Memes, Schmemes....Poppycock. :-)
Thanks for posting the article, Ed.
But as an historian with a special interest in the history of ideas, I simply I am not buying Mr. Lynch's product -- i.e., the "new science" of Memetics (click on his name to find out what else he is peddling).
And I say that not because I am a member of the "end of the world" crowd. On the contrary. Y2K nibbled only at the edge of my consciousness until a week ago, when for some reason I decided it was really time to begin boning up on the issue.
I have already concluded that the camp of the "anti-doomsayers" (let's call them the "normals", for brevity's sake) is out of it, unfortunately. Why?
1) They have absolutely no sense of humor. (For example, they don't even see the "fun" aspect to this whole thing, which appeals to the Robinson Crusoe instinct in many people -- most especially in many male people. Hey! Whooppee! Let's go out and see whether we can survive on a desert island! & etc.)
2) Instead of addressing the concrete questions that "alarmists" and "doomsayers" raise, folks in that camp generally prefer to attack their "opponents" as "liars", "freaks", "frauds", "wackos", "nuts", "fruitcakes", or even "memetically impaired" (Mr. Lynch). What they are missing is the fact that it is more important to ask the right questions, than to supply the right answers. In other words, by dismissing the questioner as "meme-infected", they thereby dismiss his question, too.
If he is asking whether an airplane is likely to fall out of the sky on Jan. 1, 2000, do not respond: "What a stupid question to ask, you fruitcake!" Rather, explain WHY it will not fall out of the sky. And if you can't, shut up, and let somebody else answer the question.
3) They ignore the fact that in this country, "apocalyptic" or "millennial" expectations have historically been a constant. (Just think of all the new religions & sects we have produced!) They did not create the Y2K "scare" -- they simply attached themselves to it, as "free-floating anxiety" always will. The Y2K "scare" was created by Y2K itself, in my view.
4) They are Americans. And unless they are old enough to have lived through the Great Depression, they really do not believe anything bad can happen to them. In short, bad=unrealistic.
5) They are condescending. For example, Lynch:
To prevent such troubles we should counter the spread of destructive apocalypse memes long before December 31, 1999.
This means explaining the viral nature of such memes to those yet unaffected, to immunize them from communicable panic.
We should counter them? Who's we???
jbe
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