![\"Fahrenheit](\"https:\/\/content.artofmanliness.com\/uploads\/2017\/03\/Fahrenheit-451-Header.jpg\")
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While books like <\/span>1984<\/span><\/i><\/a> and <\/span>Brave New World<\/span><\/i><\/a> are getting a lot of buzz right now because of the political climate of the country, I think there\u2019s a classic dystopian title which is even more deserving of our reading (and re-reading): Ray Bradbury\u2019s<\/span> Fahrenheit 451<\/span><\/i><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n If you\u2019ve not read the book, you likely at least know its general plot: In the future, firemen no longer put out fires, rather, they <\/span>start<\/span><\/i> fires to piles of books. Books have been outlawed, and anyone caught with them is a criminal whose stash is to be burned up, sometimes with the daring reader along with it. <\/span><\/p>\n One particular firefighter, Guy Montag, encounters a couple of people who help change his mind about books, and particularly, the ideas held within them. <\/span><\/p>\n While <\/span>1984<\/span><\/i> and <\/span>Brave New World <\/span><\/i>offer scary glimpses of a future that some argue is already here, <\/span>Fahrenheit 451<\/span><\/i> is filled with hope, and offers ideas for how people can resist — not the government necessarily, but the shallowness and thoughtlessness of the age. <\/span><\/p>\n Let\u2019s look at a few specific lessons we can garner from Bradbury\u2019s classic.<\/span><\/p>\n “You don’t have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n In the dystopian future Fahrenheit 451<\/em> depicts, books slowly lost their value over time. As society began to move at a faster pace (quite literally — cars travel so fast that billboards must stretch 200 feet long to be readable), the written word started to seem too slow and boring, especially in comparison to the new forms of media that became available. People preferred to stay home and watch the “parlor walls” — giant television screens — or go see a sporting event instead of reading. Publishers abridged books into shorter and shorter works to meet the needs of steadily atrophying attention spans, but demand for even these “Cliffs Notes” shriveled.<\/p>\n Eventually, the government simply banned books altogether, under the pretense that not having to deal with reading and difficult-to-digest ideas would make the public happier.<\/p>\n Looking at the current media landscape, it’s a course of events that doesn’t seem entirely far-fetched.<\/p>\n Articles and books have been made ever shorter (or substituted altogether for videos) in order to appeal to those who cry “TL;DR!” to anything over 500 words. News and debates are often conducted in soundbites and conveyed in 140-character tweets.<\/p>\n Many people shake their heads at these trends, and act as if they’ve been brought about by shadowy forces and greedy media corporations. “Those people” over “there” are to blame.<\/p>\n It’s true that media companies do want to make money. But they’re only able to do so by fulfilling what the consumer demands. If the consumer wants short, dumbed-down content, that’s what is produced. Websites wouldn’t create clickbait headlines if they weren’t effective in soliciting clicks.<\/p>\n The reality is that it isn’t corporations who are responsible for our media, but the public. You, me, and everyone else. How you direct your attention, what subscriptions you’re willing to pay for, and what you click\/share\/re-tweet greatly determines the content that is put out by websites and media corporations.<\/p>\n If you vote for quality with your clicks, that’s what you’ll get. If you vote for bite-sized nuggets of fluff, an endless supply will be produced.<\/p>\n Until at some point, as in Bradbury’s novel, all information becomes so trivial and seemingly useless, that it could be banned outright and only elicit a shrug of the shoulders.<\/p>\n \u201cCram them full of non-combustible data, chock them so damned full of ‘facts’ they feel stuffed, but absolutely ‘brilliant’ with information. Then they\u2019ll feel they\u2019re thinking, they\u2019ll get a <\/span>sense<\/span><\/i> of motion without moving. And they\u2019ll be happy, because facts of that sort don\u2019t change. Don\u2019t give them any slippery stuff like philosophy or sociology to tie things up with. That way lies melancholy.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Our modern society has an obsession with acquiring information, most of it in the form of social media and internet articles. We think that reading about the news<\/a> (in reality, often just the headlines of the news) and keeping up with what\u2019s happening with our Facebook friends, makes us smart, informed citizens. <\/span><\/p>\n And to some degree it does. Surely, having some knowledge of mere facts is better than none. The problem, especially today, is that by simply watching the news or reading articles on the internet, you can hear very different facts about the exact same subject. It\u2019s really hard to know who to trust, how to suss out what the truth is about a certain matter (if that\u2019s even possible at all), and how to develop a truly informed opinion about something. Rather than putting in the hard work of doing those things, we simply hit the \u201cShare\u201d button or re-tweet something after reading a headline that we think conveys some new information. <\/span><\/p>\n In today\u2019s world, being informed doesn\u2019t actually matter much, or set you apart. Simply knowing isn\u2019t enough, even though it can sure feel like it. As Bradbury writes above, when you\u2019re chock-full of information, you feel satisfied and enormously \u201cbrilliant.