Skip to content →

Word power: “I used to be a human being”

When someone next to you answers the phone and starts talking loudly as if you didn’t exist, you realize that, in her private zone, you don’t. And slowly, the whole concept of a public space — where we meet and engage and learn from our fellow citizens — evaporates.

 

Published September 18, 2016 in New York, Andrew Sullivan’s I used to be a human being is an intelligent essay.

It is also the cautionary confession of a “manic information addict” whose doctor asked him, “Did you really survive HIV to die of the web?”

Based on Caspar David Friedrich’s 1818 painting Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, the artwork atop this post is by Kim Dong-kyu.

Several of Kim Dong-kyu’s “updates” of famous paintings illustrate Sullivan’s essay, and you can see more of the artist’s “smart phone addiction is real” works here.

 

Published in opinions and journalism word power