Moving Past the Ultimatum

I should say, in the interest of full disclosure, that I was skeptical of Rushkoff right off the bat. Program or be Programmed? It’s the ultimatum that really gets me. As a casual reader looking for a hook, I admit that I love his style. It’s blatant and provocative, and undoubtedly interesting. I’m being taken advantage of by the elite? “They” don’t want me to understand how my devices work? Insomuch that Rushkoff works to put programming on a pedestal , trying to make seem like necessary civil disobedience, I think he succeeds.

As a critical thinker, however, I’m less sure. By the end of things, I feel a bit chilled, and not for the right reasons; I feel as though I’ve been run roughshod over and vaguely insulted; I think that some credit where credit is due is lacking left and right.

I can’t help but think, at the end of this semester of reading, that we as scholars and as access activists, can do better than this. In a discipline where much of the fascination lies in the in-between spaces, the up-against and the puzzles, I simply reject the notion that there are two rigidly defined choices and nothing else. Near the beginning of the introduction, Rushkoff says, “In the emerging, highly programmed landscape ahead, you will either create the software or you will be the software. It’s really that simple: Program, or be programmed. Choose the former, and you gain access to the control panel of civilization. Choose the latter, and it could be the last real choice you get to make” (7-8). He’s very concerned, all along, about the elite that controls the dominant medium of the age, and I can’t fault him for that. Media is obviously controlled by people with powerful hands. However, I think that if the discussion turns into a simple David vs. Goliath power struggle, that it will end in reduction. As far as I’m concerned, program or be programmed is the kind of attitude that will create an elite/powerless dynamic just as much as the programmer vs. end user juxtaposition that Rushkoff sees happening now. That type of better-than-thou attitude is one of the things that I think turns people off from wanting to understand the technology they’re using. It’s not productive with casual users, and I don’t even think it’s productive amongst an academic audience. If we’re truly interested in the spread of thoughtful and powerful digital tools, the worst thing to do is to force them.

I struggle with this, because there are aspects of Rushkoff’s writing that I think are really valuable. He’s certainly not wrong about the potential power of programming, and I wouldn’t try to deny that media has long been harnessed most effectively by those with the money and the influence. I appreciate his appreciation of the “value-creation” potential of technology. Personally, I think there’s great value in programming, and I hope that I can continue to pick up skills that will allow my digital work to evolve.

It’s just the rigidness that I can’t allow. Is anything so black and white? What does making this type of argument even get you? People that agree, would have agreed anyway, and people that are on the fence, like me, are apt to find things to question—like me—and feel less friendly to the cause than they did before they started reading.

And since I’m questioning things, let me add one more thing. Rushkoff says that we’ve at least, as a society, gotten to the point of writing. We write while the elite program. The point I think he misses, though, is that writing in a digital age is not at all the same as writing in any previous age. If I have learned anything this semester, it is that our communicative actions are deeply tied to their forms. A question that needs to be asked, I think, is what is it to write in an age of programming? What aspects of programming can we become aware of; how can the technology inform our writing strategies? To put all of our academic and social eggs in the basket of programming just seems short-sighted, and it devalues the other meaningful work that’s being done, sometimes work that is “just” being done using the programs already at our disposal.