Do You Use Technology Or Does Technology Use You? A Brief Review of Neil Postman’s Technopoly

91Z8WzYA3hLAre we using electronics or are they using us? That is the fundamental question that Neil Postman asks in Technopoly. Postman wrote this book in 1992. Long before the smartphone and even a few years before widespread use of the internet. This makes his assessment of the direction of our culture all the more prescient.

Postman decried our move from a society that used tools into one that is now shaped by tools. He called this a technopoly—“a self-justifying, self-perpetuating system wherein technology of every kind is cheerfully granted sovereignty over social institutions and national life.”

What Postman saw was a collapse of significant cultural symbols, bowing to the idol of this technopoly. Technopoly is not simply about technology it is about the way in which we rely upon these tools. It is the unblushing allegiance that we give to “scientific facts”.

Long before Google, Postman saw our dependence upon the machine to define reality for us. Something is true now because Google says it is true. (Consider here and here).

This ideology is not neutral. It aims to take no prisoners and bring about the surrender of our culture. Postman devotes an entire chapter to showing the path which leads to losing important cultural symbols. He notes that they are often trivialized instead of directly blasphemed.

So what is the answer? Postman gives a list of characteristics of those who “resist the American Technopoloy”. They are people who:

  • pay no attention to a poll unless they know what questions were asked, and why
  • refuse to accept efficiency as the pre-eminent goal of human relations
  • have freed themselves from the belief in the magical powers of numbers, do not regard calculation as an adequate substitute for judgment, or precision as a synonym for truth
  • refuse to allow psychology or any ‘social science’ to preempt the language and thought of common sense
  • are, at least, suspicious of the idea of progress, and who do not confuse information with understanding
  • do not regard the aged as irrelevant
  • take seriously the meaning of family loyalty and honor, and who, when they ‘reach out and touch someone’, expect that person to be in the room
  • take take great narratives of religion seriously and who do not believe that science is the only system of thought capable of producing truth
  • know the difference between the sacred and the profane, and who do not wink at tradition for modernity’s sake
  • admire technological ingenuity but do not think it represents the highest possible form of human achievement.

Postman says that we must understand

“that technology must never be accepted as part of the natural order of things, that every technology…carries with it a program, an agenda, and a philosophy that may or may not be life-enhancing and that therefore requires scrutiny, criticism, and control.” (Postman, 185)

I am intrigued by Postman’s ideas here. I think in many places he is spot on and he clearly saw the dangers that were awaiting us. Is it to late to fight the Technopoly? I would say it is already well upon us and the governing ideology of our day.

Anger Works, Hope Lasts

photo-1559816827-cd6130a58bf7On my drive to the office—actually on my drive to get a donut before work—I pass by a beautiful house. It’s positioned well away from the highway, its wonderfully manicured lawn, fenced off from society with beautiful cedar posts. And on that fencing are housed 5-6 canvas signs. One reads:

Fauci lied. People died.

The other one, I never can read quite fast enough, but it has something to do with if you voted for Biden you have blood on your hands. Each banner is accusatory and rather than injecting hope into each passerby it aims to move the needle on political debate by shaming the opponent. Hot takes preferred over hope giving.

As I drove by this morning I thought about that strategy. My first thought was, “don’t you know that people are inspired by hope more than shame.” But in reality, I only wish that was true. Fear motivates far more quickly than hope. You can gather an angry mob ten times quicker and ten times larger than you could gather a group to go spread hope. Hot takes, anger, fear, and shaming “work”.

The Pragmatism of Anger

Then I started thinking about pragmatism. Pragmatism is the philosophy that whatever works is what is true. In a purely pragmatic worldview truth is relative and ever-changing. It does not have its own existence. Truth is just the thing that works in some given moment. Therefore, the most fundamental question within this worldview is, “Does it work?”

From a pragmatic worldview, anger and hot takes are preferred because they get the results needed. Hope is more of a slow burn. You may never see the fruit of hope, this side of glory. That was certainly true of Abraham and so many other people of faith who “did not receive the things promised…” Hope isn’t practical.

