It used to be that the social media realm was predominately ‘child’s play’, and by that I mean that it was a platform that was controlled by the youth; the tech savvy generation. These were the kids that were brought up with every natural sense plugged into some sort of electronic or synthesized device, while the rest of us watched, scratching our heads, hesitantly adjusting to the massive expansion of the global information highway.

Times have changed despite people’s preconceived notion that this is still the case. When people think of social media, the common belief is that Facebook and Twitter are still ruled by the Tweens to the late 20 year olds. Would it surprise you that 22% of all grandparents are linked into some form of social networking platform?  According to MyVoucherCodes’ latest study of 1,341 UK seniors, 71% were connected on Facebook, 34% activated Twitter accounts and 9% utilized business social network LinkedIn. Though 22% might not seem like a massive percentage, 68% of those surveyed admitted to have joined only within the past year, showing a humongous new awareness across the board of mature users.

This trend shows promise to continue to expand. In another study from Pew Internet, survey showed that within the time frame of April 2009-May 2010, social networking usage rose to a whopping 88% among the 55-64 year old demographic and 100% among 65 and over. Although young people still hold the majority in numbers, their social networking presence only grew 13%.

What does this mean to you as advertisers? A fair warning. No longer is it effective to be relying on merely traditional forms of media to advertise and target your demographic, especially if it is targeted towards seniors. As the baby boomer generation is closing in on their 50’s and 60’s, this group is not only the type to be saturated in depth with a printed publication but also be digitally entwined with the latest smart phone, blog about their rich experiences in life and take joy in knowing how to scrutinize their children’s Facebook accounts. A healthy and targeted mixture of online and print advertisement proves to be the most effective to not only establish your brand but to also show your consumers that you understand that they are no longer a foreigner in the new digital dimension.

For more advice or to plan out your own multi-platform campaign, please contact sales@seniorlivingmag.com

(Article originally published for Senior Living Magazine’s Business Newsletter on July 5th 2011 –Online Brain Melt Cures)

Technology can seem like a bit of a mind numbing epidemic sweeping the youth. It’s not hard to see how dependant people have become with the Internet and digital devices. All you have to do is look around at a crowded restaurant and count how many people are texting with their phones despite being surrounded by present company. People are increasingly living in both realities, virtual and physical and looking on from the outside, it can seem isolating and confusing.  Facebook, blogs, eBay, Google… and what the heck is Twitter all about? Not only that, even when you go online, it’s like a foreign language filled with 3 character words and limited vowels: LOL, BTW, OMG… WTF?

But it is just that- the online world is a new world. Not only for information, social media, email or egotistical bloggers but it also can be an alternate platform of your physical life that you customize for yourself. More and more seniors have been breaking down the barriers of just seeing the internet as a tool to find local restaurants and have started to explore the possibilities of what it has to offer. Social media has been a clear indicator of this as, according to a study done by MyVoucherCodes, 71% of 1,341 seniors surveyed have active profiles on Facebook, 34% were sharing their thoughts on Twitter and 9% were using business social network site LinkedIn to establish a professional presence.

This is astonishing considering, when asked, 68% said that they had signed up within the past year. As faceless as technology can seem, it also has the ability to give you an independent voice, directly impact your environment, join specialized communities and integrate yourself into the expanding global village.

Here are some interactive ways to take advantage of being online:

1. Start a Blog – It might seem a little self absorbed but a blog is a great way to document your opinions, feelings and passions without the fear of being reprimanded. Anonymous or bravely as yourself, sharing your experiences online can be great for your soul as well as connect you to other like minded individuals. You might feel a bit exposed and venerable at the start but you might be surprised at how liberating it can be.
2. Join the Discussion – When I first discovered discussion boards, I was sceptical. It seemed like a waste of time and also a place where people just wanted to feel smart and give advice, despite knowing what they were talking about in the first place. Then I discovered that there actually ARE great discussion boards out there and within those boards are close communities of people that grow to care about each other, despite never meeting in the physical sense. Most websites also have comment sections on their articles, giving you the ability to respond and have insight on the media that is presented to you. By giving this feedback, you are not only speaking your mind but giving the publication an idea of who is reading their articles, allowing them to be able to bring you more relevant content in the future.  Discussion boards additionally have the ability to allow you to let down otherwise guarded limitations and speak your mind, be yourself. And besides that, where else could you find 1,000 other people that have the same strange fascination with old German novelists.
3. Social Media – Everyone knows to some degree what the major player social media sites are: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Youtube. Whether or not you are actively involved in any of them, understanding the power and social importance of these sites, not only online but offline, is very important to staying in touch with the drastically changing global world. Businesses, publications, organizations, political parties, friends, family – in some part, everything is hooked into these platforms. I’m not advising for someone to be that person at the restaurant tweeting about what type of sandwich they’re eating, but exploring and familiarizing yourself to these medias can prove to be rewarding. Social media allows you to customize your online interface so that you are surrounded by your interests. By liking things on Facebook, following brands and personalities on Twitter and joining groups on LinkedIn, you are connecting yourself to communities of organizations, interests and relevant information that you otherwise would be ignorant to therefore decluttering your internet experience.

