Justin/ Baudrillard

Illusion is no longer possible because reality is no longer possible. A simple but very profound sentence. It didn't take me long to find evidence of this working in the "real world." I was checking my mail on aol.com and, as I know I shouldn't do by now, I was glancing over the headlines on the aol home page. They really get more and more meaningless every day, but I guess that's sort of the sick joy people get out of it. What caught my eye was a headline about Filipinos reacting to something said on the tv show "Desperate Housewives." My mom is half Filipino, and it's not really that often you hear much about the Philippines. I guess I have been fortunate that it is one of the least joked about East Asian countries here. I've heard a couple of jokes here and there, but it's nothing I'm sensitive about. Anyway, it was unusual so I looked at the article. Apparently Teri Hatcher's character questions a doctor's opinion on the show and asks to check his diplomas to make sure they're not from a med school in the Philippines.
I didn't have any problem with the joke, really. Even though the joke means more to me than it ever could to Teri Hatcher or most of the people watching it, it's not a big deal. I visit my cousins there, most of whom will live poorly throughout their lives and never have the opportunity to see anything outside of their town. But I do have a cousin who does nothing but study, and it's really a dream for him to come here to practice medicine. His work ethic and intelligence are extraordinary, because they have to be in order for him to give himself a chance.
Still, it's just a joke on a fictional television show. The fact that it's on tv says that I shouldn't trust it. The fact that the line comes from a character who, even were she a real person, I wouldn't trust lets me know that it doesn't matter. But the people who blog about it make it matter. I scrolled down to the bottom of the article out of curiosity. I knew what I'd find, but I had to see it for myself. Sure enough, there were pages full of comments about Filipinos that were absurd. People struggled to grasp any stereotype that might fit.
Blogging allows idiots to publish words that they don't even think about to a page that thousands will see. And even worse, they aren't held responsible. You might as well say, "Here, right something controversial on the third page of the New York Times, and don't worry because nobody has to take responsibility for it."
The point is that blogs, though they are messages from real people, aren't real either. They are products of a new persona created by the internet. A group of people that will read an article and write the most obtuse, hostile response to it they can think of in a few seconds. Their thoughts will be published before they can even doubt themselves. It encourages the spread of thoughtlessness.