Don’t Indulge Too Hard in Cyber Monday And Celebrate Cyborg Monday Instead
Do what you want with your own life. It’s your life. But I was just thinking that maybe Cyber Monday is kind of stupid. This the point in the post where I need to acknowledge my privilege. I am lucky and I feel that most of my material needs in satiated.
Maybe I feel like I am constantly being marketed to and pressured to spend money on material goods that I probably don’t need.
Maybe you feel this way too.
That being said there are some good deals on Cyber Monday and some of the deals don’t involve material items. Also maybe there are some things that you actually need for your life. I need new cookie sheets, me thinks, if the criteria for needing new cookie sheet pans are that yours are basically black and covered in a weird tar, which mine are. Also I might have my eyes open to see if any of the running races that I am interested in are having any Cyber Monday Sales.
Still. . . I am worried about a robotic uprising.
This past holiday weekend one of my sisters told me that scientists predict that the Singularity will happen in the next ten years. I didn’t know what the Singularity was either, so if you knew, you have one up on me. The Singularity is apparently when Artificial Intelligence becomes sentient and is no longer under human control. You can read this article about the Singularity in the New York Times here.
For some reason, I believe that by bucking the trend of indulging in Cyber Monday, I might somehow ward off a robot takeover. I am not sure if my logic makes 100 percent sense but is seems to me that if don’t over indulge in consumerism, perhaps my actions might starve off robot labor or a robot takeover. In this fashion, I might keep Big Amazon from having all the sales. This statement is problematic for me as well, because I am pro-Amazon when it comes to Kindle books. In my defense though, I am teaching myself to read actual, physical books again along with my Kindle books.
Truthfully, I don’t know that avoiding Amazon and its ilk today will stop robots from becoming sentient. The science fiction books that I read on the subject, mostly Emily St. John Mandel and Margaret Atwood, led me to believe that the one thing that will lead the world away from the path that we are on is a huge pandemic. This is idea is scary too. The theme of these books seems to be is that after a big pandemic people learn how to live and work together again and in some ways they are happier once things are simpler. However, the path to happier is scary and dangerous.
Maybe a better path is to just curb our consumerism a little so we can slow the ascension of our robot overlords.
In any case, it might be easier said than done because sometimes the temptation to spend money on Cyber Monday is too great to overcome.
Here’s an idea though. . .If you feel the urge to spend money today online, use some of your favorite robot or Cyborg (part human/ part robot) pop culture as a sort of nicotine patch to distract yourself from the temptation to spend.
Before we start I should tell you that I have never watched: The Terminator, The Terminator 2, i-Robot, Pacific Rim, and Westworld and thus they won’t appear on the list
Five of my favorite Robot themed Pop Culture Things for Cyber Cyborg Monday:
- One of my favorite episodes of the adult cartoon American Dad is “May The Best Stan Win”. In this episode a future version of Stan is turned into a Cyborg and comes back to present day to try and woo Francine out from under present timeline Stan’s nose. It has some great quotes and jokes. One of my favorites involves a reference to Hershey Park.
- One of my favorite Pixar movies is Wall-E. It is the story of the last lonely robot on earth who is assigned the task of cleaning up the planet one piece of garbage at a time. It is moving and maybe even a little forgotten, but it is a gem. You won’t regret watching it.
- Singer/ Songwriter Jonathan Coulton is one of my idols because he makes such unique songs and he marches to the beat of his own drummer. I respect his success despite not being signed to any record label. One of my favorite Jonathan Coulton songs is about a robotic uprising where his main character becomes a Cyborg and apologizes to the girl he had a crush on as middle school student when she loses an eye in said uprising. The song is called Future Soon and you can listen to it by clicking on the Youtube video below this list.
- Speaking of geeky humorous songs, I also enjoy another song about a robot uprising. It is by the band/ comedy duo Flight of the Concords. It is called “Robots”. In the future, “the world is quite different since the robotic uprising. . . “There is only one kind of dance, The Robot.” Anyway, “Robots” is silly fun.
- Speaking of bands that are also comedy duos, I also enjoy the profane song “City Hall” by the group Tenacious D. I am not sure that is has that much to do with a robot uprising but it has a stanza about Rock’em Sock’em Robots. Just a note, if you are an older relative of mine, perhaps this isn’t the song for you to listen to.
I also like Iron Man and Darth Vader too and in a sense they are both Cyborgs.
What robot themed pop culture do you enjoy?
Are you planning on doing any online shopping today?
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