So what does this mean? It means that there are no excuses not to take the plunge and explore everything that the internet has to offer. Take a hike up Mount Douglas and blog about it. Connect with friends from 20 years ago and gossip on Facebook on whose gotten fat. Feeling silenced? Go online and debate your stance on whether or not Elvis is dead. Before you write off the online world as a mind numbing brain melt, take the time to understand the possibilities and smell the virtual roses. TTYL.

(Article originally published for Senior Living Magazine’s Reader Newsletter on July 5th 2011 –Online Brain Melt Cures)

On one hand, technical skills are the foundation for efficiency, talent and productivity. We spend our youth accumulating skills, paying high prices on tuition and trade programs and working much into our mid-life, gaining experience while perfecting tasks and processes for minimum pay.

On the other hand, personal skills are what connect us to our social and professional worlds through relationships, both in business and personal environments. We gain professional relationships, consumer loyalty and trust in our brands by how we appeal and approach our audiences.

Stanford Research Institute, Harvard University and the Carnegie Foundation have all spent bundles of money and years to study what exactly impacts a person’s success in life. Their results found that technical skills, despite the profession, were responsible for only 15% a person’s success with getting a job, keeping a job and succeeding at the job; the majority of responsibility falling over to personal skills at 85%.

Not a believer? Think about arriving at a 5 star hotel and getting horrible service. Despite the hotel’s outward beauty and amenities, would you be inclined to go back? If you were eating at an expensive restaurant and your server was unenthusiastic and abrupt, would your experience as a customer be positive? The hospitality industry is based around the importance of great customer service, making most of its business from returning customers and word of mouth.

The numbers are alarming considering the time and effort put into memorizing and exacting our techniques, all the while leaving our outward personality and communications skill sets, for the most part, to our natural abilities. This is not to say that you should quit mastering your trade, but rather to shift the focus on providing your talents through making it a wonderful experience for not only yourself but for your employees, business partners and clients. By going out of your way to ensure that your relationships are as positive and enthusiastic, you are inevitably setting yourself up a perfect environment to gain appreciation and exposure for your technical skills, as well as a fantastic business reputation.

(Article originally published for Senior Living Magazine on May 31st 2011 – Personality vs Technique)

(Image source: http://afroblush.wordpress.com/)

With the international success of social media websites (Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter , etc.), being tapped into these networks can prove to be a goldmine of great exposure, viral  marketing and a great way to build brand trust within your audience target. Because social media marketing is still a fairly new concept, many businesses are confused as to what to use it for- many are reluctant to try to implement it as a marketing tool and many have gone to the other extreme and have abused its power; both running the possibility to be detrimental to your brand and business. The following 5 tips are quick and easy, do-it-yourself ways on how to effortlessly set-up, manage and control your social media.

1. Pull Traffic to your Website and Promotions
   This is an important one and pretty straight forward. The point of your social media should always be to lead people back to your main website. Profiles on your social media platforms will help you build a personality for your brand in the eyes of peers and clients but the goal really should be to drive viewers back to your webpage. This is important because your website is where you can control what information they get, how it is promoted and the overall experience. Promoting specific deals and coupons on these platforms is also a great and cheap way to give people current information and keep them interested in your business. Be careful though- there is a fine line between promoting and spamming.
2. Provide Value
   Even though the first point was about website traffic and your own personal promotions, an overall commercially saturated profile will defer people from visiting and interacting with your page. People like buying, deals and specials but no one likes to feel like they are being pressured. The best way to get your promotions across and keep interest in your profile is to balance out your marketing approaches with other relevant content. Provide related articles, advice, comments and viral media to give your customers value. This ensures that they don’t feel pressured into continuously being sold to and will feel more comfortable to begin to build a stronger, more trusted relationship. Keep your profiles current and updated- people are not going to revisit a page with no new content. Write your own articles or direct your audience to interesting information in order to build yourself a reputation as a leading expert in your industry.
3. Interact with your Audience
   One of social media’s amazing attributes is that it integrates you directly into your user’s social experience, allowing you to interact and communicate on a personal level with them. By having conversations and discussions, you can obtain vital information on your demographic (what marketing campaigns work and which ones don’t, what is important to your target, how to gain their loyalty) and build a strong personal relationship with them while getting great exposure. Don’t be afraid to reach out and directly interact with your audience!
4. Network with Your Peers
   With both small and large businesses, it is important to have great connections within your group of peers and industry. Having a strong social presence online allows you to expand your networks beyond territorial restrictions and make global partnerships. With social media websites such as LinkedIn and Facebook, it is easy to find contacts of other industry professionals and associations that could provide you with both the networks and advice needed in order to advance your business.
5. Be Consistent and Everywhere!
   If you’re going to go the social media way, make sure that you are everywhere on the internet. Create a profile with all the major players (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Youtube, etc.) and know the differences and functionality of each site. You don’t exist if your users can’t find you online. Don’t rely on them to hunt you down or put any effort into finding you.

Providing a social media presence for your business, at first, might seem daunting and confusing, especially if you are unfamiliar with the platforms in the first place. As the internet becomes more and more of an integrated influence in our lives, it is essential to access the possibilities of what social media can do for your business.

