LIE TO ME: Dissimulation Between "Friends" and Those Pesky Memes

Upon reading an excerpt from Nietzsche's "On Truth and Lying in the Non-Moral Sense", one thing is clear; civilization and organized species in general, were doing just fine without their homo sapien counterparts. The discipline of acting on one's instincts alone panned out satisfactory for for the previous thousands, if not millions, of years. These primal societies ate, slept, had sex and got into the occasional fight about one or a combination of the two or three, not unlike the dramas of the 21st century, (sans the waterworks or time to reflect). When humanity came to be, the notion of having to "think before you speak..." became prevalent as did the invention of the lie and the search for the truth.

According to our truth from textbooks, man is superior to other mammals because reason, the ability to think logically, lies within him and no one else. He has the propensity to ponder existentially while his fellow living beings can only just be. However, while man's thoughts continue to branch off one another and could eventually plague him, beings of the lower portion of the totem pole can rest easier, content, as some might say, in their own ignorance. After all, with knowledge comes a necessity to know even more and for some, a way to conceal it or keep it for themselves. Therein lies the lie.

In reference to the Internet, man is superior to other men. He can create an identity, or a profile, and become whomever he wants to be. He can have hundreds of unseen "friends" who reveal all kinds of truths to him without the obligation to do the same. As a consumer of these truths he can also monopolize these identities and take from them what he wants, (ex. identity theft, credit card schemes, etc.). Man is a big fat liar and often profits from it. This dissimulation between "friends" is not a given evil however, creative alter-egos are also attainable here on the Web, where fun becomes virtual.

Fun is yet another term that can be dissected into a billion different brackets and a plethora of perspectives. While some prefer the latest picture show, others may enjoy a quiet evening at home. With all the advances in the electronic/communications department beckoning to anyone who will listen, it is only predictable that memes came to be the Web's biggest star. Again, following in the role of the anonymous Web poster, memes are bit cultural phenomena that are often passed from one end of the world to the other, that were first introduced, by definition anyway, in Richard Dawkins's The Selfish Gene. These memes can come in many forms, such as "LOLCats", "lonelygirl15" and the more recent, "Kanye West Interrupting Meme". Although many may not understand the appeal of memes, no one can question their relevance to our pop culture.