I come from a certain tribe of evangelicalism. Early on I was heavily involved in critiquing movements like Rick Warren’s Purpose Driven Church. I have been an outspoken critic of things like firetruck baptistries, decisional regeneration, and governing a church by “what works” instead of by what honors God. I’ve labored to kick pragmatism in the teeth.

I still believe pragmatism to be dangerous. But I’ve failed to see pragmatism in my own heart. You know how I know? Because so often I’ve taken the path of a hot-take instead of slow-burning hope. And I’ve done that because I know that an angry missive will get a response whereas offering a hopeful perspective will largely be ignored. Anger works—graciousness doesn’t. When I light the short fuse instead of the long one, I’m likely being a pragmatist.

I can’t help but think about that beautiful house on the hill with the shame-inducing canvas. The truth is, here in Southwest MO, it has a ready audience. It’s red meat. 3/4 of our population did not vote for Biden. As I’m assessing those berating billboards I’m confronted with the pragmatic questions I ask of them. What is the point? Does it work? Does it accomplish what you want?

Hope Lasts

But there is a fundamental question which stands over all these. Are those placards the way of Jesus? Do angry hot-takes, shame-inducing billboards, and malicious missives honor God? Do these things accurately reflect the God of the Universe? And do they lead to human flourishing?

That question about human flourishing is very much connected to the question of whether or not something honors God. God is honored when we treat our fellow image-bearers with dignity and grace and wonder. Shame doesn’t create a culture you want to live in. Anger consumes culture it doesn’t make beauty.

Will shame be present in the new heavens and the new earth? Will anger? Or will hope? Our hope will be realized and our anger and our shame will fall like scales as we see Christ for who He really is.

Hope makes beautiful. It isn’t necessarily practical. Neither is faith and love. But they remain whilst our angry canvas’ withers into dust.

And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love…

Photo source: here

Should We Preach With a Wider Audience in Mind?

photo-1620565404258-27ef4fbb0b72John Newton was not that great of a preacher. Newton preached during the time of great orators like Whitefield, Wesley, Davies, Tennent, and many more. Those who heard Newton were sometimes surprised that he had such a full congregation. He was sincere, orthodox, pious, but he was not “graceful in delivery”. Richard Cecil, a fellow Anglican clergyman, said this:

With respect to his ministry, he appeared, perhaps, to least advantage in the pulpit; as he did not generally aim at accuracy in the composition of his sermons, nor at any address in the delivery of them. His utterance was far from clear, and his attitudes ungraceful.

So why, in an age when preaching was at a premium, was a middling orator like Newton pastoring a congregation filled with people? Cecil gives the answer:

He possessed, however, so much affection for his people, and zeal for their best interests, that the defect of his manner was of littler consideration with his constant hearers: at the same time, his capacity, and habit of entering into their trials and experience, gave the highest interest to his ministry among them.

Newton genuinely loved his people. And they knew that he loved them. He wouldn’t use the pulpit to clobber them, to share their secrets, or anything of the sort. But he was often among the people and heard their hearts. This would inform his preaching.

When he picked a text he likely had a conversation in mind. He always aimed to help his congregation. His passion for Christ and his congregation bled out into the pulpit. He spoke their language. For an outsider looking in—he might have seemed bumbling, somewhat dry, and harder to follow. But he spoke their language and so they absorbed his words.

Should We Think of A Wider Audience When Preaching?

1 Peter 5:2 exhorts us preachers to “shepherd the flock of God among you”. That is a little more difficult to apply in our day. Who is “among us”? Do we include our wider online audience? Do we preach in such a way that our sermons would be fit for publication or YouTube snippets?

I think Newton may give us the answer here as well. He would converse often amongst his people: “Walking about an hour or two among the people, and sometimes drinking tea with them”. This would give him insight into their spirits were working and the things which they were struggling with. This would often give Newton direction in the pulpit. And as he noted,

“What is observed of ten persons in these different situations, may be applied to ten thousand. For though some circumstances vary, the heart of man, the aids of grace, and the artifices of Satan, in general are universally the same.

