The Ubiquity Of Popular Culture In Our Lives
12:43 am in Religion by pgesystems
Nowadays, most people have a lot of time on their hands due to the nature of technology and how it has made our lives, on one level, much easier to handle. Because of that, many of us can afford to wonder on what people back 60 or 70 years ago would think of the things and activities that we do as a normal part of our daily lives.
As an example, how many people living back in the 1940s would understand or even be able to use a computer as it is designed today? To them, the word ‘computer’ meant a machine in a huge room that cost many millions of dollars. They are completely normal to us and we even use what are called ‘computer skins‘ to decorate them, though it’s a sure bet that our grandparents would have no idea what the term meant.
And when it comes to personal health and fitness — or at least giving the appearance of personal health and fitness — how many of our grandparents out there would even be familiar with the term 6 pack abs? It’s probably a good guess that not many of them would think of a six pack as being much more than something beer or soda was carried around in rather than something done to buff up abdominal muscles.
And when it comes to something like tattoos, which used to be things that many people equate it with Navy sailors, the idea that one can design own tattoo art and then have a body artist put it on their skin would generally be something that most people wouldn’t have even been able to conceive of having done. Tattoos back then usually came out of Navy bases in San Diego or Norfolk, Virginia.
Today, popular culture is so much a part of the fabric of our lives that we probably wouldn’t want to escape it even if we could. It is their, staring us in the face, 24 hours a day and we pretty much seem to love that fact to however, most Amish or other communities who like to live simple lives probably don’t think as highly of it as we do, especially if they have to ride their carts on the same road our cars are on.
People like the Amish are forced to deal with popular culture and try to prevent it from trespassing on their own lives whenever they can. They probably look at us as being far too much in touch with the here and now and our own self-involvement then they usually are. However, most people not Amish probably wouldn’t dream of going back to the actual old days that we sometimes pine about.
For a fact, there is no way of ever being able to completely eliminate popular culture in our lives. But our grandparents probably pondered on that same question when they first saw Elvis Presley doing his grinding and wiggling on television. However, we look at that and wonder what all the concern was about. It’s fairly certain that people have century from now will wonder the same thing about us.