(Article originally posted for Senior Living Magazine on May 31st 2011 – Social Media for Dummies)

Online games, blogs, and social networking are just a few examples of how modern communication has been revolutionizing our sense of community and identity. These venues of technology allow us to virtually project our sense of self and also detach ourselves from various physical and emotional realities that society fixes on us, conceiving new and sometimes multitude forms of identity. It is hard to imagine a time without having several representations of ourselves distributed on the digital platform that we interact with daily. Identity is an illusion of security that we rely on in order to classify and stereotype ourselves and others into neat tidy categories in order to make sense of the chaotic nature of reality. As the digital revolution continues to expand and blur the lines between virtual reality and physical reality, the theory of identity and self perception becomes increasingly more difficult to define as the ability to separate key aspects such as physical characteristic traits and environmental influence continues to impact social negotiations on all fronts. A virtual avatar, meaning “a perceptible digital representation whose behaviours reflect those executed, typically in real time, by a specific human being” (Bailenson & Blascovic, 2004), is a prime example of this separation mimicking very much the representation of self but having the ability to be seemingly foreign in nature at the same time. Elizabeth Reid (1994) describes the importance of avatars as, “much more than a few bytes of computer data – they are cyborgs, a manifestation of the self beyond the realms of the physical, existing in a space where identity is self-defined rather than preordained.” Through the use of online avatars as seen in games like World of Warcraft (WOW) and Second Life, how we choose to represent ourselves through digital projection effects how we interact in such environments and even carries over to face-to-face reactions. As we separate further and further into different versions of self, the technology begins to impact every aspect of ourselves despite the illusion of fantasy involved in such avatars and game play. Just like how an individual can have a different type of relationship with a parent, sibling, friend, or lover, we now find ourselves dividing up into further replicates of the self, having the ability through digital virtual reality’s avatar selection to emphasize certain personality traits that inevitably become who we actually are and how we interact online and offline.

Online gaming not only provides a source of entertainment for an individual to plug into for a few hours to escape the stresses of life but has developed into a massive social network in the form of massive multi-player online role-playing games (MMORPG). In these games, the individual assumes the role of a fictional character, usually existing in some sort of a fantasy realm. These games are mostly non-linear – which means that the character is emerged in a world where they can interact with almost anything with no scripted game play structure. The character continues to evolve, developing new skills and higher status among other players through its interaction with others and their effort invested within the world. Many people flock to games such as World of Warcraft to enact a fantasy of heroism or connection that is lacking in their own life, creating an escape and alterior existence that their physical one encapsulates. Avatar selection therefore becomes the utmost importance in how other players view an individual and inevitably how an individual interacts in the game overall.

World of Warcraft, the leading MMORG with a gigantic subscription base of 10 million users worldwide, was the subject of one study in relation to avatar selection. In an experiment based with 40 undergraduate student volunteers, Nick Yee and Jeremy N. Bailenson found that avatar selection was a key determiner for how the gamer interacted within the game (2009). The study tested 2 key attributes, attractiveness and height of the characters. Result found that when the participant was randomly given the taller avatar to control, the user was far more likely to be aggressive and bold in game play, showing increased confidence and achieving higher potential for power compared to the shorter ones. The more attractive the characters, were the more likely they were to approach other users and be inclined to behave in a friendlier way, despite the fact that it is merely a digital character. The choice of online self perception inevitably does play an impact on self perception behaviour online as this study’s results have shown. An user subtly chooses to conform to their online identity through the expected attitudes and behaviours that are originally conceived and absorbed from the avatar’s own identifying characteristics.

As we absorb these characteristics through online gaming, one question is raised on whether or not our online identities stay on the virtual platform or if the impact carries over to our physical reality realm. The average role-playing gamer spends about 20 hours a week online, emerged in a fantasy world, affected by their avatar (as explained before) to react and behave a certain way online (Yee 2004). 20 hours dedicated to one game translates into one eight of an individual’s week, equating almost to the amount spent at a part-time job. Just as our physical reality has the ability to affect our online one, such a dynamic amount of time spent in one application has the ability to affect all aspects of our identity. In another study done by Yee and Bailenson (2009), they attempted to find empirical data of this effect. In this experiment, 40 more undergraduate students were used and immersed in both virtual interacts via avatars and face to face communication with each other. Initially participants were paired into two face-to-face interactions for a designated time span. They, then, were given a randomly chosen avatar and placed into a virtual scenario. Most of the avatar-performed interactions where linked very closely to the representation of the characters. The taller ones once again were more likely to be dominant despite their actual size and the attractive ones more approachable and friendly towards the other participant. When separated from the avatar and brought back into face to face communication, a carry over of this behaviour was recorded as the participant still held onto the characteristics of their digital representation, showing a distinct difference in the previous physical reaction. The research showed that there was a visible lasting effect of the avatars influence as the volunteers became immersed in the roles they had just interacted in. As we see ourselves as harnessing and controlling the digital sphere in a pixelized form, we must recognize and understand that the avatars in return change our behaviour also.

