Sunday, January 07, 2007

YOU are Time's Person of the Year 2006

Time magazine declared a couple of weeks ago that its Person of the Year for 2006 was “you.” There were a number of interesting articles, including one playing off of Andy Warhol’s prediction that someday everyone would be famous for fifteen minutes. (The author noted that with the advent of blogs, MySpace, YouTube, etc., it is more likely that “everyone is famous to fifteen people.”)

My reaction, like that of many Time readers, was that the editors had kind of copped out and that there were many other, better choices they could have made. I got an e-mail today from an old friend and colleague, Don Nagle, who is now working in Mexico. He passed along the following commentary about Time’s decision, written by Dennis Wadley of Bridges, a missionary with Hope International in South Africa, giving a different perspective about Time’s decision:

"The magazine cover features a sheet of mylar that reflects the reader's own image, and the feature article, entitled 'Power to the People,' celebrates the new media age that focuses on individualism in the extreme. It has given us MySpace, YouTube, MyYahoo, MyWay, MyStuff, MyNews, and a myriad of other me-centered sites. And there is the iPod on which to play MY music (which tells me 'I can do anything I want any old time').

"There is 'my' fashion and even hamburgers 'my way.' The pop culture today is all about Me and anything-goes toleration of evil, and it is a sign of the times. The Bible prophesied this generation in 2 Timothy 3:1-5:

"'This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, trucebreakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.'

"This is a miraculously perfect description of the content of MySpace or YouTube, and it was written 2,000 years ago. Jesus is coming to catch His Bride away before the Great Tribulation.

"Are you ready?"

1 comment:

Hannatu said...

I appreciated this post, Palmer. I had seen it referred to in another article which therefore made no sense to me since I didn't know what the original article was. Thanks for enlightening me on something in my cultrue.
I don't know Tim Fuller, but John graduated from Houghton and it's all true what you said about the isolation.