Medium is the Message

"Medium is the Message" is the phrase that Canadian historians latch on to as they debate their international peers about what the great white north has contributed to media theory, not including the infamous John Candy quote, "Who wants an orange whip? Orange whip? Orange whip? Three orange whips."

This rings true for me, a soldier of peace, who is contemplating how to bring together two siblings who are in a bitter rivalry over their competing weddings. A week ago, after enduring the sinus serrating stench of Phils, I encouraged my friend to encourage his mother to encourage my brother to encourage my sister to say sorry to my brother.

"What? why?" he responds.

"Medium is the message!" I return. "You see, if I just tell my sister to say sorry to my brother, that won't work. And if I tell my brother to tell my sister to say sorry, that'll make things worse. So, somebody else needs to tell my brother to tell my sister, and my brother always sees your mom at work. But, if I tell your mom to tell my brother, that'll just be weird because I'd have to find a time and place to meet your mom. That's why I am telling you to tell your mom. That way, when my brother tells my sister that Dave's friend's mom told him to tell her to smarten up, the entire situation will just be too ridiculous to maintain its dramatic underpinnings. Get it? The medium is the message."

But in these electronic days, traditional media like word of mouth and telephone calls are too fleeting to inspire a call to action, and new media like social networking sites, text messaging, and instant messaging are too superfluous and noisy. What medium can possibly convey any sort of message? It's all a wash.

Advertisers need to take a lesson from spam artists; people only respond to immediacy.