French Flag Facebook

My head spun at the speed with which memes started popping up on Facebook Friday evening after the news of terrorist attacks in Paris began to spread. It seemed like the situation wasn't even resolved and there were all sorts of Eiffel Tower re-imagined as a peace sign and other such shows of support began appearing on my news feed. Then there was the option to superimpose the French tricolor over your profile picture in show of support. All this before the facts were in and the crisis resolved.

We can look at this as an example of  the Global Village in action: wide swaths of humanity joined together in instant virtual solidarity and common concern for our brothers and sisters on the other side of the world. I want to be careful with what I'm about to say here, because I assume every one's sincerity. While this may be true, there is something about it that makes me uncomfortable; like something grave is being trivialized, albeit unintentionally. 

For decades we've grown use to ribbons of various colors denoting one cause or another and now, in the cyber age, we have memes, stickers, stylized profile pictures and many other forms of virtual communication that I've seen but don't know the names for, that we can use to express our emotions and concerns. But then soon enough they are usually gone and we've moved on to the next cause of the month, week or, heavens help us, day. This all goes hand in hand with the 24 hour news cycle that keeps us from really absorbing the events happening in the world around us. We see, we are horrified, we "do something" then we're on our way. 

I'm not knocking this new found custom. I get that we want to feel as if we're involved and express our concern. But again I turn back to the very real danger of superficiality, and of not really talking the time to understand what's going on and how everything is connected on a deeper level.

I didn't change my profile picture to the French flag motif, though I was tempted, because tomorrow I'll just have to change it again to Beirut or Germany or The Philippines. The attack Friday wasn't an isolated incident, but was a part of, as Pope Francis has observed, a "piecemeal World War III" that is only escalating. To confront this reality we are going to need more than clever memes or poignant quotes posted to our wall. It's going to take courage, unity and resolve: as well as understanding the distant roots of this conflict, and that we really are in a struggle for civilization. When Facebook comes up with a handy dandy profile picture filter to express all that, then I'll participate.