Our culture used to have much more readable messages and symbols. Not because they were overtly hidden – but because we can no longer speak the language. One of the effects of a classical education (something that was done up until about the 1950’s) was the development of verbal, written, musical, and pictorial languages that were based on thousands of years of human development and thought.

Most modern people have completely lost the original understanding of our cultural cornerstones. The Declaration of Independence’s phrase ‘the pursuit of happiness’ really means something very different than what most people know (happiness = eudaimonia, a central concept in ancient Greek philosophy, often translated as “human flourishing,” “well-being,” or “living well,” but represents the highest human good, a state of deep fulfillment achieved by living virtuously, developing one’s potential, and fulfilling one’s purpose, distinct from fleeting pleasure (hedonia) and rooted in meaning, authenticity, and growth). Classic stories like Dante’s Inferno had so much staying power because they spoke with the language of classical definitions.

Today, we’ve traded thousands of years of cultural wisdom for internet memes and viral trends that usually only last a few days. How much have we lost? Watching videos like this can give you an idea.

I find it interesting we can no longer ‘read’ a clear message from art (like this video shows us), but instead traded that for ‘critiquing’ art. Each person can now give a piece of art its meaning and value based on their individual interpretation. An interpretation often only based on nothing more than personal opinions, ignorance of context or language, and even outright bigotry.

Instead of ‘critiquing’ a painting using only modern limited social trends and sensibilities that are limited to only the beliefs of the viewer/critiquer, maybe we should once again learn to read them and learn about a lived experience of others without trying to make it something it was never meant to be.