Gullibility is a rum thing isn’t it? It has parallels with the suspension of disbelief we are so familiar with when we enjoy various types of fiction. Suspended disbelief which should have been turned on again but never was. As if suspended disbelief seeps out of fictional domains into real life and jams on the gullibility switch forever.
Yet we are familiar with the need to suspend disbelief while enjoying fiction in novels, theatre, movies or television. We understand what it is. We know Oliver Twist didn’t exist, Jeeves was too brainy to be real, Superman violates the laws of physics and we don’t learn history via Hollywood. Or anything else useful really.
Knowing all this while suspending that knowledge is what we do. We are accustomed to our roles as readers of fiction, or members of a TV or movie audience. TV and movie audiences are is the big ones of course, the ones which exploded from nothing over the past century.
Modern movies are also pushing the boundaries of reality as they have never been pushed before. As indeed they are pushing their audiences as they have never been pushed before. Maybe it is possible for the suspension of disbelief to become too big a part of daily life. Perhaps a seat in the audience has become too easy and familiar. Too much mental popcorn clogs the critical faculties.
We are certainly asked to absorb large quantities of some bizarrely impossible fiction via movies and TV. Much of it relies on what we may as well describe as magic. The powers of Superman are essentially magical. He violates physical laws with impunity and relies on magic to do it. As does Dr Who. As do the Teletubbies. It begins early.
Taking this a little further, maybe suspension of disbelief and the role of audience member have become core parts of our roles in life. More so for some than others, but clapping the NHS was both a suspension of disbelief and a seat in the audience of a medical drama. Clappers clearly accepted their role as an audience.
The idea sits well with celebrity culture and its almost universal invitation to suspend disbelief when it comes to fashionable causes. Yet huge numbers of people are not taken in by it and are not particularly gullible. Unfortunately huge numbers of people do wish to be part of the audience, are determined to be part of it. As for the real world, that's outside where it belongs.
2 comments:
Yes, I wonder whether it is supply or demand. The media have given the public a huge number of opportunities for some very seductive fantasising, and this could have influenced the way we see things. The supply of information has been corrupted (starting, I guess, with the rise of novels for the middle classes in the 1800s) and now we tend to believe any old rubbish, unable to tell fantasy from reality.
Or it might be that there is a primeval requirement for blanking out reality and believing what isn't true, hard-wired into the species. At first this was met by religion and various drugs, but we have required stronger fixes. Or, what amounts to the same thing, there are just too many alternatives available. We all used to be conned in the same manner, but now we are all conned by different narratives.
Sam - it may be the effect of simple stories passing among us more easily than the complexities and nuances of real life. We probably are wired to accept simple stories because they require minimal cerebral energy. Unless real life forces us to make more effort that's what we do.
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