danah boydSep 26, 2023
"The Screens are the Symptom" is a re-review of Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451" in light of contemporary ideas of book banning, screens, children, and broader epistemic battles. http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2023/09/26/the-screens-are-the-symptom.html
The Screens are the Symptom. | danah boyd | apophenia

Show threadCory Doctorow
@zephoria To his dying day, Bradbury insisted that F451 wasn't an anti-censorship novel, but rather an anti-TV novel.
Sep 26, 2023 at 11:22pmWeb
Show threadKevin Boyd (he/him) 🇨🇦Sep 26, 2023
@pluralistic @zephoria Well, he certainly captured the cacophony of the modern youtube vlogger experience.
Show threaddanah boydSep 26, 2023
@pluralistic ::laugh:: and yet he positioned them as the medium presented in response to censorship that also kept the people distracted from the war that was about to destroy them while those who survived wanted books to thrive.
Show threadCory DoctorowSep 26, 2023

@zephoria I always treated this as proof that writers - including me - have no idea what we're doing, something I tell high-school kids who have the clever idea of answering their teacher's assigned question, "What did Doctorow intend in this passage" by emailing me and asking for my answer.

"Don't ask me - I'm not nearly as smart as Bradbury was, and he was an idiot on this stuff. What hope do I have?"

Show threaddanah boydSep 26, 2023
@pluralistic This is also a good reminder that what authors intend is not always how their books are interpreted. ::wink::
Show threadCory DoctorowSep 26, 2023
@zephoria Yup yup
Show threadAntifafi 🖤 🍉🌻✊🏿🔻🌈🌍Dec 28, 2023

@pluralistic @zephoria

Thank you so much for your excellent reflections. This made me reread and re-appreciate the book myself.

Since you were intrigued by the screens and the role of children in F451 -> do make sure to get a copy of Bradbury's collection The Illustrated Man and read the story The Veldt. Here's a quote: 'Would I have to tie my own shoes instead of letting the shoe tier do it? [...] I don't want to do anything but look and listen and smell; what else is there to do?'