Ted Talks, a media organization created in 1984 by Richard Wurman, is a platform for scientists, sociologists and other professionals to share their ideas and discoveries in the fields of technology, education and design. Since its original inception, Ted Talks has grown into a phenomenon shared around the world. In over 100 languages, Ted Talks now covers material from health to entertainment and science to psychology, and today, anyone can create their own Ted Talks.
Some of the topics covered in Ted Talks include My Stroke of Insight, The Skill of Self-Confidence, Your Body Language May Shape Who You Are, Why Some of Us Don't Have One True Calling and Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. Today, there appears to be a greater need than ever to understand ourselves and unpuzzle our environment. The talks are meant to educate, inspire and encourage the average yokum, delineate his angst and damp it down in a pre-apocalyptic world of greed and suffering, an emergency kit of psychological memes designed to assist Joe the Plumber make sense of it all. And according to journalist Martin Robbins, 'every talk is awesome and inspirational and ideas aren't supposed to be challenged.'
The set design for each discussion is identical: a stage with one chair, a table, a projector screen and a computer for the power point presentation. One speaker, Shame Researcher Brene Brown, took the stage to discuss Vulnerability in the Workplace. After listing her degrees, qualifying her insights, she cited her lengthy data sheets on vulnerability, collected over four years. In a nutshell, it turns out that successful people 'aren't afraid to say I love you first,' whether accepted or not. Earth-moving science. The results of her study brought Brene to an emotional breakdown, closing her books and seeking out a therapist when she was confronted with the reality of what it was going to take to live a wholehearted life and make sense of the collective determinations on vulnerability as observed through the lives of her successful 'vulnerable' candidates. The disconnect with this Ted Talk was that while relating this story, peals of laughter were coming from the audience.
Brown's conclusions on vulnerability and success are a knitted collection of reformulated ideas from the last four decades, simplistic formulas for gaining success, status and popularity, the Chicken Soup for the Soul philosophy that today passes for serious discussion.
Most Ted Talks don't delve too deeply into subjects such as poverty and homelessness and the corporate reasons for social disassociation and anomie. These discussions, as seen through the titles above, are fluffy pep talks aimed to cheer us, to define our depression and to subliminally guide us in accepting our rote, under-paid jobs. We must look within, fix ourselves, we're the problem, don't look too far to where the real problems may lie.
Ted Talks fills a void. Not many people understand the affects on their life in a world given over to little critical thought and no meaningful introspection. We are overworked, tired and crippled with debt, with little free time to review, let alone think, about critical issues. Television gives us false hope to feed into our wants and needs, and false and unimportant news to clarify the global muddle for the ignorant, along with a bottomless pit of triviality in the form of reality shows and sports to keep us occupied. There is scant analysis of important topics and those who do ask intelligent questions are marginalized or labelled a 'conspiracy theorist.' What are we to be as elected leaders and corporate raiders pillage and destroy the planet? Individuals whose only thoughts are of themselves and the bottom line - profits.
Here's a new study on vulnerability - the man who is laid off and has a wife and three kids to feed and educate and no further source of income. Or the single mother working three part-time minimum wage jobs in order to put herself through school. Or the mother who has lost three children to a drug epidemic and no money to pay for the burials. Brene: How about a less trivial study on vulnerability?
No comments:
Post a Comment