A brief foreword: This essay was originally written and published by Evan Post on his website, postmania.webs.com. For those of you that haven't had him as a teacher, Mr. Post teaches both IB English and philosophy at Grimsley. In the last few days before school was shut down, he spoke to his classes about the coronavirus and his response. The next week, he shared this essay. Although some of his references might be lost on those that aren't in his class, Eliza and I thought that the ideas in his essay had more than enough merit on their own to be worth sharing, and he was generous enough to allow us to publish his essay here. (A final note: because this website host doesn't support superscript, I had to improvise when referencing in-text citations. All in-text citations are followed by a number in parenthesis that corresponds with the number found at the end of this essay).
Vehicles
So here we are, a lot sooner than the prediction I made in class last week. If global events are revealing anything about us human beings, it might be our tendency to predict the future, to learn that we were wrong, and then to move on to the next prediction, and so on. We’re delightfully absurd that way, aren’t we?
What I’d like to share here are some thoughts on what we can do in the present to make it more bearable and, perhaps, to create a more bearable, even pleasant, future (though I’m not going to indulge in speculation on that last point because . . . well, see above).
Last week, I mentioned to a few of my classes that it was popular science author Richard Dawkins who coined the term meme in his book The Selfish Gene (1). That book was a synthesis of a few decades of the work of some very clever evolutionary biologists, among whom is one of my intellectual heroes, Robert Trivers (2). Dawkins explains that the fundamental mover of evolution by natural selection is the gene. Genes replicate themselves and some endow their vehicles (i.e. us) with certain physical or behavioral features. If those features result in the vehicles’ prospering (i.e. not dying before making lots of smaller vehicles), the gene replicates itself in the process. Imagine a pair of baby giraffes in the period before they had evolved their most distinctive physical trait, when they probably just looked like sad horses or something. Now imagine that one of these two had genes whose expression resulted in him having a slightly longer neck than the others in his giraffe playgroup while the other’s gene expression resulted in his having no neck at all. Both of these genetic anomalies would likely be the victims of some merciless ribbing from their normally-constituted playmates, but when they grew up and the low-hanging leaves become as scarce as hand sanitizer at Wal-Mart, the long-necked one would get the last laugh, wouldn’t he? (3)
So, at the end of his book, Dawkins suggests that units of cultural information might, themselves, operate as replicators in a manner analogous to the behavior of genes. I can’t
remember if he uses any examples, but the 12-bar blues might be a good one (4). This chord progression started somewhere south of us and, in the century or so since, has come to dominate popular music around the world. That was, admittedly, kind of an “Ok, Boomer” example (5); perhaps one you might find more relevant involves Grandmaster Flash (6). Perhaps someone got there first, but I think it was he who first discovered that you could take a moment of already-recorded music and use it as a building block to build an entirely new piece of music. That innovation, the sample, has proven very successful at propagating itself in the pop music landscape of the last forty years (7).
So, as far as I can tell, the way your generation uses the term meme is entirely consistent with Dawkins’s hypothesis. Someone your age imagines SpongeBob SquarePants capturing some element of the human condition (8), does a bit of image manipulation, and off it goes into the virtual world. If other folks appreciate its value, cleverness, or whatever, then it might replicate itself right into youth culture. Then, a few months later, you use it as your “Meme Day” costume and I end up feeling left out because I don’t understand why everyone thinks it’s funny.
This pseudoscientific account of the intersection of evolutionary biology and popular culture is preamble to the idea I want us to explore together: that while each of us is a potential vehicle for the transmission of the Covid-19 virus, we are also vehicles for ideas (9). If that’s true, what moral responsibility do we assume thereby?
I don’t pretend to know anything about the science of epidemiology, but over the last few weeks, we’ve all gotten at least a little education in this regard. We know that it spreads through the air so if someone coughs near someone else, that’s one way to spread it. We know that our habit of coughing into our hands and of touching our faces could result in our leaving germs on surfaces other people touch: that’s another way to spread it. We know that if someone prefers the music of Greta Van Fleet to that of, well anybody, then that person is twelve times more likely to cough Coronavirus all over your doorknobs; that’s another way to spread it . . . (4)
See what I did there? I used this particular, gray-haired vehicle to pass on a bad idea (10).
