INSIDE VOICES 1. What’s The Meaning of Myth?
REAL JACKOBAT:
Well people think myth means “falsehood.”
That’s the first lie of modernity, that truth and fiction are sworn enemies.
ALTER EGO JACKOBAT:
Enemies? They’re roommates! They share a fridge! Truth eats fiction’s leftovers!
REAL:
(Laughs softly.)
Maybe. But a myth isn’t a lie – it’s a lens.
It’s how humanity tried to make the invisible visible before it invented microscopes.
ALTER EGO:
And then we invented YouTube. Which is the opposite: making the visible invisible.
REAL:
That’s not entirely wrong.
Myth used to illuminate; now we scroll in darkness, pretending to know light.
ALTER EGO:
So myth is… like the Wi-Fi password to the collective unconscious? But no one wrote it down properly so we keep typing “Prometheus123” and getting the wrong signal.
REAL:
That’s not bad. The gods used to live in stories; now they live in algorithms.
The difference is myths once told us why to live.
Now algorithms tell us what to watch.
ALTER EGO:
Yeah, and the gods didn’t have “skip ad” buttons. Zeus just was the ad.
REAL:
Myth was the original user manual for existence.
But unlike modern manuals, it didn’t tell you how to use life, it asked you why you wanted to.
ALTER EGO:
Okay, but here’s my beef: myths are old. Dusty.
I want a myth with Wi-Fi, self-driving chariots, and emotional-support dragons.
REAL:
You say that, but you and I wear the same mask.
Maybe the myth isn’t old, maybe we just keep rebooting it.
ALTER EGO:
Ah, so the pumpkin’s not decoration – it’s reincarnation.
REAL:
Precisely. Every mask is a reminder that identity is a costume borrowed from eternity.
ALTER EGO:
Deep. Also slightly sweaty.
REAL:
Pretension and perspiration. The twin costs of philosophy.
ALTER EGO:
Okay, philosopher, what’s the modern myth then?
Netflix? TikTok? Elon Musk’s Twitter saga?
REAL:
Every civilization tells the story it can afford to believe. Ours believes in progress, speed, and endless novelty. So our myth is the feed; the infinite scroll of the gods.
ALTER EGO:
Oh, so I’m basically a digital shaman with bad Wi-Fi. Makes sense. I chant into the void, and sometimes the void clicks “like.”
REAL:
And sometimes the void unsubscribes.
ALTER EGO:
Yeah. But that’s the beauty. myths need skeptics.
Otherwise, belief gets stale.
REAL:
True. The moment a myth becomes unquestionable, it stops being alive.
Doubt is oxygen.
ALTER EGO:
And memes are the modern hieroglyphs.
Tiny gods, all screaming in pixels.
REAL:
Then maybe we haven’t lost myth at all , we’ve just fragmented it into a billion jokes.
ALTER EGO:
So you’re saying the Internet is mythology, just badly moderated.
REAL:
Exactly. The new Olympus is the comment section.
ALTER EGO:
And every troll is a fallen angel with a keyboard.
REAL:
And every creator a mortal trying to speak divine language before the algorithm forgets them.
ALTER EGO:
So what’s the moral, pumpkin-head?
REAL:
Myth isn’t about believing the impossible, it’s about remembering the invisible.
ALTER EGO:
And laughing at it before it gets too serious.
REAL:
Precisely. Because the moment you stop laughing at the gods…they start laughing at you.
ALTER EGO:
Then we better keep them entertained.
REAL:
Agreed. Now, shall we myth again next week?
ALTER EGO:
Next week doesn’t exist until someone tells a story about it.
REAL:
Then I’ll meet you in the next story.