So the important choice of choosing an online avatar becomes a more tedious task. Unlike the previous discussed experiments, most avatar implementation is not random and is carefully developed by the online user. Amy Axelsson (2002) observed that, “avatars in virtual environments were used to denote qualities of their owners… Users create avatars that display overt aspects of themselves which become more stable over time as their participation in the online community continues.” The more time being a certain persona that represents exaggerated characteristics of one self, even if it is merely an online representation, the more developed that characteristic becomes in its user. Depending on the online platform you are consorting with, your avatar psychologically essentially becomes a piece of you, despite possible gender swapping, physical exaggerations and role-playing tendencies (being heroic, aggressive, sociable). Adrian (2008) argues that essentially this can make our self awareness in a post-modern society a bit “schizophrenic” and that because of the consequences of an easily manipulated sense of self online towards offline, we should be more rational in terms of our choices of digital self depiction.

Today’s multifaceted technological environment allows us to be as many different people as we need be to express or escape ourselves. More and more so, the physical reality is becoming less solid in determining who we are, how we view ourselves individually, and how we fit into the hordes of subcultures that categorize us as societies. We believe that turning to lucid environments is something that we can control just as we control who we become on these online social networks and game communities. It is undeniable that the virtual and physical world are blurring together, creating more opportunities for the expansion of personal self. What we as users must recognize though is that there is an ever-increasing lack of division between online and offline persona, as each influences the other in a multitude of interactions of self perception (confidence, socialization, and irritability). Yee and Bailenson describe this phenomenon as “what we learn in one body is shared with other bodies we inhabit, whether virtual or physical” (2009). So as clear as we are our physical selves interacting in a rational based society, we are no longer confined to these dimension as we can manipulate our sense of self through the online influence of avatars.

Works Cited

Adrian, Angel. “No One Knows You Are A Dog: Identity and Reputation in Virtual Worlds.” Computer Law and Security Report 24 (2008): 366-371. Online

Axelsson, Amy. (2002). “The Digital Divide: Status Differences in Virtual Environments.” In R. Schroeder (Ed.) Social life of Avatars: Presence and interaction in Shared Virtual Environments (pp.188-204). New York: Springer.

Bailenson, Jeremy and Blascovich, Jack. (2004). “Avatars.” In W.S Bainbridge (Ed.), Encyclopedia of human- computer interaction (pp. 62-64). Great Barrington, MA: Berkshire. Print

Reid, Elizabeth. (1994) “Text-based Virtual Realities: Identity and the Cyborg Body.” http://www.alualei.com/cult-form.htm. Web.

Yee, Nick and Bailenson, Jeremy. “The Proteus Effect: Implication of Transformed Digital Self- Representation on Online and Offline Behaviour.” Communication Research 36.2 (2009): 285- 312. Print.

After reading an article written by James Rachels, I have come to exist in the continuing and idealistic argument that it is wrong to buy factory farmed meat. Factory-farmed meat meaning pretty much anything you pick up at a supermarket – oh, and don’t forget McDonald’s, Subway, Wendy’s, Burger King, etc. They have they’re own massive conveyor belts specifically harvesting animals so you can chomp into your extra greasy Big Mac. But I don’t think anyone would argue in favor of animal cruelty and therefore I’m not going to pretend that my opinion is something I need to prove. We all know its wrong. To argue anything else is to believe that animals do not have certain primal rights such as the right not to suffer.
Most people would instantly say that “No, I do not believe in cruelty to animals.” And a lot of the time, if they were to see an animal hurt, would try to help or put them out of their ‘suffering’ if help isn’t an option. What is then the difference between this and buying factory farmed meat? Inevitably, by buying into the industry when purchasing meat at a local supermarket, we are supporting, if not inducing, this demand for the market, creating such torture on animals like mutilation, mutation, and suffering. Just because you are not the one clipping off a chicken’s beak or confining a small lamb into a cage, does not mean you are not the one paying money to ensure that this is done. Yet the majority of people do not acknowledge this and continue to have excessive barbecues with cheap meat and eat hormone-injected chickens from KFC (more info) . This leads to an overall sense of hypocrisy. I do not think our convenience or cost should trump over the millions of pigs, cows, chickens, and many other animals that are put into assembly lines every year just so we can have our cheap and fast Big Mac or Chicken McNuggets. And this is where the problem lies. Most of us have some kind of inkling that animals are being manufactured but could it be in the facelessness of the meat that we find a comfortable place to live in ignorance? We don’t have to see the suffering take place or the idea that the meat we are buying was an actual animal once so therefore it does not exist.

We see this in correlation with how we’ve treated humans in the past – races and genders that we, as a majority, have had belief to be of lesser worth . If we go back to Egyptian times or Colonial America, we can see slaves being mistreated and used as work horses or Nazi Germany, where a whole race, the Jews, were tried to be potentially brought to extinction. We see an underlying lack of sympathy for causes that are not directly forced upon us. We’ve adapted our ways ideologically towards people, promoting human and gender rights, believing that we’ve triumphed over inequality to a certain degree and advanced as a civilization, embracing nationality in a sense of multiculturalism. So, just because animals don’t fit into our species or definition of ‘human rights’ than we should use them as tools for mass consumption? This may seem like a radical statement, reaching for dramatic emphasis but nonetheless holds truth in rationality.
An argument supporting this consumption is to lay refuge in nature: we are on the top of the food chain so therefore it is in our mammalian right to harvest a food supply. There is merit in this argument but does not address the moral crisis at hand. When watching the discovery channel, we see a lion hunt the gazelle, kill it, and eat it. We have empathy for the gazelle but realistically realize that it is a natural course of nature and therefore acceptable. Now if we were to see the lion hunt down its prey, contain it, torture it excessively and unnecessarily before killing it, I doubt anyone would be to able to say that this is within the lion’s natural right to do so. Conveyor belts and giant machines deal with the fundamental aspect of being involved in a naturalistic environment.

