A video worth watching, and re-watching, to pick up on subtleties…

HYPER-REALITY from Keiichi Matsuda.

I think this video is a genius statement of art in many ways.

The woman (who is the main character) has been reduced to a cog in a machine, despite all that technology painting a facade of a wonderful world where we would imagine it should be the other way around: that the technology should empower her - not enslave her.

The woman asks “Who am I?” to Google, like Google is the one who would know! And Google does. Who Google says you are, is the identity about you which matters.

The “Inspirational Guru” is her boss, at the corporation “Jobmonkey”. The title “Inspirational Guru” is a euphemism, as in, he’s the closest thing she has (at that time) to any spiritual leader. He certainly holds power over her, and is sort of like the master of her access to reality (including access to friends and money, which has now become a corporate system of “points”), as Jobmonkey has it all figured out to work.

Note that a loss of identity with Jobmonkey (or any similar corporation) is also a loss of the “points” (money), friends, achievements, level status, etc.

Here’s what particularly caught my attention as a Buddhist monk: would you like Buddhism to be “Powered by Bully! Entertainment”? (See 5:38 into the video). The default answer these days seems to be “yes”.