This morning while it was still dark I walked into the kitchen, turned on the lights and pushed play on Bethel Music’s album Peace. I love pushing the play button on my discman in the morning; I don’t have to prepare myself to ignore a single notification to get into morning reflection mode.
I might be the only person to decide to grow their collection of CD’s in 2021 (I started with one disc: Years ago I decided to go all digital and threw out all my Bluray’s, DVD’s and CD’s, as often as I moved it was a decision that made a lot of sense at the time). None-the-less, I made this decision for a lot of reasons:
- Quality: CD quality is the highest quality available for the vast majority of music, I know you can get CD quality from streaming services, but…
- Ownership: On numerous occasions I have had a favourite album disappear from my streaming service of choice.
- Mental health: Music is good for mental health. Internet much less so. Notifications are terrible. CD’s allow me to skip right to music and bypass messages, news and notifications that drag me down.
- Privacy: My CD players don’t connect to the internet and the tracks I play are not helping big tech build a more complete profile of who I am. You can think that it doesn’t matter and you have nothing to hide, I can feel the same way and decide to walk naked in the streets. Just because you have nothing to hide doesn’t mean that everyone needs to know.
- Censorship
This last point requires a few paragraphs on it’s own. For me the writing is in the sky, clear as day; those who affirm the hateful, intolerant, misinformed message of the gospel will not always have the right to internet access. Album’s whose message is deemed as hateful, intolerant or misinformed will not always be available online or even available for trade via the various trader and auction websites. Ebay committed to not allow the sale of ‘canceled’ Dr. Suess books.
How do I come to this conclusion? I’ve read the book of Revelation a few times, and while there are a lot of interpretations, one thing that seems clear and indisputable in this prophecy is that love for Christians is heading to non-existent: The world celebrates the death of God’s last two prophets.
On December 31st the Government of Spain granted itself broad, sweeping authority to combat misinformation, making it a class of threat equal to invasion by land. In Canada Bill C-3 and Bill C-10 are designed to grant the government similar scope over online content. I have seen news of similar sorts of legislation presented in various other developed countries, and one day some version of these authorities will be law in each in every one.
I am a web designer/developer by trade, and something that is taught and talked about in this circle is that any system that creates opportunities for someone to be an asshole, will eventually be used by someone to be an asshole.
Governments can talk about limits, democratic process and good intentions: You and I both know that we can count on somebody eventually using these powers in a way we disagree with.
This means that people who affirm hateful, intolerant messages like:
- Life begins at conception.
- That God created humans male and female and that there are important biological differences between the two.
- That heaven and hell exist and that Jesus is the only way to eternal life.
Shouldn’t count on access to privileges like the internet. Frankly, I wouldn’t count on passport renewals, drivers licenses, and the like either.
It’s been a turn-around for me, I am someone who loves gadgets and integrations. However, I now pursue dumb, offline tech wherever possible. This week I ordered a 5th gen iPod Classic.
Sincerely, Cabra. 