Naked America
During the last couple of weeks (have I already been back for that long?) I had the pleasure of partaking in that most American of traditions, going to the mall. It was exhilarating and deeply unsettling. But the strangest part about it was trying to pinpoint what about it was so strange. There were malls in Malaysia. Good ones too. Malls that could easily dwarf the one I wandered into. So why did the humble Arden Fair seem so intimidating? I think it might've been that everyone in it was pretty much naked.
I don't mean this as a judgment on the "clothes" people around here are wearing, though that's certainly a part of it. All of the people I saw from the food court to the Mac store hid so little of themselves. That's right. I'm invoking both meanings of naked. Levels, baby, levels.
The girl in front of me at the cheese steak fastfood chain (don't judge, I was hungry) talked about nothing important on her cellphone as if she were surrounded by the deaf. It was eerie. Like if someone started taking his clothes off in front of you because he thought you were asleep. I didn't really know what to do with that kind of exhibitionism, so I did the best I could to be a non-creepy voyeur. I guess I succeeded, since the girl in front of me never stopped talking or paying attention to herself. Maybe that's what's weird. There was just no awareness of the people around her. It's like everyone ended up in the mall by way of their personal solipsistic dream. No one else was a real person.
The strange thing is that no one seems to notice being naked. People don't notice how much of themselves they display to the world on an everyday basis. I certainly never noticed it before. But now it's obscenely obvious. People just wave their naked parts for the whole world to see and more often than not, the whole world is too busy waving their naked parts to notice. But now it's all I can see. Like I said, it's exhilerating and deeply disturbing.
Everything that anyone's ever said about Americans being loud and open seems pretty true right now. I don't think we can really call it a virtue anymore than we can call walking around after you forgot to put pants on a virtue. It's just that no one realizes how exposed they really are, so of course then can't do anything to change it.
In Malaysia you had to fight for your privacy. You needed to be constantly vigilant. We were always covering up something, either parts of our body or parts of our selves. I was only ever "naked" when I was alone. In a public space, you always had to maintain your privacy. The Private is never Public.
And here in America the prevailing wisdom is that no one cares. No one cares about your cleavage or your speedo or your Nazi boss or your lying boyfriend... the Private can be Public because the Public doesn't give a crap about your life, private or otherwise. That's the glorious freedom I've missed these last seven months: the freedom to be anonymous and to not have to hide a thing.
The freedom found in our malls showcase the new American dream: being naked around other naked people and buying whatever you want in an air conditioned setting.
Living the dream, baby, living the dream.
I don't mean this as a judgment on the "clothes" people around here are wearing, though that's certainly a part of it. All of the people I saw from the food court to the Mac store hid so little of themselves. That's right. I'm invoking both meanings of naked. Levels, baby, levels.
The girl in front of me at the cheese steak fastfood chain (don't judge, I was hungry) talked about nothing important on her cellphone as if she were surrounded by the deaf. It was eerie. Like if someone started taking his clothes off in front of you because he thought you were asleep. I didn't really know what to do with that kind of exhibitionism, so I did the best I could to be a non-creepy voyeur. I guess I succeeded, since the girl in front of me never stopped talking or paying attention to herself. Maybe that's what's weird. There was just no awareness of the people around her. It's like everyone ended up in the mall by way of their personal solipsistic dream. No one else was a real person.
The strange thing is that no one seems to notice being naked. People don't notice how much of themselves they display to the world on an everyday basis. I certainly never noticed it before. But now it's obscenely obvious. People just wave their naked parts for the whole world to see and more often than not, the whole world is too busy waving their naked parts to notice. But now it's all I can see. Like I said, it's exhilerating and deeply disturbing.
Everything that anyone's ever said about Americans being loud and open seems pretty true right now. I don't think we can really call it a virtue anymore than we can call walking around after you forgot to put pants on a virtue. It's just that no one realizes how exposed they really are, so of course then can't do anything to change it.
In Malaysia you had to fight for your privacy. You needed to be constantly vigilant. We were always covering up something, either parts of our body or parts of our selves. I was only ever "naked" when I was alone. In a public space, you always had to maintain your privacy. The Private is never Public.
And here in America the prevailing wisdom is that no one cares. No one cares about your cleavage or your speedo or your Nazi boss or your lying boyfriend... the Private can be Public because the Public doesn't give a crap about your life, private or otherwise. That's the glorious freedom I've missed these last seven months: the freedom to be anonymous and to not have to hide a thing.
The freedom found in our malls showcase the new American dream: being naked around other naked people and buying whatever you want in an air conditioned setting.
Living the dream, baby, living the dream.
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-Ezra