infonet

I had seen a few references in circulation but couldn’t quite manage to replay the film in head until reading this excellent but cringe-inducing analysis from Frank Swain.
The essay underscores how life imitates art, and rather than living in that under-privileged but blissful unawares computer simulation, we are in fact relegated to a rather bleak vision of 2017 from three decades hence—The Running Man. Complete with the billing of actors turn politicians in Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jesse Venture and a game-show host more powerful than the president (now even more ironic considering that Schwarzenegger has been appointed Trump’s under-study as reality television-show master of ceremonies), the film is an uncanny reflection of our gladiatorial appetites. Even the technological state of affairs with the infonet and the infonet of things held up pretty well.  What do you think? Perhaps we’ve not crossed the threshold to blood-lust and public execution of society’s maladroits but virtual sticks and stones and teapot tempests are certainly not that far behind and are effective ways to placate and manipulate the home-audience.