Forty-five years ago liberal Harvard theologian Harvey Cox released his prophetic book The Secular City. It was a far-reaching analysis of how the church would fit into Technopolis, the city of the future. Cox proposed two traits of life in this secular city: anonymity and mobility. He also depicted the two characteristics with images vivid for the time, though dated now. He saw anonymity as a giant switchboard, and mobility as a complicated highway cloverleaf. Occasionally I like to haul out my dog-eared paperback copy and just refresh myself with those predictions about what life would like life in a a secular world.
I always find Cox's conclusions rather accurate. Of course, his pictures of life in Technopolis are worn, especially with younger cohorts. I mean, many younger Americans can't describe a switchboard and cloverleafs are not the obstacles they once were. Shoot, if you can navigate IRS From 1040 (revised) you can do most cloverleafs. So, the question is, what images would depict the life realities of anonymity and mobility now. My answer? The computer console or the internet or the ethernet.
You see, the best way to become a phantom in society, to disappear fro the face of the earth, to become a non-entity, is to develop a cyber-persona that lurks somewhere underneath the fiber optics and morphed images of your PC or MAC. Just the same, in a matter of seconds you can be transported to never-never land and back via your internet connections. Anonymity and mobility at the touch of a computer keyboard.
So, there is social networking and contact with others. So, what's so anonymous about that? Well, this new world of relationships is custom made for disguise. You can camouflage yourself to be the person of your dreams, or maybe, the non-person. Guarding your real identity is as quick as a new password or limited access to your private pages and information. It is heaven for predators and pretenders, the ultimate hiding place.
At the same time, it provides one of the fastest means of escape, a way to beam your mind and attention to just about anyplace in the universe. Some people stay lost in a world of computer gaming and fantasy sports and relationship networks for hours at a time, at least providing mind mobility at the touch. This virtual world places people in exciting locales, far away places with strange sounding names, even mega-churches on the other coast, on a canal in Venice, on the beach at Cannes, on the red-carpet in real-time Hollywood.
Of course, none of it is real. Back in '65 Cox couldn't possibly dream of what Technopolis would eventually look like out there in the future. The changes he predicted happened exponentially and we're far beyond switchboards and cloverleafs. but, what people are discovering in his new age is that the cyber stuff, while cool and satisfying to the itch at some minor level, can't fill the awful void in our lives. So, virtual is good. But, it's doesn't quench.
We still need real. You know, family, friends, neighbors. An impersonal worls needs real live human contact, pressing the flesh, touching, a hug now and then, to know and be known. Humans need close contact of the first kind, the presence and proximity of others. That's why church on the net doesn't work for me, why Facebook doesn't satisfy my high relator profile, why I don't retreat to solitude all the time.
This is Technopolis, no doubt about it. But, anonymity and mobility aren't what they were cracked up to be. Give me some human contact anytime.
Just saying---
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