A Few of My (Many) Qualms with Social Media

This past Friday night I went to a concert geared toward a crowd much younger and more feminine than myself. It was a very emasculating four hours, and by the end of it, I had to do something manly to overcompensate, like eat a Snickers bar or something. But for the most part I enjoyed it and lived to tell about it, so that's good.

My reason/impetus for going in the first place? I couldn't turn down the opportunity to see the young, beautiful, and extremely talented Ariana Grande perform live. Her voice is breathtaking on the radio, and when I learned that she was coming to Kansas City, I knew I couldn't pass up the chance to hear it in person. Even if I had to survive a trio of post-pubescent boys with falsetto voices, shallow, artless lyrics, and biceps the size of a healthy newborn, I'd just bite the bullet, fashion my best fake smile, and countdown to the woman of my dreams.

The moment was fleeting, she sneaked on stage suddenly, and left as quickly as she came. All I know was that goosebumps covered my epidermis for the song's entirety, and I was told by those around me that I lost all control of motor skills and coordination, while drool spilled from the corners of my mouth and onto the pre-teen girl next to me.

As she pranced off stage leaving the crowd in a frenzy, I realized my night had hit its climax.

That is when Emblem3 (heir to the Boy Band throne after One Direction, The Jonas Brothers, and countless others) and 4,256 smart phones made their appearance.

I'm still not sure if I can believe what I saw as the young men walked out on stage. In one, unitary motion, every girl, woman, and homosexual or questioning male, lifted their smart phone above their head and began recording the performance.

All eyes were fixated on the 2x4 screen in front of them, and not on the stage and the pop stars themselves.

After what felt like an eternity of fist pumps, high squeals, and dry-humping the air in front of them (much to the approval of the pro-female, pro-teen crowd) the dreamboats finally skated off the stage. The cell phones returned to their base, in the pocket of their rightful owner.

All the while I couldn't help but be reminded of Angel Boligan's cartoon, El Universal.

I used to assume art imitated reality, but maybe in these days the roles have reversed: reality imitates art.

Hot Chelle Rea didn't help the matter, egging on the audience when it was their turn in the spotlight. "Who wants to be in my picture?" He asked. The crowd exploded like an unscrewed Dr. Pepper would had it been shaken by Thor in the moments after he had recently been denied a bank loan.

"Check out our twitter page after the show if you want to see yourself, Kansas City!"

Light-bulb goes off in my head: this is all just a big marketing ploy. You're all blind.

They lobbed out some bait, and the fish bit... hard.

One of my favorite writers, David Sedaris, made comment on the recording of our lives in his newest release, "Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls." In his essay "Day in, Day Out" Sedaris wrote "it's not lost on me that I'm so busy recording life, I don't have time to really live it. I've become like one of those people I hate, the sort who go to the museum and, instead of looking at the magnificent Brueghel, take a picture of it, reducing it from art to proof. It's not "Look what Brueghel did, painted this masterpiece" but "Look what I did, went to Rotterdam and stood in front of a Brueghel painting!""

Instead of living the performance, these girls recorded it. I'm not blaming them, that's just where we sit today. That is what they are expected to do.

"Climb the mountain not to plant your flag," says David McCullough, Wellesley High School English teacher, in his commencement speech "You are not Special." "But to embrace the challenge, enjoy the air, and behold the view. Climb it so you can see the world, not so the world can see you."

"Go to Paris to be in Paris," he continues, "not to cross it off your list and congratulate yourself for being worldly."

Go to concerts not to so everybody knows you heard magnificent vocals or squeaky beach boys, but to enjoy them.

Facebook checks us in when we go places. It encourages us to post photos and statuses telling of our adventures. It tricks us into thinking that we are closer to people than we ever were just because they are a few clicks (hyperlinks) away. But the truth is that this false sense of proximity is making our ties weaker and weaker. We know less and less about our "friends" because we all constantly monitor and tweak our profiles to give off the image we want to be seen, not the image that is real.

Instagram is all about proof. Proof that you did something or that you are something.

Twitter, even in the naming, gives you the misconstrued idea that people care enough about you that they will "follow" your every thought. The game is to follow as little people, and to have as many followers as humanely possible.

These networks are false realities. They are gradually becoming the real-world, though.

Personal connection is falling by the wayside.

Maybe art is no longer imitating reality. Maybe reality is chasing after art, and were all here to watch it unravel.