Keeping all this in mind I must admit that I am a hypocrite. I’m not a vegetarian nor do I think that I would ever really try to become one. Maybe it was growing up in a hunting and farming family but I can arguably say that I have seen animals killed humanly for food, have taken part in the act of slaughter, therefore gaining an overall respect for the sacrifice of the animals I eat. The meat always has a face. And this is where I find trouble avidly agreeing with James Rachel. He declares that if you find any unmoral aspect of factory farmed meats than you should ask yourself why… and then ask yourself why again… and evitably you morally are obliged to be a vegetarian – case and point.  Although I respect the will power of vegans and vegetarians and their dedication to their view, I do not necessarily agree with taking away our primal instinctual choice to eat meat. It is the mindset of meat eaters that must change and a respect for every life, including animal and plant, that needs to be enforced as an individual and capitalistic ideology.  Now in a time where antibacterial soap and 3G telephones rule our lives, we don’t have to get our hands dirty and respect the lives we consume. We’re all too happy to have our food handed to us on a cellophane platter.

Religious fundamentalism is unlike many other political ideologies. Whereas many ideologies such as liberalism, fascism, and socialism focus to control and restrain social problems in relation to government, fundamentalism is a reaction to society for a variety of different reasons hoping to reintroduce traditional values, merging the gap between church and state. This makes it an especially charged and tense ideology as the tendency of conflict between religions or as Samuel Huntington (1996) explains, “clash[es] of civilization” are prone to occur. Throughout history, religious wars have shown the power of fundamentalism and usually are more predominant in cultures that become fragmented in ideological belief leading to the search of societal identity and security. As religion has been a foundation of this in many people’s private lives, the reintroduction of belief into government attempts to abolish doubt and return society to its ‘rightful’ order (Heywood 283). This is not an extinct ideology despite its traditional orientation and bloody past. It is an ideology that has cut across and respawned in an array of cultures and religions, having an appeal of fanaticism ranging to a more docile and peaceful approach. As we look towards the major confl icts in our modern world, as liberalism becomes the norm (an ideology, in a way, void of group consensus and unity, focusing primarily on individuality and freedom), we can see two major fundamentalist groups gaining power - Islamic fundamentalism and Christian fundamentalism. Despite being very similar in many ways, Islamic and Christian fundamentalism represents a rift between Eastern and Western ideals not only through a religious premise but also through social, economic and political structures.

Islamic fundamentalism centers around implementing guidelines on morals outlined in Islam’s sacred texts, the Quran and the Sunnah. As the world’s second most followed religion, Islam’s strong structure is not just ritual ceremony of tradition but has established itself as a way of life for many people. Very much like Christian fundamentalism, Islam and the Quran have been interpreted in many ways, splitting the Islamic state into separate fundamentalist groups. Three main divisions are recognized to be Wahhabism, Shia Islam and liberal Islam. Wahhabism was initially the Saudi Arabian political state dating back to the eighteenth century that implemented the banning of modern technologies (pictures, music, videos) in order to restore culture and society back into a pure state. Wahhabism’s doctrine was the cornerstone for a fundamentalist group called the Muslim Brotherhood, an organization the spawned Islamic philosophers such as Sayyid Qutb. After spending time in the states and being repulsed by the overtly saturated liberal state of materialism and sexual promiscuity, Qutb developed an anti-western standpoint that “highlighted the barbarism and corruption that westernization had inflicted on the world, with a return to strict Islamic practice in all aspects of life offering only possibility of salvation (Heywood 298). This philosophy has been the reference of thinking that many later and modern Islamic fundamentalist groups such as the ‘jihadi’ conform to.

The ‘jihad’, meaning an internal or external struggle of one’s body or soul, involved in such groups shows a strong militant aspect of this fundamentalist thought process. Groups such as al-Qaeda, the Taliban, and Hamas use the devotion of Islam to spread across their distaste for Western views of Capitalism and ideals. The prolifi c World Trade Center attacks, on September 11, 2001, brought this crusade to the limelight as the world was forced to recognize the fanatical war of religions that was being waged now in the fore front and no longer behind closed doors. Paul Berman’s comparison of totalitarian movements and fascism towards these forms of political and militant Islamic groups shows the significance of recognizing Islamic fundamentalism as not just a political ideology but a passionate political movement gaining power out the East in reference to Anti-Westernism (2003). Political Islamists (secular nationalists) and traditional Islamists have not always agreed on policy but do share certain key factors that contribute to its view of fault in Western views. In his article “Joseph and Pharaoh: Religious Fundamentalists and Secular Modernists in Contemporary Islam and their Hostility towards Western Liberalism”, Stephen A. Harmon explains this, “Yet despite the mutual hostility of Islamists and secular nationalists towards one another, the two factions agree on one thing: they both hate and fear classical western liberalism, though for different reasons”. The Islamist reason for the dislike of classical liberalism is its individual based mentality supporting the separation of church and state. The secular nationalists hate classical liberalism because of the decreased precedence of government’s role and the free choice of political affiliation (Harmon 2010). As society becomes more unstable in the Eastern societies, radical fundamentalism can be seen to be on the rise as people try to find stability through religion.