Technology like my laptop and my class website enable me to get ideas out quickly. Every text, email, tweet, Facebook or Instagram post is a sort of cough isn’t it? And just as not every cough has Coronavirus in it, some idea-coughs (11) fail to spread anything at all; indeed, that’s probably the case with most of them. But some of them spread rapidly and change minds. Evolution by natural selection is about an organism’s fitness to survive in a particular environment. Longnecked giraffes flourished in one where trees with edible leaves grew tall. Had all the food been on the ground, they would have been screwed. Likewise, if I’m waiting in line at a Whole Foods or a Lizzo concert and I idea-cough something mean but clever about the president, it might just take off; if I do the same thing at a Trump rally, my idea will probably die out pretty quickly, and perhaps me with it. Think about how our online communities have increased the potential for contagion in our idea-coughs. It took a long time for the blues to move from one guitar player to another to get it from rural Mississippi in the 1920s to London in 1964. Imagine if Robert Johnson had had an iPhone and a YouTube channel.
Our mental environments (both the virtual environment we inhabit online and the one in our skulls) appear to have two salient features: lots of fear and lots of anger. Sometimes I wonder whether there’s really a difference between the two, but let’s treat them as separate for now. Most of us are thoroughly freaked-out about Coronavirus and many of us are checking the news more frequently as a result. If a CNN-touted expert tweets something about the virus preferring earth-tones, the next people walking their dogs past your house are sure to be wearing hot pink and day-glo orange, right? Another way to idea-cough something into existence is to appeal to folks’ sense of righteous indignation. The left hates the president and the right hates the media (12), so if I want to spread some germs, all I have to do is fit something suitably quotable or visually entertaining into that ready-made context. There are some doors that lots and lots of folks walk through; if you want to spread something, those are the doorknobs you want to cough on. The seductiveness of this arrangement is compelling: ideacoughing something frightening or furious into a virtual landscape dominated by fear and rage could easily result in its virtual transmission. I’m not on Twitter or Instagram (13), but if I were, I’m sure I would be hourly checking each of my tweets’ status to see if it was flourishing on Twitter’s virtual-savanna, hoping that it was a long-necked giraffe rather than a no-neck giraffe with a limp.
Imagine if we felt the same way about an actual virus, if I felt some sense of triumph or expanded self-worth upon learning that I had infected one hundred people with Covid-19. I mean, to be a vector of transmission might get me a few minutes on cable news, right? I’d be important. I offer this point not to convince you that spreading viral infections is cool but rather to suggest that our aversion to spreading those infections and our willingness, even eagerness, to spread hurtful ideas are logically and morally inconsistent.
Therefore, I propose that during the coming weeks of social distancing, as we exercise care over the transmission of the germs for which we are vehicles, we likewise consider the effects of the ideas we are spreading electronically. Here are a few categories and accompanying principles that I am going to try to observe in my capacity as a carrier.
Coronavirus information and advice
As I encounter information about Covid-19, I plan to pass on those bits that give people things they can do to help others or to help themselves. I will try not to serve as a vehicle for ideas that encourage people to feel either helpless terror about the state of the world or self-righteous anger at what should be or should have been done by others to make the state of the world better. Plenty is in my power; I’m not going to worry about the stuff that isn’t (14).
I also hope to avoid transmitting preachy sentiments (15). I’m noticing an online trend of scolding folks who haven’t been following the proper social-distancing protocols. Those scolders are almost certainly in the right, but to be right is not necessarily to be effective. Tough love has its place, but it only seems to work when it’s got some muscle behind it. A father can take his daughter’s phone or she can hide her dad’s cigarettes in order to coerce the other into better behavior but how often has someone been successful at tough-loving you into changing behavior merely by scolding? By no means does calm, rational argument always work either, but at least it treats the other as an equal. Shaming closes ears: respectful engagement may open them. I, myself, am inclined to think that the person who has sense enough to hold me in high esteem might very well have other opinions worth hearing, and in that I suspect I’m not alone. When I have it to share, I’ll pass on firm, heart-felt advice (16), respecting that the other person is autonomous and very well might ignore it.
