HW 13- Feed B

I think of Feed as a mirror of the world. If it is a hammer, I want no part of the world that it is shaping. Rather, I feel that it is a mirror because it reflects the world as it stands now. With our world, so many things seem to be constantly becoming more and more digital and centered around the fee- oh, I'm sorry, the internet. The book clearly reflects this because everything in the lives of the teenagers revolves around the feed. Without it, their lives are unbearable and they become hollow shells of people. If you take technology from a teenager, their lives are likely to react in a similar fashion. If not identical exactly, you will see similar theme's and reactions.

I think that a mirror can be a hammer though, and in a way this book seems to be trying to accomplish that very feat, or so I see it. By showing people what they act like from an outside perspective, you can give people an unknown insight into their one person. Granted, Feed is quite an exaggeration of the world right now, but it is really just a combination of multiple aspects of American culture taken one step further. By showing people the road they are headed towards, they can take a step back and adjust their way of life so that they are not so reliant on an abstract factor such as the internet, or the feed in the book. I myself have seen the error of my ways multiple times by seeing somebody else do something similar or identical and realizing how annoying or wrong it is for me to do whatever it be, like interrupting a conversation somebody is having for instance. Feed looks to accomplish the same thing with American teenagers and the internet.

I would want my piece to be a hammer rather than a mirror. Ideally though, my piece will be both, a hammer and a mirror. I think that the best way for somebody to correct themselves and change their life is to see somebody doing the same thing and the consequences that befall them. I always want to strive for growth, for strengthening of a structure, be it literal or figurative. There are enough mirrors out in the world, between TV, movies, magazines, and the other tentacles to the media's octopus. Too few of these try and make a difference in the life of the person interacting with these things. In a dream world, a chain reaction would occur which would turn everybody's mirrors into hammers to help build for a better tomorrow and make tomorrow a better day.