More dead baby fear, or Slate's war between the worlds

Panic over the South Korean dead baby story keeps going, with William Saletan sounding Slate's alarm.  It's a fascinating piece of cyberfear.

To begin with, after reprising the narrative, Saletan realizes that, like all good distant atrocities, the bad thing is really about us.

[L]ook in the mirror. Every time you answer your cell phone in traffic, squander your work day on YouTube, text a colleague during dinner, or turn on the TV to escape your kids, you're leaving this world. You're neglecting the people around you, sometimes at the risk of killing them.

(Looks up from blogging anxiously) 

"You, too, can let babies die!"

It's fascinating how the author shifts from observing one type of interaction (person to software) to a second (person to person, mediated by software) without realizing it.  

This unacknowledged slide is related to the old expression "stop talking on the phone" - one doesn't really talk on the phone, but talks to someone else through the phone.  To the caller, which is more important, the other person or the handset?

Saletan's revivified argument also turns a blind eye to all pre-digital distractions, be they pre-Web radio, tv, books, or just daydreaming*.  It's a classic move for those expressing fear of new technologies, especially in the US.  Question: are any of those other technologies or media or practices not "virtual"?  Are they ok now in their absorption, validated by being non-cyberspatial?

Having summoned fear at a murderous level, Saletan then extends things further, calling up a clash of civilizations, or rather worlds:

That's the real horror behind the Korean story: The balance of power between the worlds is shifting. Here and there, virtual reality is gaining the upper hand.

This one death is but a sample of the horrors to come.  World-sized, Lovecraftian terrors.  

Again, note the slide from interpersonal communication to interaction with software.  

Say, does "balance of power" suggest the possibility of war?  It does:

The dead baby is just another casualty of this war between the worlds—a war increasingly dominated by the world in which you're reading this.

Lest we think Saletan is basing too broad an argument on a too-narrow pedestal of one single case, don't worry.  He has (3) more (out of 48.2 million):

At least two Korean men have died of exhaustion after round-the-clock video-game marathons. Another man, nagged by his real-world mother for disappearing into video games, allegedly resolved the dilemma by killing her. 

*EDITED TO ADD: an email reminds me that Saletan does, in fact, mention tv.  It's part of a string of digital sins: "Every time you... turn on the TV to escape your kids, you're leaving this world."  I'm not sure if he lists tv there because of inherited tv=wasteland criticism, or because of increasing digital integration for tv, or both.

(via MetaFilter, image from Elven*Nicky)

Comments

[Andy Havens]

Question for the academy: are sports real?

They're played in real life, but they are games. Right? People get paid (sometimes) to play them. Whole industries and media revolve around them. But they are...

games.

Right?

I'm a writer and marketing guy and designer by trade. I've spent 85% of my career using words and images to overlay meaning on top of mediated communications related to the buying and selling of stuff. Is that real? The words were written on computers. The images are in Photoshop and InDesign and on Web pages. Is any of it real? None of it can be eaten, worn or lived beneath... but I've made a comfy living at it. And I've helped sell services that contribute to others' lives.

Was that all a dream?

When I play Magic the Gathering with my son on the dining-room table, is that real? We also play on the Xbox. Is that less real?

These discussions make me tired. Life is life. It's all real. Calling it "virtual reality" just makes it easy for lazy reporters to make inane distinctions.

Novels are VR. Sports is VR. Movies are VR. Plays, TV, ads, songs.

In one sense, anything related to language is virtual reality, as words are not the things they describe, are transient and open to multiple meanings.

My avatar, my checkbook, my journal, my diploma. My life. All of which is tired on this Friday (arbitrary, virtual designation) afternoon.

[Carl Roberts]

The Korean couple were obviously suffering from mental trauma/exhaustion/stupidity. Had they chosen exercise as their drug of choice, I doubt that there would be such a media firestorm over the issue.

I am a school teacher (argument by authority), and let me tell you something: parents neglecting their children is more common than anyone will admit.

More than a clash between worlds, there is a generational clash over the identity of the digital meme. The Baby Boomers, horrified at their inability to wield the reigns of power, are seeking a scapegoat for their collective failure.

Look for more fear mongering and finger-pointing in the decades to come.

[Bryan Alexander]

Well said, Andy. I thought the "but is it real?" stuff was left behind in the 1990s.
...your sports analogy is *excellent*. I'm going to use it.

Agreed, Carl. It's typical of fearsome internet journalism to foreground the presence of technology, then minimize everything else.
...agreed about generations, too. Say more about the Boomers? Surely the generation including folks like Howard Rheingold, Sit Tim Berners-Lee, and Ted Nelson would be better at this.

[Ken]

Awesome post!