I think what this is telling us is that if we craft our sermons with our people in mind, the Lord will often see fit to give it a wider audience. Aim to help the people of whom God has sovereignly placed in your care and it will likely be fitting nourishment for a wider audience.

Of course, it is also possible that the way in which you speak to your people will land differently when it is picked up by a wider audience. We must be aware of this, but we cannot exchange speaking in the dialect of the flock of God which is among us.

Shepherd your flock. That is the one to which we will give an account when we stand before the Lord.

Photo source: here

What Does “Becoming Fishers of Men” Look Like?

photo-1583249598754-b7a2f59651fbI didn’t really grow up in church. I think I had a spell in 7th or 8th grade where I went to youth group some—but that had more to do with pretty girls than Jesus. I do, however, remember bits and pieces of one sermon I heard. It involved what I assumed was an expert fisherman explaining to us what Jesus meant by “becoming fishers of men”. He talked about bait and lure and “reeling them in”.

I think that metaphor stuck with me a little because when I first started teaching the Bible I put together a sermon on Jesus’ call to be fishers of men. And guess what I did? I studied fishing methods and I applied them to evangelism. If you want to catch people with the gospel you need to attract them with a lure.

That was a silly Bible study that I put together. For one, the fishing methods in the first century do not exactly match the methods used in trying to catch a bass in Northeast Missouri. But secondly, it missed an Old Testament connection. Jesus’ turn of phrase actually comes from Jeremiah 16.

16 “Behold, I am sending for many fishers, declares the LORD, and they shall catch them. And afterward I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain and every hill, and out of the clefts of the rocks. 17 For my eyes are on all their ways. They are not hidden from me, nor is their iniquity concealed from my eyes. 18 But first I will doubly repay their iniquity and their sin, because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable idols, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations.”

Jeremiah 16 is in the context of judgment of the nations while the Lord restores Israel. These “fishers of men” will be overturning the works of idolatry as the fortunes of God’s people are restored.

A Negative Image or a Positive Image?

The metaphor in the OT of being “fishers of men” is predominately a negative one. Because the image in the OT is predominately negative this has led Robert Stein to say, “There does not appear to be any OT precedent for the expression ‘fishers of men’. Mark Strauss believes there is a connection, but believes “Jesus reverses this image to one of salvation. To fish for people is to rescue them from sin and death by calling them into God’s kingdom.”

But what if Jesus isn’t completely reversing the image? What if the “rescuing people from sin and death” is very much a part of what is happening even in Jeremiah 16? Perhaps we are given a picture of what this “becoming fishers of men” looks like even in the next passage. In Mark 1:21-28 we see Jesus teaching with authority and casting out a demon with authority. Mark’s major point in that text is about establishing Jesus’ authority. But that is also present in his calling of the disciples to “himself”. That’s a power move.

Mark loves to provide a section of teaching and then follow it up with an example. I haven’t seen others make this connection, but to me there is at least some connection between Jesus’ action with the demon possessed man and his call to be “fishers of men”. This is what it looks like to rescue people.

This, to me, is a helpful understanding of what it means to be fishers of men. I think for far too long this phrase has been of the stuff of fishing stories and piling bodies of fish up on the shore. But being fishers of men has much to do with human flourishing. I think what Andy Crouch says is fitting:

The best test of any institution, and especially of any institution’s roles and rules for using power, is whether everyone flourishes when everyone indwells their roles and plays by the rules, or whether only a few of the participants experience abundance and growth. (Crouch, 185)

Jesus uses his authority (his power) in order to “fish men” out of the clutches of demonic oppression. He sets the on the bank and into flourishing. That is what it means to “become fishers of men”. And the disciples must learn this lesson. It isn’t about catching enough fish to sink your boat and brag to your buddies about your haul, or to get filthy rich off your catch. You are “fishers of men” to rescue them from the wildness of the sea, to rescue from the clutches of idolatry, and to set free into flourishing under Jesus’ authority.

Any “fishing of men” that doesn’t lend itself to human flourishing isn’t the stuff of Jesus.

Photo source: here