Identity, Violence and the Electronic Church
Mar 7
posted by Admin in
Religion in the Public Sphere
| 3 Comments
Display and performance are "fundamental to the process of constructing human reality"--that visible religion plays an active cultural role marking boundaries for the formation and re-formation of identity. -- Sally M. Promey, "the Public Display of Religion" in The visual Culture of American Religions pp. 27-48.
The iphone image (shown right) displays the numerous religious apps available to users.
A March 6, 2011 keyword search on Google.com for religious images generated the following:
- Islam - 49,000,000 results in .16 seconds
- Judaism - 6,360,000 results in .25 seconds
- Christianity - 18,400,000 results in .20 seconds
- Hinduism - 2,250,000 in .26 seconds
- Buddhism - 6,070,000 results in .21 seconds
- Atheism - 1,690,000 results in .30 seconds
- New Age - 535,000,000 results in .20 seconds
- Religion - 275,000,000 results in .15 seconds
What do these numbers mean? Is religion really on the rise or is it just our perception of religion that is on the rise?
To stimulate discussion, I give you three insightful quotes from Marshall McLuhan.
The loss of individual and personal meaning via the electronic media ensures a corresponding and reciprocal violence from those so deprived of their identities; for violence, whether spiritual or physical, is a quest for identity and the meaningful. The less identity, the more violence. -- Marshall McLuhan, "Violence and the Media," Canadian Forum, 1976"
The eighties will see a great swing from the military towards the temple bureaucracy, from the outer conquest of space to the inner conquest of spirit. Holy wars will occur --an extreme example of hardware shifting to software and spiritual values. -- Marshall McLuhan, "Living at the Speed of Light," Maclean's magazine, 1980
Many people simply resort instantly to the occult, to ESP, and every form of hidden awareness in answer to this new surround of electric consciousness. And so we live, in the vulgar sense, in an extremely religious age that, in the popular notion at least, is probably the most religious that has ever existed. We are already there. -- Marshall McLuhan, "Electric Consciousness and the Church," interview by Herbert Hoskins. The Listener 1970
Has this increase of religion's presence in the public sphere exacerbated religious prejudice or alleviated it? Is our religious mosaic fostering an atmosphere of tolerance or fear? Are religious identities threatened by the increase of religious ideas in the public sphere? Are secular authorities threatened by this perceived increase of religion in the public sphere?
#1 by Cameron F. on 3/10/11 - 12:09 PM
I consider this a snapshot in a moment on the web on how religion is present and pushing itself into the public sphere via the internet.
What's interesting in the numbers is that there are only 18 million Christian returns versus 49 million Islamic returns.
Does it signify that Islam is much more savvy and is aggressively using the electronic media for its religious agenda? Would a Christian be threatened by these numbers?
Also interesting, the search phrase "New Age" returns 535 million returns. Is this a reflection of non-denominational growth in global spiritualism? Are religious notions fragmenting and merging with other religious traditions forming this new spiritualism where we borrow what we like and discard the rest?
Marshall McLuhan asserts that the electronic media in its creation of the global village stripped us of our identity, reducing individuals to an anonymous group. Has this loss of identity created a backlash of religious fundamentalism to re assert identity. McLuhan also asserts that we are now living in an extremely religious age. Is this true? Are we more religious now than ever before? Or is it just our perception that we live in a more religious age? Are our senses distorted by the sheer volume of media content available to use that we think there is more happening. It makes me think of the war coverage on CNN with the same news bite being replayed every 3 minutes creating an illusion that there is non-stop violent action going on 24/7 without stop.
#2 by aefisher on 3/12/11 - 4:28 PM
#3 by Martin Speer on 3/14/11 - 12:17 PM
There is still a scientific gap in understanding McLuhan's idea and theory of the global village concerning its materialistic and the metaphysical aspects. With increasing electrification of communication the senses of man are conditioned to increased interaction (that had been suppressed for centuries by the predominance of the printing press and the visual sense of perception). This increased interaction is in McLuhan's thought tactile, and in its perfection the "sensus communis" (the translation of all senses into each other, see Take Today, p. 3), which is, for McLuhan, the right meaning of Thomas Aquinas' phrase, and, as a utopian goal, the victory of a true rationality that is at the same time spiritual and tribal. The global village, which is a process of re-tribalizing humanity by use of electronic media (not a fixed state), has to get through all kinds of clashes of ideas and ideologies to transform the perception of people. Nothing, so McLuhan, is invisible in the global village, figure and ground (to re-use McLuhan's Gestalt psychology terms) become visible at the same time, time and space are faltered. This is a hurting process, hurting for the senses and at the same time for the cultural predispositions. Religion, once a stabilizator of local tribes, but also the beginning of all civilizations, serves as an ideology (as propaganda) against electronic and sensual globalization on the one hand, but, on the other hand, has to be re-discussed on a global level. Therefore this increasing interest, in propaganda (and in cheap forms of religions like angel religions as well, that are also propaganda) as well as in the search for intercultural understanding of religious thoughts. This is a chance and a martyrium - the war and peace in the global village.
It is necessary to divide this from economical and political propaganda that uses the term "global village" - multi-national industries, for example, to fix their predominance in a special business, or states to fix their cultural predominance in special regions.
It is therefore also necessary to look carefelly if a violent conflict and an increase in (perhaps religious) propaganda emerges because of economical or political suppression or because of the non-reversible, sense-hurting global electrification process.
Not much place has been used to reflect on Jacques Ellul's books on the connections of propaganda and electrification that were a major influence for McLuhan in the Sixties. Perhaps because it is too frightening?
Yours,
Martin Speer