The Future Will Be Pixelated, Probably

What are the implications on one's lived experience as online life is rife with meaning and possibilities?

- INDRAN PARAMASIVAM

"Hey, you know what, guys? This right here, this rambling, boring conversation containing already-made-before observations, this could be a podcast." - Peter's Def Jam, Family Guy, Season 15, Episode 12

I DIDN'T REALISE IT until someone else pointed it out: At the height of the Covid-19 lockdown, my dad levelled this question at me: "Why do you like watching videos of guys shouting at each other?"

He was referring to my conspicuous consumption of specific podcasts platformed on YouTube. These were either full-length often hours long sprawls or clipped versions of the latter in video format, of people, mostly guys, talking to and/or at each other. To my dad, it didn't matter who they were. He didn't care for either Joe Rogan or Joe Budden. What mattered was that his son exhausted a significant number of the day's hours watching grown men squabble online.

But what he didn't know and what I didn't bother to acknowledge to myself on a deeper level because it was a beyond-obvious fact at the time, was that I needed it. I needed to watch grown men argue about whether or not aliens exist, whether Kanye West is the greatest everything of all time, whether the John F. Kennedy assassination was a CIA hit, and so on. Starved for conversation and company during the era of forced social distancing, and chained to my bedroom, I found some form of both online. It was good enough - which, all things considered, was sufficient.