\u201d But are you really?<\/span><\/p>\n Our world isn\u2019t made better or moved forward by knowing facts. It\u2019s the \u201cslippery stuff like philosophy or sociology\u201d that enables progress of thought and action. It\u2019s thinking deeply, connecting ideas, knowing the context of those ideas, and solving problems by delving into your toolkit of mental models<\/a> that matters.<\/span><\/p>\n As Montag\u2019s sage mentor, Faber, says: <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not books you need, it\u2019s some of the things that once were in books. \u2026 There is nothing magical in them at all. The magic is only in what books say, how they stitched the patches of the universe together into one garment for us.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n You don\u2019t need more information. You need new ways of stitching the world together. <\/span><\/p>\n To give a quick example, let\u2019s briefly look at Paleo dieting. Many folks in the last decade have taken up what they consider to be the diet of cavemen. Eggs every morning, plenty of meat\/seafood, nuts, leafy greens, etc. This is based on the information that those foods are what our prehistoric ancestors — who were presumably healthier than their modern, overweight descendants — had available to them. <\/span><\/p>\n But it\u2019s not that simple. As Kamal Patel asked in his podcast with Brett<\/a>, \u201cWould paleo man have really eaten 3 eggs every morning?\u201d It\u2019s far more likely that ancient humans had a varied diet based on what they could hunt and forage at that time and season rather than eating the same things every day. They likely had intermittent periods of fasting and gorging, and consumed many foods that are either now extinct or look very different than they did 10,000 years ago (though of course some are also remarkably similar). <\/span><\/p>\n On top of all that, can we really be sure that a caveman diet is what\u2019s best for everyone in the 21st century? It\u2019s more likely that folks have different needs and that various diet regimens can work for them. <\/span><\/p>\n See how adding a little bit of context from history, archaeology, and modern nutrition creates a very different picture than the simple facts of \u201cknowing\u201d what constituted a caveman\u2019s diet? <\/span><\/p>\n So what does one do to be able to look at ideas through different lenses, and not just amass facts but connect them together? <\/span><\/p>\n Read widely, both fiction and non-fiction. Consider both sides of an issue — or take it a step further and dismiss both and come up with your own opinion or theory (one based on evidence, of course). Delve into various disciplines like biology, philosophy, psychology, sociology, physics — spend more effort on trying to understand how the world works and less on understanding pop culture. An ancient Greek classic could end up giving you more insight into the modern world<\/a> than a catchy internet headline (or even an evening newscast) ever could. <\/span><\/p>\n As a man in my late 20s, in social situations it feels as if I\u2019m expected to be in touch with every corner of popular culture. Inside jokes are based on an SNL skit, references are made to <\/span>Breaking Bad\u2019s<\/span><\/i> Walter White (even here on AoM<\/a>), and of course, Queen Bey\u2019s upcoming twins are even a topic of conversation. <\/span><\/p>\n Frankly, it\u2019s a lot to keep up with. You truly can end up feeling out of the know if you\u2019re not aware of what\u2019s going on in the world of sports and entertainment. I\u2019ve only fleetingly even heard of Chance the Rapper, so I felt rather out of touch when everyone was talking about his Grammy win a while back. <\/span><\/p>\n To be a Netflix or Hulu \u201cbinger\u201d has become common (and yes, my wife and I are plenty guilty at times — we plowed through <\/span>The Crown<\/span><\/i> and loved it). <\/span><\/p>\n And when we\u2019re not in front of a TV, our attention is bogarted by some other screen — be it a phone or laptop or tablet. Americans are in fact consumed by screens for <\/span>more than 10 hours a day. <\/span><\/i>This can be a little misleading — if you\u2019re working for 8 or 9 hours in an office, that\u2019s the bulk of it right there. And yet, if you\u2019re honest, you know that even outside the office a lot of your life is spent staring at backlit rectangles. <\/span><\/p>\n While this is partly just the new reality of the world we live in, it\u2019s also a sad testament to the inevitable loss of \u201canalog\u201d experiences — the way digital gigabytes have become substitutes for flesh and blood relationships.