Do you worry about the heat death of the universe?
Not really. The universe won’t be ending in my lifetime and as far as I’m concerned, the world was birthed when I was and will die when I do. You are supposed to grasp the concept of life after death but it seems pointless to me because I won’t be there. From a young age, you are supposed to play peek-a-boo with a toddler to help them understand the permanence of objects and the idea that things don’t end when they shut their eyes, but as far as the toddler is concerned, nothing does exist when your eyes are shut. When I am sitting on my bed at night, there is no reason I am not to believe I’m the only source of life in the universe. So I don’t really worry about things not existing, because as far as I’m aware, when I don’t exist, neither does anybody else.
How do you create meaningful experience in your life?
I think meaningful experience in life is done by doing things that will exceed your time on Earth. You have a finite amount of time spent on the planet, but you can prolong that experience or even immortalize yourself through acts onto others. For example, Michael Jackson is somebody I consider immortal. There will not be a day that goes by for as long as humanity is around when his music will not be listened to at least once a day. He has impacted millions of people in only a short amount of time spent alive. So in a way, impacting others cheats your death. You don’t really die when you stop breathing, you die when the last person has spoken your name for the last time.
In your opinion does this photograph of a pumpkin:
A. Reflect a profound reality (A picture of pumpkin is like the real thing)
B. Mask and denature a profound reality (A picture of the pumpkin is like a shitty version of the real thing.)
C. Mask the absence of a profound reality (the pumpkin was a lie.)
D. Lose all connection to reality, becoming pure simulation (Pumpkins, as a natural phenomenon, are a lie and this picture I just handed you is just a napkin that I peed on.)
E. All of the Above
Source: UNDERSTANDING JEAN BAUDRILLARD WITH PUMPKIN SPICE LATTES
To follow up with my answer choice, I find this dilemma ever present in my life when making connections online. I often find myself growing strong feelings for people I have met on the internet and it’s always a very weird process, to be trusting and loving towards a picture on a screen, or a video in an app, or a text in a messaging box. I feel like I am almost being cheated out of the real thing. I feel dumb for falling for a trick almost; like somebody is trying to mock me by showing me what I am lacking in my life but it is somehow stuck in the pixels on my phone. The instant gratification of the internet is something that has overwhelmed me recently, and this concept is something that I wrestle with at night, you’re not the only one.
Are you afraid that everything will happen?
Yeah. And no at the same time. I’m always worried I’ll lose her or they’ll give up on me, or maybe he’ll finally call it quits and decide I’m too much. Everything can happen at any moment but nobody ever really thinks about it. Which is why I say no at the same time. I can’t always think about everything. In fact, most of the time I only have the capacity to think about what’s right in front of me; the light from my phone in the dark is sometimes the brightest thing in my entire life. But I’m still a teenager so I can’t really say I have much experience.
How do you make earnest connection in a world of instant gratification?
Be genuine. Learn new things every day. You can do anything you want with the internet. Do cool shit. Go out of your comfort zone. Meet new people and talk about shit thats important to you. Talk about movies and music. I’ve met my best friends in the entire world through the internet. Twitter is my home. I stay on my phone constantly and I hate it. But I also love it. There’s something so addicting about the instant gratification of this generation that I can’t get enough of. But at the same time I need to remember to get outside and look at pretty plants and girls every once and while.
Do you think trends are accelerating more quickly now than ever? Do you think the acceleration will ever stop –can it contain itself, or will the whole system collapse?
Yes trends are definitely accelerating. It probably won’t ever stop but rather transition into another trend, it’s just how pop culture and the music scene is right now. Trends don’t really bother me to be quite honest. It does upset me that a genre like future bass can get wildly popular, and anybody who makes it within its peak hour can achieve internet stardom, but if that makes them happy at the end of the day, I say go for it; somebody else’s musical or fashion choices have no bearing on me. But I still think its lame as hell that people would rather listen to the same Wave Racer track done over 50 times slightly different (absolutely no disrespect to Wave Racer or future bass stuff, its all cool), rather than a group of artists like Brockhampton who are doing innovative and exciting things in music. But people will catch on, so I’m not worried.
