ON THE AVENUES: On the blood red atavism of social media.

ON THE AVENUES: On the blood red atavism of social media.

A weekly web column by Roger A. Baylor.

Long ago, when both of us were considerably younger, I was drawn to the artistry and musicianship of the Who’s Pete Townshend owing to his determination to be articulate in contrast to rock music’s less thoughtful cultural propensities.

Townshend was, and perhaps still is, searching for proper context, as might be phrased something like this:

“Now, stop applauding so I can explain to you what this song really means. How can you understand anything amid all that screaming and drooling?”

Consequently, it’s both pedantic and refreshing to contemplate milieus that bear at least a trace possibility of being edifying and educational, because posterity surely will record that the current era is one of unceasingly vapid entertainment, no longer balanced by anything remotely substantive.

Then again, perhaps I’ve been spending too much time surveying America’s latest vast wasteland, social media.

Of particular interest to me lately has been the practice of mob-baiting on Facebook, a phenomenon I’m sure has a buzz phrase attached to it, although I’ve taken to describing it as “throwing raw meat to the piranhas.”

It begins with individuals collecting “friends” as the basis for an ideological mailing list, one designed to function as a repository for fans and sycophants, not the sort of genuine friend with whom one might periodically agree to disagree. Businesses do this, too, but more on that in a moment.

With the viewing (not “reading”) audience thus secured, the next step is to contrive stimuli calculated to jerk knees. Any such content need not be factual; in fact, the more emotionally untethered and intellectually ridiculous the better: “Obama,” “Koch brothers,” “atheists” or whatever else serves as alleged content sufficient to push all the pre-programmed cultural buttons in gorgeously choreographed cadence.

The reaction is swift and decisive. As the propagandistic raw meat is waved in the general direction of starving dogs, they react as Pavlov’s mutt might have predicted, by flailing, thrashing and foaming at the mouth. “Atta girl” … “those bastards” … “kill the infidels” … and so on, and so forth. I’m actually softening the vicious tone of the attacks.

There you have it: It’s Facebook, your Personalized Piranha Feeding Device. Just add a chosen enemy, click, and watch as the water turns blood red … and you become your own cult of personality.

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As the decline of literacy becomes ever more depressing, and with imbecilic auto-entertainment sufficing for the majority – sadly, I’m probably not overstating the case – then how might those of us in the minority seeking some semblance of idea-compelled existence move forward with living a life of authenticity?

The answer eludes me, but I’ve been trying my best to locate the thread in what seems like a room filled with screaming, angry people. Speaking only for myself, authenticity means being myself; yes, there’ll be cynicism, profanity and a caustic tone, though not to the exclusion of intellectual honesty and constructive suggestions.

Authenticity means it might take a good long while to sort through issues and problems, because they tend to be what they are owing to their fundamental difficulty, not a simplicity that’s too good to be true.

I think that authenticity involves forcing oneself to step outside the circle of the like-minded, and to listen to what others are saying, preferably those who have experienced the world in a different way, from a different place, and with different eyes and ears.

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For a very long time, my inner world has been engaged in a struggle to apply the concept of authenticity to my working station. Beer is my life, but “craft” beer lost its grip on authenticity so long ago that the narrative may be impossible to reclaim.

Once upon a time, better beer was about a thought process. It was about teaching and educating, illustrating the whys and wherefores. In the current age, “craft” beer has devolved into hedonism, masturbation and ephemeral trend chasing – on the enthusiast’s end. It’s just another form of entertainment, miles wide and millimeters deep; like the bike lanes in my hometown, “craft” beer begins and ends nowhere, and is connected to nothing in a wider, inter-related world.

Meanwhile, “craft” brewers adept at the imperatives of capitalism are busy constructing a new boss that looks suspiciously like the old. The late historian Tony Judt reminds us that capitalism isn’t about a small, artisanal brewer making really good beer. Rather, capitalism is about brewers selling a great many units of beer. There was a time when “craft” beer thrived on refuting this statement. Now, in many ways, it doesn’t even bother trying.

Full disclosure: I’ve lived varying forms of inauthenticity, too, and it would be foolish of me to deny it. Still, if it’s all about the beer, then it needs to be all about the beer. If the beer itself isn’t authentic, how can anything else spawned by it be authentic? My own company continues to explore these and other questions in an effort to find answers that constitute greater authenticity than previous ones. We haven’t succeeded, and we haven’t failed. We’re in that most dangerous of places in robber baron capitalism: The middle.

Why do we even bother with thinking?

Perhaps instead we might expediently gather the hungry piranhas, and lob some raw meat into the scrum, as one of our fellow local breweries did on Facebook just last week, when it inelegantly savaged a customer for an innocuous complaint, and was loudly applauded by a fawning, obsequious mob of home slices echoing Tim Rice’s lyrics in Jesus Christ Superstar: “Crucify him!”

Watching all this, I wanted to vomit, but it would have passed unnoticed amid the agitated, ricocheting saliva. I elected to go against the grain, and swallow.

Well, if that’s authenticity, you can both have it and keep it. If that’s what is meant by taking over the world for “craft” beer, then it’s a world you can exploit to your heart’s content. I may have helped in this world’s creation, but I no longer recognize it, nor do I require self-aggrandizement of such magnitude in my daily life. The one redeeming factor about the words “fuck ‘em” is that they are multi-directional.

I’m older now, but my determination to be articulate in contrast to “craft” beer’s less thoughtful cultural propensities is greater than ever. Fortunately for me, my list of personal needs does not include applause, drooling or raw meat. What happens next is anyone’s guess, although it’s certain that something will.

You are encouraged to log off Facebook for a few minutes and go for a walk, accompanied by your own thoughts.

Learning remains barely possible that way.