Runester

I was pretty shocked at the news revealed on the latest Kicked in the Dice Bags. Part of me knows that break-ups, infidelities, and heart-breaks happen. But I always want to assume the best, because each time a relationship ends like that … it feels like “another one gone.” Something valuable, rare, and precious was lost.

Also, parts of the story hit close to home, with certain similarities between Jonathan’s story and a close friend or two.

Apart from the actual topic of the episode in question, is the side topic of privacy in the new age of mass publication. Jonathan and Chris chose to share something that is usually considered private. What they did is not new, nearly every memoir dishes dirt on affairs, drug use, infidelity and other ’sordid’ events. The tabloids make their profits by exposing these details in the lives of others. So, why shouldn’t modern publishers – bloggers, tweeters, podcasters – do likewise and share everything (or near enough)? Besides, hasn’t most of the shame already been rubbed off? Is there really much embarrassment left when a couple has a child out of wedlock, or a man admits to a long standing affair, or when in-the-bedroom matters are discussed and shared? The answer is no. For better or worse, we live in an age in which privacy is shrinking, at least among a certain age/class and this loss of privacy has nothing to do with Big Brother putting a camera in every TV and everything to do our innate desire for attention and voyeurism facilitated by a technology that lets us publish anything … even our dirty laundry.

On the other hand … how many secrets should have been told? How much unhappiness is the result of keeping a secret; of not admitting that we are unhappy with a relationship, or that someone has suffered abuse, or that a close friend/family member has an addiction problem? In other words, if there is any silver lining to this trend (which I’m not convinced there is) then I’d look for it there – the shedding light on those secrets that corrupt and corrode by being kept.

But, still. Modesty evolved along side human civilization for a reason. Maybe it’s archaic and withering as no longer necessary. Maybe it allows the social lubrication, the ‘illusion of goodness’ that let’s us form peaceful social groups and accomplish great tasks. Maybe, without this illusion we won’t be better off, but so jaded by ourselves and our fellow’s that we’ll turn away from congress with them in disgust.

Wouldn’t that be ironic? If the bitterest poison was not lies or propaganda or secrets but the raw truth?