Final - Filth/Technology

Texts like “The Filth” and “The Ticket that Exploded” are similar in their approach to the shocking, and both drew a significant amount of resistance. Perhaps the most important question that arises, then, is why this reaction was drawn.
The most obvious answer to this is that we as a “sophisticated” people have placed boundaries on what can be said and done in the public eye, and when a line is crossed we react with shock and anger. To an extent, this is a valid theory. If one finds something to be discomforting or unfit for exposure to others, they are likely to do something about it. But is this really what is happening in response to The Ticket that Exploded?
Certainly there is something about “The Ticket” that makes us uncomfortable. The most common complaint across all arenas of communication in class has been that certain scenes containing alien sex are too profane, too grotesque. And here we run into another problem, for Burroughs consciously made these acts homosexual. Stemming from this comes another debate—whether it is the homosexuality that makes one uncomfortable. Suddenly the discussion has new life, and we are led completely astray from the original problem. The issue isn’t what aspect of Burroughs’ novel makes us uncomfortable, it’s why we get uncomfortable.
It has been said in many forms that the stem of all fear and hatred is the misunderstood. It is safe to say that there is a definite lack of understanding in the reader’s comprehension of the cut-up method, which is the result of pouring conflict upon conflict. Burroughs challenges the innate response of disgust, inserting pornography with no background or apparent reason. With this, all understanding is lost, and we are left with actions stripped of their comfortable norms.
The tendency to react one way in public and respond another way in private, is common today. It is possible that the “culture filter” actively creates one process of thought, whereas in the absence of it, another would form. This applies directly to the phenomena of porn consumption in “red” states. The religious filter creates the public response, (moral outrage) while at the same time fueling the private reaction, consumption of porn.
It is important to note that this is not the only factor in porn consumption. People are sexual beings, and will turn to sex in many forms. Burroughs and Morrison challenge our sexual appetites by presenting us not with gay sex or straight sex, but with unusual sex. For this reason, the Porn in Red States phenomena does not strictly apply. The discomfort and disgust these books create is a result of the unknown, the unimaginable.
Interestingly, technology has opened the door to the unimaginable, or perhaps in Greg Feely’s case, the unavailable. Morrison notes this, as the protagonist of his story is a middle-aged man interested primarily in pornography and his cat. By creating a hero out of a figure otherwise closeted by society, a non-icon, Morrison highlights the preconceptions we have about who heroes truly are.
Perhaps the most important thing to take from these texts is that “filth” is an aspect of life…we despise it, crave it, produce it; to avoid it is to deny life’s imperfection. It is impossible, try as John might, to imagine a perfect world. Human life is rooted in conflict, disgust is an innate emotion because the disgusting is a product of life, and the search for beauty relies on encounters with the unpleasant. We will continue to strive for a pure world, and in doing so, will unintentionally add to the filth. Fighting the filth is necessary; it keeps us alive. If we cannot acknowledge what is wrong, we cannot do what is right. And so it is there, it is us. Always keeping one foot in the filth.