life were being captured on film and made available for all the world to see. Wouldn't the incentive to "control the message" be even stronger then? Obviously a documentary film-maker recognizes that danger and prepares for it, but in this case the subjects are necessarily afforded the opportunity, over and over again, to hone their image-making craft with each successive attempt... with lots of time - seven years! - between each attempt in order to reflect and apply what they learned last time.

Watching a Colbert Report from a week or two ago, Vicki and I heard Aaron Sorkin (screenwriter of The Social Network) talking about why he doesn't have much love for Facebook and other similar platforms (including the one you're reading this on): it's all about presenting yourself in a way that you can control and manipulate at your leisure. As he put it, the personae found in those places often resemble the actual people behind them in the same way that Reality TV resembles reality. Which is to say: not necessarily much at all.

I certainly try to be honest on this blog, but there's no denying that I carefully control what sort of updates I provide and often strive to avoid making myself look bad. I suppose that's all well and good as long as the audience recognizes that, but is this sort of thing becoming the new reality now? I hope not, as we're all obviously much more complex and flawed individuals than anything that most of us would ever choose to reveal whenever we're dictating the message rather than revealing ourselves through our actions. It's definitely given me great food for thought.

(The title of this blog post, by the way, is taken from Robin Williams' 1979 comedy album of the same name.)