Christian fundamentalism, as stated before, is not unlike Islamic fundamentalism. Christianity, as the world’s largest religion, is deeply entwined with Western culture, dating back to the Roman Empire and spreading through conquests throughout Europe and eventually to the Americas (Heywood 2007). As Islamic nations held onto the words of the Quran, Christianity’s sacred text lies in the Bible, encompassing it’s own structural guidelines of morality and establishing itself also as a way of life for its followers. A key aspect in understanding this ideology is the evangelical Christian’s belief in the second coming of Christ. The Rapture, where Christians would be embraced by Christ and granted eternal bliss, shows the belief’s emphasis on following the doctrine to reach this salvation and those who do not are left behind and condemned to peril in hell. Because there is no temple in Jerusalem, the place where he is supposed to reappear, alliances of Christian fundamentalists and Jewish followers were made and support for Israel by Western societies was made essential. This can be seen in both the democratic and republican parties in the United States as pro-Israel strategies have been used to win elections and popularity.

Interpretations of the Bible also caused divisions within the religion resulting in three main sub-groups: Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant. The emerging liberal and stable state of the Western world has resulted in the privatization of religion therefore inspiring secularism to be an attempted mainstream system of political process. In terms of fundamentalism, the ‘New Christian Right’, a collaboration of Christian groups that focus on integrating Christian ideals and religious culture back into society, was formed in reaction to this ever-changing, constantly evolving liberal society which threatened these traditional ideals. These Christian ideals focused on social issues can be seen in the United States political sphere through legislative controversies surrounding topics such as same sex marriages, stem cell research, and especially abortion, all which are strongly denounced by the Bible. President Ronald Reagan’s famous speech said, “I have always believed that this anointed land was set apart in an uncommon way, that a divine plan placed this great continent here between two oceans to be found by people from every corner of the heart who have a special love of faith and freedom” (Lewis 2002). This showed the mixture of secular idealism and religious theology incorporated within his administration. Switching now towards modern times via the Bush administration, it is very easy to see the religious triumpalism and moralism that was referenced in certain actions like declaring the ‘war on terror,’ (militarization towards the Middle East) as a triumph over evil.

Islamic and Christian fundamentalist groups can be seen to encompass many of the same key factors in establishing themselves as an ideology. Although on separate spectrums of the world (East and West) and both symbolically pitted against each other, they’re foundation of reasoning and even passionate following can be seen as a mirror reflection of each other. One major aspect is the preference of militancy. Heywood addresses this by stating, “Fundamentalists are usually happy to see themselves as militants, in the sense that militancy implies passionate and robust commitment” (2007). Although both sacred scriptures promote a sense of peace, the Quran talks about the equality of man and the Bible preaches about the virtue of loving your neighbour, and despite the fact that for the most part the two fundamentalist groups uphold peace and compassion for all, both groups can have a tendency contain extremist groups that will result to violence in order to press their beliefs on another cultural group. Famously we can see this in Islamic fundamentalism through the use of suicide bombs and through Christian fundamentalist groups in use of bombings of abortion clinics. Both fanatical sides say that the violence is justifi ed “as they are intended to eradicate evil [and] they fulfi l the will of God” (Heywood 2007).

Another major comparison between Islam and Christianity is that by introducing a fundamentalist approach to society, it enables a sense of nationalism to unite the public through times of insecurity and unrest. Heywood describes this strategy of induced collectivity by dictating that the reasoning is is that “if ‘we’ are a chosen people acting accordingly to the will of God, ‘they’ are not merely people with whom we disagree, but a body actively subverting God’s purpose on Earth, representing nothing less than the ‘forces of darkness’” (2007). By creating an opposing side for the public to defend themselves against, it unites the masses as they fight collectively against one great evil. Both fundamentalist groups believes that they are under attack from some threat and therefore through the return to the merge of the state and church, a strengthened and controlled society is able to withstand such a danger.

Antimodernism is also a common theme among most religious ideologies. The desire to return to a pure and family oriented society is very evident in Islamic and Christian fundamentalism. Both sides have a range of adherence to the resistance against modernism. For example, certain orthodox groups such as the Amish in the states and Wahhibism in Saudi Arabia, reject all modern technologies whereas some groups use modern technology as a tool for mass media to spread their beliefs and word of God. The incorporation of modernity is not always seen as an evil to religious fundamentalist groups but as a “reconstitut[ion of] religion within the limits of modernity, even as it copes with modernity within the limits of religion” (Parekh 1994).

