Eric Bryan, Union Staffer
What happened to the future?
I write this in the immediate wake of NASA’s call for new astronauts, for the first time asking for new staff to head their next program of as of yet unseen spacecrafts. According to spokespeople at NASA, not only will there be new mechanisms to take people to the moon, but for the first time, ships to take explorers beyond the pull of Earth’s gravity, and potentially into deep space. And society collectively yawned.
There is some level of understanding to this. The death of the space shuttle program was essentially the final nail in the coffin to known spacecraft. The final tangible link between science fiction and reality severed. However, understanding does not mean sense. Nor rationality.
Essentially what we, as a people, have done, is say, “If we don’t already know it, it’s not worth our time.” Essentially what we, as a people, have done, is collectively dismiss any active participation in the labor pains of the future. Which is, of course, the worst possible step to take: confidently to the side.
We have decided that because we do not have jet packs and flying cars, that we have been wronged. The joke has overtaken reality.
Look around you. Take the effort to sway your fucking neck around. Stop reading for a minute. What future have we been denied? There may not be a jet pack, you ridiculous person, but even air planes, archaic technology even two generations prior, can in a matter of hours, take you to wherever in the world you’d like to go. Your phones are Star Trek gadgets. The myths of 50 years ago made so real, so prevalent, that they have become almost banal in their existence. Traded readily for a new one.
Where the future stops, is accepting what we have as all there is. And that is exactly what we’ve done. You can put a video of your dog licking its nuts on what is essentially a global bulletin board in seconds. That’s the future. You can put a video of your dog licking your nuts on a slightly smaller (slightly) bulletin board. And that’s the future. Downloading Rilo Kiley’s discography from your boyfriend’s dorm room because you saw on your iPhone’s Facebook app that your aunt was listening to them on Spotify. That’s the future.
Bullshit. That’s distraction.
Without the present, there is no future. And we have no present. We have a hyperbolized version of the past that we covet so greatly as to call it some sort of gift. Steps to the side in shiny shoes. We have gadgets, and that’s amazing! It is! Make no mistake, I am writing this from a Macbook Pro that has shown me the intimate photos of the deaths of world leaders. But these are no different than the electronic watch, the flashlight. Convenient, and forward thinking, but ultimately little more than luxuries. Pleasantries in a greater conversation.
And we are stopping there. Saying hello to a greater world and walking back to the dregs of the atomic age, retaining its fear with none of its innovation. And we are better than that. You are better than that. Humanity, like any species, is in the place it is largely through caution. Through fear. And while that may keep us alive, it will also keep us still. Shaking and silent. If we are to get anywhere, we have to say what we have, with all of its bright light and brilliant chrome, is not good enough. We were promised a future we have not been given. Let’s go take it.
