The Derealization of the World and Rising Human Passivity

Han claims that digitalization derealizes the world (p. 47); as humans, we now interact less with physical objects and are more inclined to have technology solve our problems for us. I recall the physical things I used to have that I no longer feel interested in using. Growing up, I had about three hard copies of dictionaries from different publishers. I can still remember how I would flip those pages and check the meanings of words as I wrote my assignment in secondary school. Video cassettes are another. I think of how much in control humans were with them. You could hold it, clean it, rewind it, or fasten it forward. It was yours to keep and maintain. 

As an ardent music lover, I remember my dad’s shelf full of hundreds of cassettes. I remember how he cherished and cared for them for years. Now, in the age of digitized streaming services, there is a sense of removal and passivity among humans as technology takes control. We have become removed, indifferent, and hardly know how things we use every day work. If I need to subscribe to Netflix, for example, I only need to pay for subscriptions and expect the digitized streaming service to get the job done while I sit back and relax. If anything doesn’t work fine on these services, we feel disabled and have no idea how to fix it. We call customer service, and sometimes we might even have to chat with an AI customer care agent to get things fixed. We have given our control and connection to objects away in replacement for digitalized dominance. (270) [TO-9]

[Han, 2022]

2 thoughts on “The Derealization of the World and Rising Human Passivity

  1. I share some of these experiences, Temi, and, as well, a concern for patterned “derealization.” One example: not long after moving to a house in the country (end of a gravel road, no internet service provider available, except via satellite), we were having a heckuva time with internet. We subscribed to Netflix’s DVD service, and that worked okay for a while, but that, too, recently shuttered. We went to one of the RedBox kiosks, the one outside the Speedway in Christiansburg, but it no longer distributed physical DVDs, only streaming codes. It seems strange to visit a kiosk at a gas station, to pay for a code, only later to be able to stream the movie. And if you are one whose housing is prohibitively remote, “tough luck” or “how unfortunate for you” are the sympathies and the end of it.

  2. Great piece Temi! Smartphones, which operate as people’s digital teddy bears, provide amazing connectivity and information access, but they also add factors that could lead to a derealization of corporeality by changing how people view, interact with, and portray their physical selves online. Finding a balance that respects the advantages of digital connectivity while keeping the depth of physical sensations is a problem. I went to church service last time, I could not figure out any member who brought a hard copy bible to church, most congregants used their soft copies on their phones.

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