Throughout the ages, religion has played a fundamental role in the shaping, reinventing, and influencing the world. It is hard not to see the impacts of religious undertones in every social environment despite its claims to be liberal, socialist, or conservative. As we look towards the East, we can see the strict governance over education, women’s rights, and obedience. As we sit here in the West, we can see the religious controversies over the limitations of personal liberty and freedom as birth control and assisted suicide issues are constantly on the forefront of political and public arenas. Islamic and Christian fundamentalism, both being very authoritative ideologies, have been around for hundreds of years, constantly adapting to modern situations while still upholding the need for the immediate return to traditional values in an otherwise chaotic and heretical society.

Works Cited

Berman, P. (2003) Terror and Liberalism. New York: W. W. Norton.

Harmon, S. A. “Joseph and Pharaoh: Religious Fundamentalists and Secular Modernists in Contemporary Islam and their Hostility towards Western Liberalism.” Midwest Quarterly 49.2 (2008): 179-199. Web. 28 May 2010.

Heywood, A. (2007) Political Ideologies: An Introduction.

Lewis, B. (2002) What Went Wrong? Western Impact and the Middle Eastern Response. Oxford: University Press

Parekh, B. (1994) “The Concept of Fundamentalism”, in A. Shtromas (ed.), The End of ‘isms’? Refl ections on the Fate of Ideological Politics after Communism’s Collaspe. Oxford and Cambridge, MA: Blackwell.

Piracy is a word that instantly is meant to catapult us into fear, warning us to steer clear of file-sharing and labelling offenders passive aggressively as thieves. Piracy, essentially the derivative of the word ‘pirates’, is as Oxford Dictionary spells out for us “the practice of attacking and robbing ships at sea” and the alternative being “the use or reproduction of another’s work without permission” (p. 671). So why go so far as to compare attacking and robbing with the reproduction of creative work? Control – a struggle of control between an artistic freedom of shared knowledge and a capitalist barricade of intellectual property rights and copyright infringement laws. To take this concept a little further, a look into ‘sampling’ and ‘mashing’ (building upon and recreating stolen creative work) raises many controversial questions about ownership and creative freedom, forcing many people to draw a line and pick a side.

On one side of this line, we have copyright officials and enforcers. These are the people, such as the looming giants of the music industry, that will protect their investments and capital, fighting to all extents of the law. These are also the people that refuse to allow adaptations or share their work, shielding it from the world just for the sake of ownership or lack of cash flow incentive. On this side, money is a momentous factor in the argument’s inflexibility and is the cornerstone of most of their power. Swinging to the other side, we find copy-fighters – organizations of the belief that information belongs to the masses for the betterment and advancement of the creative culture. The philosophy is simple: build upon the past and create the future. Knowledge should be shared, not stolen. Artists such as Girl Talk and Madlib, known and famous for sampling others’ music to create something new and unique, are on the forefront of this media battle. Depending on what side you fall on, they can be either thieves needed to be dealt with or martyrs for an evolving creative revolution.

The act of sampling music is not a new concept despite common belief. It can be seen almost everywhere, in every genre, in every era. Influential blockbuster artists such as the Beastie Boys, Public Enemy and Madonna are all guilty of transforming someone’s previous concoction and creating hits that have become internationally known. It is hard to imagine the masses calling the Rolling Stones a bunch of musical hacks just because they launched their career reinventing old Chicago Blues numbers by Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry. And furthermore, it is a well known fact that Hip hop has been stealing other musicians’ tracks for years, building a multi-billion dollar industry with such culturally significant hits as The Sugarhill Gang’s ‘Rapper’s Delight’ (a Chic Sample) and Eric B. and Rakim’s ‘I know you got soul’ (a James Brown sample). All of these artists are what we, as a pop culture centralized society, call trendsetters, idols, and entrepreneurs at the same time as we penalize and suppress those who cannot afford the hefty licenses initiating the ability to mold these creations. Heller and Eisenberg (1998) allude that “[t]he need to pay for patented and copy-righted ideas and products, thereby limiting their availability and use in one’s creative engagements, may be a restriction and deterrent to further creative works and novelty” (p. 699). The hypocrisy lies in the record company folk continuing to prohibit the common use of intellectual property, while the same offence by their own artists is paying their salaries and mortgages for their million dollar mansions. The common folk are left with giant restrictions on how and what to create. Hettinger (1997) argues, “[h]ow wasteful private ownership of intellectual property is, depends on how beneficial those products would be to those who are excluded from their use as a result” (p. 33). The benefits of sampling or stealing something that falls into the category of intellectual property many times outweighs the negative effects of infringements of that copyright.

What about Joe Blow, the average graphic designer and not the rich executive, that just doesn’t want his work stolen? The issue in question is not plagiarism but referencing the work in the same process that the original was brought into existence. Everything, even complete original works of art, builds upon concepts, ideas, images, and metaphors that were born long before its creation, establishing a theory that no idea or creation is pure in said originality. Another easy argument for someone to make is that if there is no property protection than why create at all? But this fallacy can be disproved by looking at Confucian China, a society that invented such groundbreaking developments such as the compass, gun powder, printing and paper (Yung, 2008, p. 48). This society lived in a ‘creative commons’ arrangement that had no restrictions on the expansion of others’ ideas. Betty Yung (2008) explains that “[i]t may be even argued that with new ideas being shared as ‘cultural commons’, rather being treated as private properties, with any use of them involving payment to or permission from the owner, it would be likely to encourage free flow and exchange of ideas and may even lead to future innovations as inventions very often rest on previous works” (p. 47). The point being that by setting such high restrictions on copyrights, we are inevitably preventing revolutionary ideas and art forms.

