COOL OK THEN

CLICKFLASH!

What did I just do? Yes, I know you're all thinking it: I took a picture! Everyone in this room has probably done it, whether it's with their own camera or someone else's. But stop and think. What sort of camera do you usually use when taking pictures? WAS IT FILM OR DIGITAL???????????? Well, for those of you still trapped in the horrific world of the non-digital world, it is my intent here today to persuade you to cross the line into DIGITAL CAMERAS!

Not only is this process easy, it's also cheap, though you might not think so at first. Consider! For example, your standard disposable camera that everyone has. Nobody has a professional camera. They all just have disposable pieces of shit. Well fuck man it's not that hard to compare shitty disposable garbage to the latest digital camera to make your point. What kind of persuasive speech is this? The kind some idiot college freshman gave in 2004 before he had any god damn idea about anything in the world and no interest in challenging his shitty opinions. How much do those things cost? Six bucks? Eight bucks? Not a lot. So you get, say, uhhhh, like 27 pictures. Oh but then you have to take them so they can get developed. That takes another two days at least, and three or four dollars later, you get your pictures.

So you just spent, at minimum, nine dollars for 27 photographs. Not too bad you say? Well what do you do if half the pictures don't turn out? You just wasted half your roll of film. And you spent MONEY to see those? Now what?? Sadly, there's not a whole lot you can do.

But if you had a digital camera, none of this would be a problem, motherfucker!!! That's right. I have a digital camera so I have to justify this insane purchase. No need to hear opposing perspectives. Buy a digital camera, assholes. You can look at the picture right after you take it. Don't like it? Take another. Take as many as you want. Delete them later. That makes them better. Regular cameras suck ass.

Edit pictures. You can edit them. All you have to do is transfer the ones you take to your computer. You probably have a computer if you have a digital camera. Or at least you have access to one. Also, the cable comes with so you don't have to worry about finding one. Here's where the real advantage comes in. Almost any program, from Microsoft Word to Microsoft Powerpoint to Adobe Aftershock to Burmer Beemer to Excelior Magic Encoder to FFmemrm fmkEejf ekf etotj ijtttmngggggbjhueo fjlkel3kjgggggggggggggggg

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persuasive speech

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***Did I CONVENINCE YOU YET TO BUY ONE YET***

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•••••••••••••••••••• C A Ma E R A •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• C A M E R A ••••••••••••••••••••• C A M gE R A ••••••••••••••••••••• C A M E R A •••••••••••••ff•••••••• C A M E R A ••••••••••••••••••••• C A M E R A ••••••••••••••••••••• C A eM E R A ••••••••••••••••••••• C A M E R aA ••••••••••••••••••••• C Ae M E R A ••••••••••••••••••••• aC A M E R A ••••••••••••••••••••• C A M E Rh A ••••

This is a persuasive speech.

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Today I'll be doing my persuasive speech on how to persuade you to buy a digital cmaeaaaatnt....

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At this point you're probably asking yourself: how much does all this fancy electronic stuff cost? Well actually the prices range all over the place depending on what you want. So you should do a little research before buying the highest professional quality camera. None of us here are professional photographers. I know this because I'm not a pro. So none of you are either even though I don't know anyone in this class except for Tommy whom I went to high school with. Haha hi Tommy I dated your sister for 14 months. Actually it's pretty fucking weird that we didn't talk all semester even though I know your whole family's dirty laundry. We came from this town of 4000 people you'd think we'd at least have a human moment like a normal greeting in class once in a while in this big university where the chances of seeing each other again were almost nothing. And you're this super social funny dude but you just nod awkwardly and smile at me anytime our eyes manage to connect, which wasn't too often because who knows why.

Probably because it was fucking weird, that's why. I suppose I could have done a little more to be a regular human being instead of this stilted wooden fuck who literally had no idea how to have a conversation or make friends or make people feel at ease and didn't care about anything if it wasn't movies or video games or DIGITAL CAMERAS let's get back to the persuasive speech please. The video camera is rolling in the back. I notice that shit's not digital. Good old analog video camera does the job just fine you jackass. Bring a VHS tape on the day of your speech and record it. Teacher's orders. Then watch the recording on your own time and write an essay critiquing your performance hooookay yeah sounds great I'll get right on that. I'll just watch myself shuffle to the front of the class and mumble about cameras for five minutes without a microphone. Yeah sounds great.

Why would I want to meet my 20 year old self? Let that guy live in 2004. That's not who I am anymore. If I ran into a college-aged version of me I don't know what kinds of thoughts would surface. Probably I would be flooded with a massive wave of self-doubt and regret that it took me so long to get my god damn shit together and this 20 year old without an identity would be a colossal reminder of how sheltered and willfully ignorant I was, believing I was this incredible writer with a unique outlook. It would potentially undo a lot of the progress I've made to be an engaged and empathetic and relatable adult.

What kinds of psychological issues will affect today's college students when they're older? Now that the cultural obsession to document every waking second is so pervasive and easy I bet it will create a whole new definition of neurosis. Does everyone really want to keep their entire life in an archive easily accessible at any moment? 

Sure it's convenient to pull up an old photo or file or email and reminisce for a minute, and sure I also bet it's a nice surprise to receive an unsolicited photo exactly three years after that trip you took to Scotland and tasted all the scotch you could get your hands on but life is also filled with pain and heartache and loss and grief and horrors that fade only if you allow them to fade, and that means letting their sharpness dull with the passage of time. Keeping everything organized and only a handful of keystrokes away, ready to be accessed at a moment's notice, revitalizes all those negative thoughts that any healthy individual would have grown beyond. In ten seconds you can find a ten-year old email written by a woman who completely thrashed you and reduced you to a pitiful pile of shit who had no business dating her, let alone dating anyone. You can read this cutting letter as if it was just sent, and the ten years of distance and personal work you've done in that time collapse to nothing and you feel the feelings as acutely as when you first read them.

Okay yes you could argue nobody's forcing you to go looking through your old life or old emails or old photos so really the fault lies with you, the user, for lacking the willpower needed to resist the temptation to peek. But is it fair to put this responsibilty on an individual when technology has developed specifically to exploit our vulnerability and curiosities? Email archives reach back decades. Photo apps are smartly organized by date and event with facial recognition and effortlessly create dynamic albums that let us sort and filter with barely any thought. The temptation to look into the past only increases as it becomes easier to do so and perhaps this keeps us from rediscovering ourselves and shedding past identities or old mistakes or harmful self-talk. Maybe we're losing sight of the psychologically important idea that you are not your memories. A developed person transitions with new experiences and perspectives and does not linger in who they used to be if it no longer serves them. It is now easier than ever to let technology keep us in the past and convince us we should hang onto everything.

A good digital camera these days costs about $300. Let's assume you pay $9 per 27 pictures with your disposable bullshit. That's $3 a photo. For $300 then, you'll get 100 photos. A digital camera lets you take more than that.