Warm fuzzies
I’m not sure whether this term is familiar to people your age, but I’ve known it since my third-grade teacher Mrs. Hansen introduced it to us as a kind thing to say to others, preferable to the alternative “cold pricklies.” Even as young as eight, we knew to roll our eyes at such sentimental corniness. To value the warm fuzzy was to admit one’s vulnerability (17). At fifty-one, I’m finally getting around to admitting how much warm fuzzies mean to me: both the ones where people say kind things to me and those that just show me cute, happy stuff that makes me tear up a little, like videos of cats getting surprised, or of pit bulls finding their “forever homes,” or of interspecies friendships (18). For the time being, I’m going to think twice about ideacoughing things that might challenge or upset people, but I’m going to send the sweet, even corny, stuff out with reckless abandon.
Music
Now, of course this wouldn’t be a Post-authored piece without me slipping in some stuff about what everyone in the world should be listening to. When it comes to spreading germs, I cough music suggestions like a toddler with a cold: everybody’s getting sprayed. For the next few weeks, though, I’m going to heed Plato’s admonition that certain types of music can feed certain emotions so we should take care to listen to the music that will make us feel what we need to feel in order to do what we need to do (19). Because there’s enough fear and anger out there, I’m going easy on the testosterone-fueled hard rock or challenging, avant-garde jazz for a bit. I’m going to spend time with music that makes me dance and with music that makes me sad. And since I’m of the opinion that our tastes in dance music vary wildly but that a sad song is sad for everybody, I’m only passing on music that I find deliciously sad.
I suspect that many of you just stopped reading this essay because I’ve learned your generation has an inscrutable aversion to the word delicious in either its literal or synesthetic usage (20), but I’m forging ahead. This is a very sad time for all of us. People are sick, frightened, hungry, lonely. We can run away from the sadness this condition engenders and most of us find ways to do so: we laugh it away or transform it into the less passive--but more destructive—anger. I propose we hang out with that sadness a little. Indulge it and see whether it does something good for us. At the very least, it will connect us to reality since the state of the world is pretty sad right now. On the other hand, it might do more than that: The Buddha tells us that all beings suffer, and, in that suffering, we are all connected and through that suffering we can be better to each other (21). Some sad songs just make me morose (22), but some touch a part of me that helps me feel more connected to the pain of others, that even may make me love others a bit more. I think that’s a feeling worth sharing.
Now, of course, if I choose to share a song that makes me cry, I have to recognize that other folks might not be in the right place to hear it. I see little danger in surprising someone with a video of a cat doing something cute (23), but an achingly-beautiful, minor-key melody should probably come with a trigger warning like, “Hey! If you’re feeling sad and want to connect with art that comes from that sad place and maybe feel a little less alone in your sadness, check this out.”
Telling people what they mean to me
This may just be a subcategory of warm fuzzy, but it doesn’t operate quite like forwarding a cute animal video. In the months ahead, I plan to take time to tell folks that they matter to me. Nobody wants to go to a funeral, but I would love to go to just one where I could sit in the pew and know that the person I’m mourning had heard every nice thing I ever thought about him or her or them. Times like these remind us of our mortality and I know that, at your age, that’s something most of you would rather not think about. Death happens though, Covid-19 or not, so there’s an expiration date on everything we’ve been meaning to say to one another.
Consider using the electronic means at your disposal to touch base with a few people with whom you’ve lost contact or with whom you tend to skate across the surface of emotional honesty and let them know that you think about them and that you’re better for having known them. That class of idea-cough might not spread like a sweet video or a touching piece of music might, but I have to believe that there’s potential for something good in it, perhaps something life-changing for you and for the person your words touch.
