R1- Response to Readings

Throughout the readings, there is a great emphasis on how data has improved our ability to examine conflicts and solve problems, which is true! Data works on every scale, from understanding and solving mass poverty to helping an individual keep track of their healthy habits. On a large scale, the use of concrete fact and numbers allows people to draw connections between aspects of an issue that may have been otherwise overlooked. On an individual scale, to define oneself with numbers, allows a person to objectively examine their choices and habits in a concrete way, which removes the self doubt and even lying to yourself that can often lead to unhealthy lifestyles and daily choices. It’s amazing how data collection and examination has brought countries, communities, and individuals to a place of empowerment over and understanding of the once invisible problems that surround them

In many ways, however, data feels like a form of problem solving that is one step removed from the root of a conflict. With many quantifiable issues, such as deaths by gun violence or terrorist attacks, perpetuating numbers removes the heart from a conflict. It ignores the person and story and culture behind each data point, skipping straight to a holistic clumping of tragedy. Often times the numbers that come out of mass tragedies are so huge that they are absolutely incomprehensible to the reader in the first place. Placing such intense focus on a number, which is impossible to relate to or understand, can lead to desensitization toward the issue itself. Focus on numbers can also lead to inaction, or the spread of data can to many feel like a replacement for actual activism.

This is a place where story telling and art in response to data becomes essential. It takes careful consideration and analysis of all aspects of a problem and the culture of those it effects in order to effectively rally people to solve the problem. Artists we have the power to be subversive in ways other forms of protest cannot, and certainly in ways the simple spread of data cannot be. Traditional forms of protest, such as rallies, while effective in many ways, often fall into a cycle of conduct in which the rebellion and the “evil” are codependent. The result is stagnating, keeping the balance between good and evil rather than one overthrowing the other. In the same way, focusing on the incomprehensible data points of a tragedy skips over the installation of emotion into a reader or viewer, whether that intended emotion might be fear, empowerment, anger, or a passion to act! Art and storytelling, however, has the power to break this cycle. Art goes beyond acting as a defense or comfort during times of tragedy. It goes beyond examining a conflict as if it were made up of simple ingredients. Art holds the power to engage, invigorate, and inspire people in a bright and accessible way, even in times when an immediate tragedy does not have politics on the top of everyone’s minds.