Feed and its Contemporaries
Frazier FarrellToday, I'm going to discuss the book Feed by M.T. Anderson. It's a personal favorite of mine that I feel is overlooked in the cyberpunk genre. Its world is one of unchained consumerism combined with god-like levels of technology. That being said, it’s not as overtly cyberpunk as other titles.
The implants are more aesthetically subtle, at least in the beginning. It isn’t action-packed with shootouts between half-metal cyborgs. Nor is the protagonist and his friends a group of hackers trying to take down the system. They are very much a part of it and are themselves harmed, to lethal effect, by a hacker group.
Rather, Feed explores the life of an average teenager named Titus. He lives in a world where everything is for sale, even Schools™ and Clouds™ are trademarked. This unfettered capitalism leads to environmental destruction, massive waste, and man-made illnesses. Forests are a thing of the past, as recalled by an old timer in the “Amurica: A Portrait in Geezers” excerpt. Lesions caused by industrial poisoning are fashionable and even furniture is disposed of regularly.
The parallels with climate change, pollution, and forever chemicals are clear, but it's the titular implant of the story I find most interesting. The feed is a brain-computer interface that connects users to a direct-to-brain internet called the feednet. This device is the catalyst for the story's hyper-consumerism.
The feed is never meant to be turned off. Users are bombarded with ads for beer, jeans, and sex, depending on their tailor-made profiles. Its most insidious aspect lies in the way it dumbs down the populace. As the supporting character Violet explains, the feed simplifies the culture to make selling products easier. A simpler consumer is simpler to market to.
This conditioning starts young. During a family dinner, Titus’ little brother sings along to a feed song with the refrain, “Intracrural or oral ain’t a question of moral!”. All the while, his family does nothing to stop him, let alone take issue with the sexually charged lyrics. In School™, lessons include learning how to shop, decorate bedrooms, and use the feed to engage in even more shopping. Titus is indoctrinated to see this as a positive because the big corps “care about America’s future.” The irony being that the feed was originally marketed as an educational tool. Despite the allegedly noble intentions of the feed’s creators, the technology has become the ultimate social influencing tool.
The advertising itself is comically ridiculous. Titus and his friends get together purely to discuss Coca-Cola because mentioning the brand name enough times wins them a free case. Marty gets a vocal implant that makes him say Nike every couple of words. Yet, even this is nothing compared to the commodification of America's downfall.
Near the end, people's hair falls out as nuclear fuel rods are disposed of in cities. People sport weeping lesions. Riots break out across the country, yet corporations nor the government do anything to address these issues. Instead, they push blowout sales. Clothing lines inspired by the Kent State and Watts Riots become “brag”. Titus’ platonic friends Calista and Quendy compete to buy the most grotesque artificial lesions after they were popularized by stars on their favorite feedcast soap opera “Oh? Wow! Thing!”.
All the while, Titus’ dad, a corporate executive, goes on a trip with his coworkers to hunt and kill one of the few whales left in the toxic, multi-colored ocean. His grisly description of the gutting process is the perfect metaphor for the destruction of America. His coworkers are awash in blood and viscera, making their interns do the most hazardous work. Yet, they take to the grisly task with joy, not thinking about the consequences, merely delighting in the bloody spectacle.
We see a world where late-stage capitalism feeds on itself by using the disasters it creates to sell more products. Meanwhile, the average citizen marches forward as though nothing is happening. This is because, for the most part, they are unaware. They are distracted by their advertisements and feednet games. Even those with some inkling of what's happening are too plugged into the system to take action.
Violet, for all her awareness and rage, has no choice but to appeal to corporate sponsors to fix her malfunctioning feed. Titus is vaguely aware of the overlords running the world, yet he continues to consume, believing there’s nothing to be done because that’s just how the system functions.
His complacency is something I can relate to, more so than when I first read the book fifteen years ago. When I was younger, I condemned his inaction, but now I understand it. I check my own feed (phone) daily. Without it, I feel somewhat disconnected from the world. I use it for work, entertainment, and as a coping mechanism. I’m more plugged into the system than I’ve ever been.
I’ve seen how the media we consume has become simpler and easier to access over the last decade and a half. Videos seem to be getting shorter all the time. The most famous of these clips become popular for some unfathomable reason (Hawk Tuah Girl, Fleetwood Mac Skateboarder, etc.). People are entertained by trendy dances and lip-syncing. Everything, no matter how simplistic, can be turned into “content.” I have made content like this myself. Our technology has become more feedlike over time. The primary difference is that media conglomerates don't make it; we create it ourselves. Everyone is both a consumer and a product.
We continue this consumption despite knowing our attention spans have shortened and our data is being sold. We do it because it’s the enjoyable thing to do, it’s what we’ve become accustomed to. Just as the feednet users stay plugged in even as everything around them collapses.
In the real world, things aren’t so dire, yet. However, I think Feed paints a picture of what could be. It reminds me of the detriments of complacency. It shows me what our company, Symbiont Labs, should strive against. We need to be honest and keep safety as a paramount concern. Part of our goal is to create a culture in cybernetics that doesn’t allow this kind of parasitic corporatism to exist. We need to be in Symbiosis with people, not be feeding off them.
In order to figure out what a brighter cyberpunk future might look like we have offered the public a chance to show us their visions of the future. We are currently running a short story contest over on our website. The contest is running until the end of September so make sure to get an entry in here if you have a creative itch:
https://symbiontlabs.io/blogs/news/writers-wanted-summer-of-cyborgs-writing-contest
M.T. Anderson's stories span the breadth of sci-fi, fantasy, and non-fiction. If you would like to read Feed (ISBN: 9780763662622) or any of M.T. Anderson’s other works the link to his website is listed below:
Thanks for reading,
Frazier