So as stated before, sampling through piracy is not a new construct. It is something that has existed for decades and has undoubtably shaped our present world today. How could civilization have advanced without the criticism, reproduction and evolution involved in the process of sampling others’ ideas and how have the newly developed strict set of regulations involved with intellectual property rights dwindled our advancement now? In a society of digital mass media, being a virtual pirate has become more and more prevalent as the information flow has become virtually unstoppable making this battle of rights brought into the limelight.

APA Works Cited

Heller, M. A. & Eisenberg, R. S. (1998). Can Patents Deter Innovation? The Anticommons in Biomedical Research. Science, 280, 699.

Hettinger, E. C. (1997). Justifying Intellectual Property. In A. D. Moore (Ed.)., Intellectual Property: Moral, Legal and Intellectual Dilemmas (p. 33). Maryland: Rowan & Littlefield.

Piracy. (2001). In C. Soanes (Ed.), The Oxford Paperback: Dictionary, Thesaurus, and Wordpower Guide (p. 671). New York: Oxford University Press Inc.

Yung, B. (2008). Reflecting on the Common Discourse on Piracy and Intellectual Property Rights: A Divergent Perspective. Journal of Business Ethics, 87, 47-48

This draws me to the ‘Unabomber’. I had heard this word mentioned over the years but until I read a chapter focused on this in Slack and Wise’s Culture and Technology, I never gave much thought to the chaos of absolute freedom of speech and communication through technology. The chapter focuses on Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber and member of FC (Freedom club), and his anti-industrial revolution manifesto. Kaczynski’s famous manifesto believed that essentially the industrial revolution and all of it’s capitalistic qualities would inevitably be disastrous for society and that a revolt against technology was needed. In 1985, for Kaczynski, this revolt came in the form of mail-sent bombs to various experts in fields of strong technological backgrounds. Years later, when the taste of his reign of terror was dulled, he contacted newspapers and media outlets, demanding to be published, to be heard, and he would stop the death toll. Now Kaczynski could’ve easily been that crazy and psychotic guy that everyone labelled him to be (and most likely was), but the bombs and innocent deaths have catapulted a spotlight onto his otherwise ignored manifesto, which is now still being taught in universities and known worldwide. The deaths of innocent people was a price Kaczynski was willing pay in order to be listened to – and that he was. Essentially we can see this same fanatical method in religious fundamentalists (suicide bombers and terrorists) in today’s society. As CNN’s terror alert goes red, in our fear, we are all too eager to listen.

Should we go around killing people so everyone will listen to whatever burns and ignites our passions? No, that’s not at all what I’m saying. Is technology a time bomb ready to countdown the destruction of modern social structure? No. But a strong and unsettling question comes into my mind as I sift through my facebook news feed, dismissing and barely paying attention to how Dan’s day was or how much Jenny hates ice cream. As technology is already wrapping us up in its barrelling ambition forward, it is giving us all the freedoms we so aptly accept to uncensor ourselves to the world inexplicably. Through all the positive aspects of advancement and connectivity that these tools have given us, the balance of instant communication and expression may lead to an overall isolation in itself. Meanwhile updating my facebook status, the only question I undeniably ask myself is, “is anyone even listening?”

Works Cited

Slack, Jennifer Daryl and J. Macgregor Wise. Culture + Technology: a Primer. New York: Peter Lang, 2007. Print.

We were all raised in a specific culture or traditional format. We have all grown up hearing folklore stories, stories of nationalism, and stories that are deeply engrained with how our own cultural boundaries have been formed. Years ago, we were dependant on our own societies to feed our knowledge and curiously of what’s going on in the rest of the world by means of it’s own biased, nationalistic, and conforming agenda. Due to lack of sources for individuals to balance and find their own truth, stronger values of culture and behavioural norms were imprinted in generational upbringing. Now with the bombardment and freedom of media and its chameleon-like existence, we are now faced with a new dilemma – a challenge of discovering and inventing individual filtration systems. When something happens of historical magnitude in today’s world, not only are people faced with viewpoints from opposing forces (each encapsulating their own bias) but there is also a multitude of sources available from every standpoint forcing people to educate themselves, determine their own conclusions, and question culture and society in general – opening the door wide open for the possibility of misunderstanding, misinterpretation, reactionary stubbornness and overall confusion. Now as we reflect to the times void of massive enterprises of communication readily available to us, we must ask ourselves how this new evolution of a globalization will shape and form the way we understand government, foreign nations and culture. Will the result of the past ten years of the information and communication technological explosion diminish our traditional values and cultural viewpoints in order to expand to new horizons and unite us globally or will it essentially form more specialized subgroups of opinion, creating a larger gap between harmony in the global village?