Lies our mothers told us

Remember alienation? It used to be how we talked about the manner in which the contemporary condition was destroying our human essence. It turned about to be a lie. You forgot about it. There was no reason not to. Well, it's back -- IN THREE NEW FORMS

1.
The first is Facebook alientation, earlier outlined in an architecture review published in this very blog. It goes like this:



And then you have to think:
1) Who am I to even judge? Good for them. Having a good time. I bet pictures of me and my friends look like that to them.
2) Secretly I know that pictures of me and my friends look cooler
3) They don't, do they? That wouldn't make any sense. I'm just a facebook person like these friends. I guess I'm fine with that. Equality. Democracy. America in the Digital Age. I'm fine with that.
4) Who am I?


2.
The second is called "understanding the noble effort of I Am Charlotte Simmons alientation." It's when you see tweens hip hopping around on roller shoes, listening to music they call "emo," which is short for "emotional," and engaging in a fad called "cutting" or "cut" where they use store bought razor blades and actually cut the soft flesh of their young bodies...because they like the scars. "You ever feel real pain?" Jordan hissed. "eYe KNO PA1N 4 REL," C.W. "instant messaged" in return, bemusedly.
Anyway, it's when you look at young people and can't figure out what they're doing.

what are they doing?


3.

The third is when you learn a new way not to trust your friends because you see Nora Dunn on Saturday Night Live reruns and realize that you could just hang out with a group of people for, like, 6 years and nobody would ever think to care enough about you to let you know that no one really liked you or anything you did besides stand around.

There, I said it.