MARSHALL McLOON (McLUHAN)

Note: the impetus for this outburst was an editorial in The Vancouver Sun excusing architects for the so-called "leaky" building problem. About the same time I saw the editorial, I also saw a TV spot which may have thrown some light on a very difficult problem (what is wrong with the so-called media?). You don't have to thank me for sharing the following thoughts. (But, it would be nice).

There is an old joke that was told in the Soviet Union (when it existed) something like, "We know what the future will be, comrade, it is the past that keeps changing." (I may have heard this before, but I will credit Dennis Prager when he was leading the charge against the Los Angeles, California city council for taking a small cross off the city seal). For those of you too young or not taught the truth about communism as it was practiced in the Soviet Union, the future was known to be a workers paradise and was doled out in chunks called "five year plans." Since a plan could never fail, the future was known. On the other hand, plans did fail. For this and other reasons, once reverred individuals had to be erased from the collective memory, so all references to them in history had to be eliminated. Not a pleasant place. You may have heard about revisionists. There are those who "spin" history until it has been changed. They don't have the power to change it immediately and directly as those "victorious" Soviet leaders did. They have to take a longer view.

My thesis is that we have those who have "spun" principles of chemistry, ventilation, physiology, psychology, etc., and you can catch them at it if you try. (I hope to soon finish a review of a book about air and air pollution in which the author claims that the first smog was yellow. Is there a problem there? How many people are left who remember that it used to be brown? How many of those still care? Does it matter that smog is yellow now? But, I digress).

I had occasion to watch some Canadian TV recently and was apalled by a spot promoting Canadian heritage by honoring Marshall McLuhan. I had pushed the distasteful memory of that jerk far back into the recesses. If anyone deserved to be purged from the collective memory, McLuhan ranks among the top 20. He is credited with the saying, "The media is the message."

The spot reminded me of a comedy in which a group of misfits stumble upon a catch phrase that is swallowed by everyone and which then makes fools of them all. (Please don't ask me for an example - - - I think you get the idea). I guess there are still those in Canada and the media, even here in the good old U.S.A. who subscribe to McLuhan's concept. It would explain why the media is so vain, so self-righteous, so wrong (almost all the time), and becoming so irrelevant. Think about it for a very short time, just a moment, and you will understand why truth doesn't matter to them anymore. First, think about what a large group of us believe. We believe that Jesus is The Word. Now, compare, "The media is the message." Who brought us the message, the word? Something wrong? Dreadfully, I'm afraid.

The media has lost its inhibitions, its self control, its common decency because it is It - - - "the message" or The Word - - - the be-all and end-all (at least in their own estimation, well, not totally their own. McLuhan said so).

And, they can say there are leaks if they want. They can create the truth. It's ok. McLuhan said so. Ah, those wacky Canadians! Well, we are just as whacky if we don't stop the media nonsense. Cheer up. We are stopping the nonsense (or at least providing alternatives). And, McLuhan is dead. Dead dead. Dead wrong too.

Copyright © 2005, Donald L. Beeman. All rights reserved.

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