Everything Bad Goes Public

This Sunday's New York Times Magazine features a generously long excerpt from my new book, Everything Bad Is Good For You, which should be trickling into bookstores over the next week or so. (You can pre-order on Amazon as well.) The Times Mag excerpt is a condensed version of the TV section from the book, and they've given it the nicely in-your-face title, "Watching TV Makes You Smarter." My editors there were kind enough to let the piece retain the argumentative feel of the book itself, and suggest the wider scope of the book beyond television, so I couldn't be happier with the way it has turned out.

A few folks who read the book in manuscript form have asked why we didn't use the videogame sections as the excerpt. I'm very proud of the gaming material, and hope it will spark some additional research and thinking that builds on what I've written, but I think going with television was the best bet for the Times Magazine, mainly because I wager there's a sizable portion of their audience that simply won't read a piece about video games, while they might be tempted by a contrarian-sounding piece about TV.

But the idea for the book did really start with games, and so as a way of launching the book on the blog, I thought I'd quote from one of my favorite (and one of the oldest) riffs in the book. It's a little thought experiment that comes near the beginning, trying to get around the traditional prejudice that assumes that reading is invariably "good for you" and that games are mostly a waste of time.

[Added 4/26 after reading innumerable confused responses online] WARNING: What follows is Satire. I do not personally believe what is written below. It is an imagined rendition of what some pompous, self-satisfied gamer would say about books had he never actually sat down and read one. It's designed to make you realize how selective and short-sighted most of the criticism about gaming is. So if it seems selective and short-sighted in its description of books, that's precisely the point.

"Imagine an alternate world identical to ours save one techno-historical change: videogames were invented and popularized before books. In this parallel universe, kids have been playing games for centuries –– and then these page-bound texts come along and suddenly they're all the rage. What would the teachers, and the parents, and the cultural authorities have to say about this frenzy of reading? I suspect it would sound something like this:

Reading books chronically under-stimulates the senses. Unlike the longstanding tradition of gameplaying –– which engages the child in a vivid, three-dimensional world filled with moving images and musical soundscapes, navigated and controlled with complex muscular movements –– books are simply a barren string of words on the page. Only a small portion of the brain devoted to processing written language is activated during reading, while games engage the full range of the sensory and motor cortices.

Books are also tragically isolating. While games have for many years engaged the young in complex social relationships with their peers, building and exploring worlds together, books force the child to sequester him or herself in a quiet space, shut off from interaction with other children. These new 'libraries' that have arisen in recent years to facilitate reading activities are a frightening sight: dozens of young children, normally so vivacious and socially interactive, sitting alone in cubicles, reading silently, oblivious to their peers.

Many children enjoy reading books, of course, and no doubt some of the flights of fancy conveyed by reading have their escapist merits. But for a sizable percentage of the population, books are downright discriminatory. The reading craze of recent years cruelly taunts the 10 million Americans who suffer from dyslexia –– a condition didn't even exist as a condition until printed text came along to stigmatize its sufferers.

But perhaps the most dangerous property of these books is the fact that they follow a fixed linear path. You can't control their narratives in any fashion –– you simply sit back and have the story dictated to you. For those of us raised on interactive narratives, this property may seem astonishing. Why would anyone want to embark on an adventure utterly choreographed by another person? But today's generation embarks on such adventures millions of times a day. This risks instilling a general passivity in our children, making them feel as though they're powerless to change their circumstances. Reading is not an active, participatory process; it's a submissive one. The book readers of the younger generation are learning to 'follow the plot' instead of learning to lead."

Comments

[A.R.Yngve]

Remember Sturgeon's Law: "90% of everything is crap."

That most TV programming is dull and boring (I agree) is not a valid blanket judgment of the medium... because frankly, a badly written book is just as boring. Ditto with videogames.

Do not confuse the MEDIUM with the CONTENT.

Then again, Marshall McLuhan had a point when he proclaimed that "The medium is the message."
Some part of watching TV or reading or typing is not the content(such as plot or characterization or message), but a SENSORY experience unique to the medium.

However, that is another matter, which should get its own discussion... :)

-A.R.Yngve
http://yngve.bravehost.com

[johan]

This is just plain stupid.

[George]

Here's a response to the NYT piece from Slate:

http://slate.com/id/2117395/

George

[anonymous]

"I have not read your book, so all these points could be mute points but..."

I think it's more likely that they are moot points.