Reading Response

“As for writing, it was dangerous, said the Adams and the Eves, because your enemies could trace you through it, and hunt you down, and use your words to condemn you.”(pg. 5)

From the start this idea of words being used a tool for destruction floats around the book. As the novel progresses, we see a greater emphasis on the fear of technology and its ability to document everything you write as opposed to the safety of word of mouth. The Gardeners teach their children to memorize everything because writing devices aren’t eternal, and they teach them to be careful with their words because once its out there’s no getting it back, and this could be held against you.

When Lucerne takes Ren away from the Gardeners back to the HelthWyzer compound, we see through Ren’s experience  a greater emphasis on this fear of words, but technology in specifically. Ren describes her experiences at the HelthWyzer high school and her fear of the technology and paper notebooks used. “I had a built-in fear of those: it seemed so dangerous, all that permanent writing that your enemies could find–you couldn’t just wipe it away, not like a slate.”(pg.216) This idea of technology being used as a tool for destruction reminded me of Professor Chun’s, “Habitual New Media” talk at Barnard. Professor Chun examined this exact concept of the anxiety that comes with technology, how every word we speak on the phone is out there in cyberspace, every item we put on our computers and delete isn’t actually deleted, every snapchat we send that “vanishes” after 5 seconds, can be retrieved. There is no privacy in technology, and while this is alarming, Professor Chun says it is also empowering. Technology gives us the ability to put words into cyberspace that are permanently embedded. You can choose the words you want to put out their and use them how you want. “You enemies can use writing against you, I thought, but also you could use it against them.”(pg.226). Writing doesn’t have to be used as a malicious tool, but it can. The fact that every single thing posted or visited leaves a digital footprint is a very powerful tool.