And, I’ll start right now. To each of you, thank you for being my student. I’ve spent the better part of a week on this essay because I care about your well-being and because so many of you have made clear that you care about mine. I am so fortunate to be an English and philosophy teacher at Grimsley and to have had the privilege of spending time with you. I am really missing the classroom right now because my time with you is important to me and even under normal circumstances, that time is fleeting. Not to worry, though: we’ll figure out how to use the gifts that our technological age has bestowed, and we’ll stay in touch until this all blows over. Let’s take good care of ourselves and each other, okay?
Love, Post
Citations
1: The Selfish Gene. Oxford ; New York :Oxford University Press, 1976.
2: Some of you have heard my “Monkeys on the Beach” story: the textbook I was reading was Trivers’s.
3: Important note: This is a humanities teacher recalling a book he read at least a decade ago, the topic of which is far outside his area of specialization, such as it is. If you’re taking AP or IB Bio, I urge you not to cite me in your essays.
4: Listen to Robert Johnson’s Sweet Home Chicago for a representative example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8hqGu-leFc
5: And how many times do I have to remind you that I’m a Gen X’er?!
7: Yes, I can make even hip hop music sound boring; it’s kind of a gift.
8: Wow! Spellcheck caught that, on my first try, I failed to capitalize the B in Bob and P in Pants. These really are strange times.
9: The correspondence between the two is best captured in the current popular usage of the term viral: how many times did you use that term to describe an actual virus before Covid-19 became a popular conversation topic?
10: Or at least one that I’m not sure is true: I hope there are empirical studies underway so that we can get to the bottom of this thing.
11: ™
12: I’m not going to pretend I don’t have a dog in that fight, but for reasons I am trying to make clear in this essay, I’m coughing that idea into my elbow.
13: And I don’t know what Tik-Tok even is.
14: Example: in our power is to read The Enchiridion by Roman Stoic Epictetus, his handbook for times like these: http://classics.mit.edu/Epictetus/epicench.html
15: Yeah, I know. The idea that it’s in me to avoid being preachy is probably stretching credulity for most of you, but a boy can dream can’t he?
16: Here are three that I have encountered recently and that fit the criteria I describe
1) A British epidemiologist suggesting ways to think and behave in light of Covid-19: https://youtu.be/A2w2hIn05sg
2) A cute gif about flattening the curve (hat tip: Yash): https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fgi2pi/even_if_covid19_is_unavoidable_delayi ng/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x
3) A thinker I admire discussing what he’s learned from being quarantined in his home in Northern Italy: https://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2020/03/some-unofficial-advice-fromitaly.html
17: As if we third-grade boys weren’t routinely getting our asses kicked by the fifth-graders regardless of how we responded to Mrs. Hansen’s life philosophy.
18: For reasons I don’t entirely understand, this quiet moment between a man and a grizzly bear is one that fills me with inexpressible joy: https://youtu.be/IvKVGL95wDw
19: Republic Book III http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.4.iii.html
20: Still haven’t figured that one out. Is it the way it sounds or what it means? Both seem okay to me.
22: See Lou Reed (later, not now)
23: I write that as someone who had to put his beloved tuxedo Max to sleep last week: I still love cute cat videos.
24: You may read that sentence as prelude to the following suggestions. These are some pieces that make me feel the type of sadness that makes me love other people a bit more.
• Miles Davis: In a Silent Way https://youtu.be/8bdBONxS-Es
• John Fahey: Joe Kirby Blues https://youtu.be/Y2-B7KoBb8k
• Duke Ellington: Melancholia https://youtu.be/YW6VbVFJYzQ
• Karen Dalton: It’s Alright https://youtu.be/MtCyyB1Xu7A
• Harmonia & Eno ’76: Welcome https://youtu.be/gJbSQHz5WOg
• George Harrison: Isn’t a Pity https://youtu.be/eDrLTW_sesI
• Beethoven: Symphony No. 7 Movement 2 https://youtu.be/J12zprD7V1k
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