Why so many images?

I guess a picture does tell a thousand words as some ancient Eastern sage once said. Images - pictures - have taken over the internet media scape. Every popular website, blog etc are images - mostly mundane subject matter such as selfies which is such a recent phenomenon that it still shows up as a spelling error on my word processors - or superficial fashion/shopping/consumerism stuff. How many pictures of yourself and friends can you take/look at before you become sick of yourself and others? I am a teacher of teens in NYC and it amazes me how many images they take or look at for hours a day. I love looking at images too - for I am an artist and a visual person by nature but I also love to read. I feel that the next generations do not read enough. Reading is how we absorb and process information to make informed decisions - or so we hope. With the proliferation and popularization of images via social websites by creatives and silicon valley - there seems to be no end in sight. Let's face it - images are easier on the brain. Less work for the lazy mind. Images have become dangerous distractions from reality which needs more participation of we the people. Apathy is a luxury we as a country/world can no longer afford.

I recently was coming back to NYC from a short stay in Woodstock - on the bus. I was seated with my girlfriend right behind a young duo of female teens - probably around 16-18. They spent the entire 2 hour trip scanning through images on their smart phones and a laptop. I could not help but see through the space between seats what they were viewing. Mostly images of friends and themselves - mostly selfies of the one dominant, peroxided blond girl who was doing most of the image searching. 

I looked at some images myself, in my magazines like National Geographic and Discovery but more importantly I managed to read several articles and a few chapters of a book called Imagine Living in a Socialist USA. I feel people need to balance out their image obsession with reading and therefore becoming more knowledgeable human beings. Do more civic action - get involved-organize-fix the world because our leaders are all puppets and it is up to us to make things right through grass roots organizing. This takes time and energy - the precious time and energy most are wasting looking at and taking pictures of everything - instead of doing something useful for society. Such as reading my book Sto-ology: A Metaphysical Exploration of the Human Condition - many informed concepts on just about everything under the sun!