Benjamin Cox writes:

> Lloyd (and this is the good bit):

> Read Marshall McLuhan? I've never even heard of Marshall McLuhan.

An Undereducated American? No way! Anyone who has even heard of Marshall McLuhan is an over-educated, liberal, atheist, elitist snob who utterly fails to understand that late twentieth century America is the epitome, the essence, the pinnacle, the very definition of civilization.

It could be argued that Marshall McLuhan predicted his own obsolescence and obscurity. Certainly no one understood better than he the effect of media on the content that media could transmit. He understood that media evolve; they are born, they strut their brief hour upon the stage[1], and eventually they are replaced by media that compete more successfully in the changing climate of the times. And yet he chose print as his medium of preference[2], knowing that print was destined to be replaced by the newer media that he studied, and knowing that even those media would one day be discarded.

So what should the properly educated American understand? Television and movies, certainly. Video games. Rock and roll CDs. These are the media of the times, and any message which cannot be expressed effectively in these media will vanish, never heard, never understood, never to make an impact on late twentieth century America. But this will not be a problem, because any message which cannot be expressed in these media is not relevant, and richly deserves its obscurity.

If modern Americans remember McLuhan at all, it will be for his cameo in "Annie Hall." ("'Annie Hall'? I thought I'd seen all of Spielberg's movies!")

[1] Sorry I don't have my Shakespeare concordance handy to get the quote right, but it's in print anyway, and as everyone knows, print is every bit as passe as Shakespeare himself.

[2] He also did an audio performance of "The Medium is the Massage," but to the best of my knowledge it languishes on vinyl.