Cassandra Laughs Last

It just may be that in the eyes of our Creator, we are defined by more than the aggregate of our biometric data. But at the current pace of technology's pernicious progress, governmental and corporate surveillance scans may outperform the Almighty's omniscience. 

Human autonomy is being undone by inexorable  and invasive headways.

Our unique identities are being captured, memorialized and stored to be used, sooner or later, in one way or another, against us.  Our private mechanism of internal self-guardianship is being lost to the hostile takeover of artificial intelligence and its collateral weaponry.  

Technically we still own ourselves, but in effect, technology has wrested title from those of us who prize anonymity as a fundamental freedom. 

Our eyes, voices and faces are recorded almost wherever we go. They are being indelibly preserved for future persecutions against us as ammunition in case we stray from the parameters of thought and behavior that controllers of those dossiers authorize.  

It used to be said that one should always wear clear underwear, just to be on the safe side, should we be rushed to an emergency room. There are no skivvies for our psyches when the clinicians are big brother and big sister.

Social media is one enormous confession platform for most young people.  They can never recover their innocence or solitude, once they are "out there." There is no retreat. 

And as educators and parents know,  social media-accessing devices are a new form of substance abuse.

It cannot be cured or treated by mere cautionary tales. But government will try by means of yet another "tender loving care" misapplication.

Governor Kathy Hochul has signed legislation that apprises youngsters of such pitfalls as TikTok and the booby trap of Instagram. Notifications alone will have no more deterrent effect than do cigarette pack warnings, or caveats against drinking a sugary Slurpee at an amusement park. 

It's futile to warn or lecture about the pursuit of brain rot to children whose environment has almost totally been taken over by it. 

Children stoned on social media or enamored of artificial intelligence assistants cannot be dissuaded by patronizing adult exhortations. "Forewarned is forearmed" does not apply when practical wisdom is enforcement-less.

The more social media has proliferated, the less its victims have been capable of thinking for themselves, been interested in developing their own individuality or even noticed its loss.  Many applicants to Ivy League schools don't know how to frame an argument, spell, use punctuation, sustain an idea, write a cohesive paragraph, put someone else's idea in their own words, do footnotes, a bibliography or even tell time from a non-digital clock.

Many of the greatest authors and geniuses who contributed mightily to world culture in other areas will be forgotten.  

As the world progresses, it retreats from substance. That's evident not only in the grand scheme of things, but in revelatory minutiae.  

But that refrain has been around for many generations, and maybe the time is right to be weary of our own weariness.  

T.S. Eliot wrote, “For last year's words belong to last year's language, and next year's words await another voice.” He also wrote, “We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”

As we alternate between muddling through and sprinting to what we presume is a new awareness, maybe the kids and ourselves are all right after all. I'm heartened by some correspondence I got from a person who never signed up to be my mentor, but is anyway.

I was among the recipients of the following redacted observations that were written by this friend who doesn't want to be named: 

A piece in a recent issue of the Financial Times caught my eye. It was titled “The twilight of the physical letter.” While not widely reported in mainstream media, “less than two weeks before Christmas, Danes are sending their last Christmas cards. Not their last for this year, but the last ever to be delivered by the national postal service.” Mailboxes: gone. Stamps: gone. Paper bills: gone. Junk mail: gone. 

Will they become relics or collectibles? Who knows? With the US Postal Service reporting a $9 billion deficit for 2025, and merchants haranguing customers to pay online, can mail service in the US be far behind?

 Written correspondence has played such an important role in the development of our world. Think of the Pony Express linking towns and cities across the country, character development and plot devices in novels and opera, records of scientific processes and discoveries, and powerful appeals for social change, such as Martin Luther King Jr’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, which galvanized support for the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

What will the new historical record look like? Let’s see. 

Email has already become an outdated method of communication. Organizations have policies that automatically delete emails after a certain period, often as short as 60 days. Facebook is now considered old-fashioned, a marker for people of a certain age.

It also offers an option to “disappear” posts after a few days. Tweets? X? WhatsApp messages? 

How much thought do people usually put into these forms of communication?

One thing about writing an actual letter, especially a handwritten one, is that you really think about what you want to say. Typically, you revise and proofread it. And, yes, you can write letters on the computer ...and “send” them electronically. 

But where do they “live” after you send them? In the “cloud,” you might say. That sounds warm, fuzzy and safe, doesn’t it? But realistically, it’s a data center. 

Does that mean human history, too, is now open to being altered, destroyed, hacked or ransomed?

 Am I a Luddite? Perhaps.

There are good things about emails, texts and social media posts: they provide freedom from conventions and let you express yourself in the moment. You don’t need carbon paper or white out.

Responding to the above, another incognito acquaintance of mine, notes, "posting a letter, even if it is written on a computer, gives you time to reflect.  Perhaps just the act of writing the letter serves as an escape valve to frustration. Perhaps you don't want to mail it after all.  How many regrettable emails have you sent?  Not so many letters."

This person, in an education related field, works with high school students, and reports that since the school cell phone ban went into effect, there has been a resurgence of conversation. To illustrate how basic skills have eroded, many students needed help completing simple applications, and couldn't even remember their own home addresses without consulting their mobile phones.

We are well into the new year, and the capture of former Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro no longer monopolizes the front pages or its equivalent news feeds on our hand-held contraptions.  Mayor Zohran Mamdani's words, actions and policies are being meticulously analyzed with holders of contrary views hell-bent on feeling vindicated.

The mayor believes that the apprehension of Maduro was against international law. It involved the forcible removal of a foreign national, for trial abroad.  

The same was true in 1961, when Israel abducted Adolf Eichmann from Argentina, his adopted country of citizenship. He was the Nazi who coordinated the logistics for the deportation to concentration camps and slaughter of millions of Jews.  He was given a fair trial in Israel and executed.

Certain folks at that time and to this day maintain that was a violation of international law. What would Zohran say?