Meta is the calloused heel that grinds down on real conversations…under the laughable disguise of “community”
In the ancient world, Polyphemus was a giant who saw his world through a single, unblinking eye. He lived alone on his island, gorging himself on sheep and strangers, not unlike Zuckerberg who eats up our identities and autonomies, and spits us out for more billions.
When Odysseus and his crew, not unlike us today, came seeking shelter, the Cyclops welcomed them with wide open jaws. They devoured them one by one, not even spitting out the bones as he guzzled on the sheer pleasure of possession.
Centuries later, we have helped built our own army of Cyclops. Except it is one singular thing, its name is Meta.
This monster stares at us from behind the mesmerising glow of our screens, this one vast, unblinking eye that sees everything. It feeds on our rabid attention, swallowing whole our days and sucking away our autonomy, and before we know it, our bond with each other, our very human connection slips away alongside our right to self.
The funny thing is, we gladly jumped into this abusive relationship, ironically because we thought it would be a safe space to show our true selves, to connect with old friends, to build our own little intellectual community.
Meta, like the one-eyed monster Polyphemus in that cave, devours us whole. Meta monetises us. To get at our very core, it creates division…so we can lay bare our souls .
Once chaos has been sewn, it weakens the resolve and wakens the algorithms, the one-eyed monster, the techno-cyclops continues unabated by man, machine or gods.
That single eye cannot see truth and courage, it only craves likes, clicks, engagement, reach…or in other words it seeks noise for meaning, it forces speed for depth, and it salvitates over chaos.
And like any true evil, this hypocritical Meta believes itself benevolent.
Which brings us to the reality that we cannot fight this blue monster with strength, we have to blind it with wisdom, like Odysseus did centuries ago.
We have to resist its gravitational pull, walk away from the rabid scrolling, wake up and see the illusion of community, and the orchestrated outrage that dulls our minds…or worse yet, when we block it out, shut down and walk away.
Because that’s what we do, isn’t it? When we get tired of the assaults and the injustices, when we are exhuasted by propaganda, we block it out, we turn off and we hide away.
That’s our reality, we stop connecting on a human level outside of a digital world. We have wandered so far down the rabbit hole of Facebook that we tell ourselves that we are trapped inside this cave where the entrance is sealed with a colossal stone.
We cannot do that to ourselves, we must make that first move! We have to step outside and meet one another in the light of the real world, under algorithm-free skies. We have to act like birds that flit from tree to tree, so too must we flit from one group of real humans to the next and the next until we are one strong human chain, unbreakable.
We have to find humans that are rooted in reality.
We have to reconnect.
If we take stock now, then one day soon we will fly high again, censorship-free as we used to be. One day soon we will walk away from this insatiable Meta-Cyclops army of one, that massive one-eyed blue icon that has gotten such a hold on us.
Polyphemus’s hubris is in his arrogant confidence in his own strength, and his disregard for the laws of hospitality (xenia). He believes he’s above the gods and he scoffs at Zeus. That is Zuckerberg and his empire, his island of illusions, they believe they are above the people. They forget, no man is indestructible, no one is irreplaceable. We, the people, decide.
And so, we must be as clever and resourceful as Odysseus and find a way to leave so we can find our way home again.
AI generated image by Adobe Express (shudder)