LYNNFIELD — According to author and cultural critic Brian Watson, the future is pretty bleak.
The Lynnfield Library hosted Watson on Wednesday night to discuss his latest book “Headed Into the Abyss: The Story of Our Time, and the Future We’ll Face.” A sobering look at our society, “Headed Into the Abyss” examines where we as society fail, what we can do about those failings and why no one has done anything yet.
Watson began his talk by explaining how he views current events. Rather than blaming our societal problems on a pandemic, a war, financial instability and political battles, he posited that those were symptoms of existing, unresolved problems, or “forces.” Watson identified ten forces: capitalism, technology, webworld, politics, media, education, human nature, the environment, human population and transportation.
Watson continued by explaining how the forces are interconnected and affect our lives. For instance, technology created the internet, which facilitated the capitalist internet marketplace, thus changing the online media landscape. In other words, the forces are not just parts of our society — they are our society.
The good news is, Watson does not believe that all the forces are inherently destructive. But the bad news is that he does not believe we can reform the bad parts.
Amidst his pessimism, Watson did see a way to work toward a better future. He pushed the attendees to try to step outside their comfort zones and find the truth, not just what is easy to accept. “We live by stories and narratives,” Watson said, “and you better hope your narrative is accurate.” Only when everyone looks around and bands together does Watson believe that things will begin to get better.
What we can do, Watson suggested, is become more aware of the world we live in. He encouraged the audience to think critically about what they consume, whether that be their social media feeds, their news sources or products they purchase. He said, “If you really think about things, if you wake up in the morning and just think about things in a whole different way, you can sort of see — this is weird! This is really weird!”
