Cyber-Utopia

A summary of:
Wertheim, M. (1999). The Pearly Gates of Cyberspace: A History of Space from Dante to the Internet. Virago Press: London.
Chapter 8 - Cyber-Utopia

The main idea critiqued in this chapter is the belief that cyberspace leads to the development of "idealized communities that transcend the tyrannies of distance and that are free from the biases of gender, race, and color" (281). Famous proponent of cyber communities, Howard Rheingold writes that "Perhaps cyberspace is one of the informal places where people can rebuild the aspects of community that were lost when the malt shop became the mall" (282).

I think the problem in realizing this vision lies in the fact established in the previous chapter, that cyberspace is fundamentally amoral - which is not to say immoral, but moral-less. The examples presented in this chapter show how cyberspace in fact liberates us from the norms of social behavior we are accustomed to in the real world. Yes, there are creeps in the real world too, but creepiness is allowed to expand in cyberspace, precisely because this space demands nothing of us in terms of moral behavior. It has only one commandment: "Thou shalt not limit another's free speech."

This space generates a weird mentality, or indeed purpose. The goal is to get, to colonize. Instead of creating a world where "men of all nations will walk in harmony" (294), we seem to be climbing on one another to avoid drowning in the oblivion. "On the contrary, commentator Ziauddin Sardar suggests that what we are seeing is not so much a space for vibrant pluralism but a new form of Western imperialism" (294). As Wertheim shows, it is also an affirmation of the patriarchy; women are not entirely welcome in this space. And futher, "With the world constantly being formed anew at the digital frontier, traditional ways of thinking and being are all too easily reduced to quaint curiosities: 'Other people and their cultures become so many 'models', so many zeros and ones in cyberspace.' It is a process that Sardar decries as 'the museumization of the world'" (295). What are the effects of this museumization? It serves to affirm and enshrine the thinking that produced the Internet in the first place, which is another way in which we are heading toward Lanier's "lock in."

I do like this idea from high-technology entrepreneur Esther Dyson: "Because there will be so much information, so much multimedia, so many options [online] people will learn to value human connection more, and they will look for it on the Net" (283). But I think that cruelly, while we may crave human connection more as it becomes more and more difficult to make connections in the real world and people feel increasingly isolated, forging relationships on the Internet only reveals how they pale in comparison to the real thing; Internet connections devalue human connections. How painful that we are stuck in this cycle whereby our engagement with social media increases our desire for human connection ever more as it decreases the value of these connections. This is like Zeno's paradox; and we will never get to the point where we feel fulfilled by these connections.

I would argue, further, that by looking for a way to assuage our isolation on the Internet allows us to ignore the greater responsibility of fixing this problem in the real world. How will we ever take the necessary action to repair our societies and generate social capital in our physical communities when we could just as easily hop into Second Life?

Wertheim writes, "With these utopian visions we witness the emergence of the idea that man, through his own efforts, can create a New Jerusalem here on earth" (284). To me, this seems, sadly, like we have developed intense abandonment issues; though this is hardly a surprise, given the fact that Wertheim shows in the rest of her book exactly how our God was taken away from us. But are we really happy to accept this meager substitute for heaven; or do we do so simply because we know it won't leave us?

Another idea that Wertheim challenges is the idea that the Internet is the utopia for discourse. "Connery suggests... that the history of the coffeehouse 'holds a potential warning for those who dream that the Internet will create utopian discursive communities" (289). In the coffeehouses, for example, hierarchies soon developed, and elitism and exclusivity, presumably precisely what the cafe sought to extinguish, prevailed over democracy.

I don't see there being anything wrong with utopian visioning. I think it helps us know where to aim. I think we would do well to take up this challenge: "our common task is to do a better job with the Net than we have done so far in the physical world" (Dyson, 282). And while it is poetic, I think it is true that in the Dantean sense, we create our own hell: "Now cyberspace too is an inner space of humanity's own making, a space where the vilest sides of human behavior can all too easily effloresce" (296).

Wertheim leaves the reader with the thought that perhaps the greatest potential of the Internet lies in the fact that it is fundamentally a "network of relationships." "It is this inherently relational aspect of cyberspace that I believe can serve as a powerful metaphor for building better communities" (298).

I do hope so. If we can at least recognize our responsibility in the creation of cyberspace, we'd be off to a good start: "If cyberspace teaches us anything, it is that the worlds we conceive (the spaces we 'inhabit') are communal projects requiring ongoing communal responsibility" (302). This is where literature on moral healthcare might come in handy, oddly, because just as the medical profession has realized in recent years, we have to begin to develop codes of practice that accommodate a plurality of religions. This means we have to figure out what it is that we can create that will be acceptible to all members of this cyber community. Religion is not universal, but a spiritual longing may be, as evidenced even in the rhetoric of the cyber-enthusiasts who see in cyberspace the potential for salvation.

The key to reenvisioning the potential of this community is to think outside the box: "As Einstein himself recognized, it is the language we use - the concepts that we articulate and hence the questions that we ask - that determines the kind of space that we are able to see" (304).

And finally, Wertheim notes: "To recognize the contingent nature of our conceptions of space is not to devalue them - relativistic space is no less useful or beautiful becaus we understand its cultural embeddedness. But in recognizing this, we may become less likely to devalue other conceptions of space" (305). Aha! - things do not have to be the way the are! Things - cyberspace even - can be different! People can be different too, if we change our thinking!