Many years ago I read Ted Mooney’s dystopic Easy Travel to Other Planets; since then I have often thought of the information sickness that drifted through that 1981 work of science fiction. And I thought of it again as I read Gene Weingarten’s funny-given-he-is-shooting-fish-in-a-barrel-essay, “Cruel and Unusual Punishment.”
THE CRUDDIEST MOMENT OF THE CRAPPIEST DAY OF MY LIFE ON EARTH happened as I found myself watching five televisions simultaneously, each containing a different political pundit opining on the same subject. When I looked down toward my computer screen to see what the bloggers were saying about it, I noticed that a button on my shirt had come undone.
There I was, literally contemplating my own navel. But I didn’t even crack a smile because, in the relentless drone of insipid opinion, irony no longer held any meaning.
educating alice 