<\/span><\/p>\n Guy Montag sees this happening in his own household and tries to quell it, asking his wife \u201c\u2018Will you turn the parlor [television] off?\u201d To which she indignantly replies: \u201cThat\u2019s my family.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n His wife can\u2019t bear the thought of turning off the tube because the characters provide her companionship. <\/span><\/p>\n This idea — of the entertainment being her family — is repeated throughout the novel, and really stuck with me. It\u2019s a little absurd, but when you think about it, our lives just aren\u2019t that different. The people in our screens — be they internet celebrities or TV show characters — in many ways have become our extended kin. We spend a lot of time with them, we quote them, we aspire to be like them. We plan our weeks and evenings around when certain shows are on (or when they\u2019ll be available online). We analyze the events in a fictional storyline and come up with \u201cfan theories\u201d about how those universes operate. All the while, we may be ignoring the many nuances, plot developments, and character arcs of our own loved ones and the communities right outside our door. <\/span><\/p>\n Make an effort to give a little less credence to your fictional family, and more time and effort to your IRL family. (That\u2019s internet slang for \u201cin real life.\u201d) <\/span><\/p>\n \u201c\u2018Sometimes I sneak around and listen in subways. Or I listen at soda fountains, and do you know what?\u2019 <\/span> \u2018People don\u2019t talk about anything!\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n \u2018Oh, they <\/span>must<\/span><\/i>!\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n \u2018No, not anything. They name a lot of cars or clothes or swimming pools mostly and say how swell! But they all say the same things and nobody says anything different from anyone else.\u2019\u201d <\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n If I\u2019m being honest, many phone calls with family (especially the guys) are a little shallow. There\u2019s a lot of sports and weather chit chat. Sometimes there\u2019s a question about a house project. And of course I always give an update about how our son is doing and if he\u2019s added any words to his growing vocabulary. <\/span><\/p>\n But, generally, there isn\u2019t a ton of substance about how work is going, the general mood of the household (which fluctuates greatly with a toddler), our thoughts on current events, etc. And when those questions do pop up, I\u2019m often guilty of a quick answer: \u201cThings are going well!\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n And I notice the same pattern when amongst friends too. We rarely dig deeper than the shallow topsoil of weather, sports, quick updates about work, etc. Sometimes it goes beyond that into deeper bedrock, but it admittedly takes some event for that to be the case — being laid off, a breakup, an illness, etc.<\/p>\n While small talk and even seemingly shallow subjects are often what grease the wheels into deeper topics<\/a> of conversation, you can\u2019t stay flat forever with the people you love and have repeated interactions with. Things lose momentum that way. Relationships become stale. The idea of any disagreement or conflict, or even simply not getting affirmation, leads us to not bring up our fears, dreams, even the interesting things we\u2019ve maybe learned that day. <\/span><\/p>\n Guy Montag feels this throughout the book. Within his group of \u201cfriends,\u201d there is nothing of depth ever talked about. It revolves around complaining about kids, the latest gossip about town, political trivialities, and of course, the \u201cfamily\u201d in the TV parlor. When he tries to bring up bigger ideas about the society they live in, or even when he tries to read some poetry aloud, he\u2019s scolded and called crazy. Which in turn, makes him indeed feel crazy. <\/span><\/p>\n In order for life to have texture and meaning, we need to be able to talk about important things with other folks beyond just the latest smartphone apps or the new car you bought. As Susan Neiman rightly argues<\/a>, asking big questions — those of a moral and value-based nature — are a sign of growing up. <\/span><\/p>\n My challenge to you is not simply to have those conversations and thoughts within yourself (that\u2019s Step 1, as noted above), but to share those thoughts and questions with your friends and family. Ask your wife or girlfriend what her dreams are<\/a> (and ask repeatedly — they\u2019ll probably evolve and likely even change entirely over the course of time). Share with your friends some thoughts you had about a book you recently read. Heck, read some moving poetry aloud! You might be literally laughed at, but you might not, and if you\u2019re among friends, there\u2019s really no risk. <\/span><\/p>\nIf You Want Better Media, Vote With Your Clicks and Dollars<\/h3>\n
Facts Are Useless Without Context<\/h3>\n
Don\u2019t Let Fictional Characters Become Your \u201cFamily\u201d<\/h3>\n
Substance Matters; Conversation Matters <\/b><\/h3>\n
\n<\/span>\u2018What?\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n