YouTube

Video doesn’t afford us the same intensity of individuality that the printed word provides. Speaking aloud into the internet is emersion in the Other.
Writing affords an author time for reflection and debate. One can “catch their breath” before they pronounce the world, gather supplies before setting off to sea. Marshall Mcluhan said that “every media extension of man is an amputation.” Television removes imagination from the individual and offers it free to the masses. Print anchors the psychic ego to the paper; it creates grammars and logics to put the world to rights. It’s straight lines and consistency turn nature into a machine while the newly defined ego willingly consents to being but a cog. As long as it gets a page in the story, a place in history, however small, it is satisfied. As long as its vote is counted…

And what has YouTube amputated? Uploading videos to YouTube is making a confession to the superego. That means YouTube has supplanted religion as the sole source of the sacred. What was once prayer is now accomplished by staring into a tiny hole telling “whoever” about what you think. Someone is listening, but no one can do anything to help.

There is no enlightenment on YouTube, but there are millions of people looking for it. There is no silence on YouTube, but there are millions of people listening for it.
It is a mirror for the soul, but functions much like a hole. There is nothing to be gained from it, only much to be lost.

Does YouTube give every cog a voice? Or does it turn cogs into demigods?