The deafening hagiography of Steve Jobs

I hate to say this, but enough already. Yes, Steve Jobs was "insanely great." The Apple mogul deserves praise for his culture-altering accomplishments. I too wish he had not departed this world so soon. And may he rest in peace. But enough with the soul-rending eulogies already. GASP! What, too soon? Well, perhaps. But c'mon -- am I really the only one who thinks the cartoon at left is a tad over the top? Granted, it is well-intended and represents only one in a flood of digital bouquets thrown as appreciations, remembrances or retrospectives. A bit disturbingly, some border on being self-serving tales in obit guise. ("We spent the afternoon on the shoreline of Kona, Hawaii, where Jobs and his wife ...," waxed one writer in an apparent need to showcase her "chosen few" status.) Another obit-tale, written by Ron Rosenbaum for Slate, is entitled "Steve Jobs and Me." In it, he reveals how his 1971 article supposedly inspired Jobs. Anyway, you get the picture. I have little doubt that Jobs, an intensely private man, would cringe at the sheer volume of hagiography being spun about him. "Apple is a new religion, and Steve Jobs was its high priest," read the headline of a Washington Post story about Jobs this morning. Post reporter Michael Rosenwald wrote: "[T]here’s a greater, higher power at work here, a mystical truth that has emerged among more enlightened Apple fans and on the fringes of academic research. In a secular age, Apple has become a religion, and Steve Jobs was its high priest." Um, you gotta be kidding me. Though Rosenwald is quite serious (he drank the Apple Kool-Aid long ago), he acknowledges that there is truth in the words of a friend who told him: “I feel bad for the guy and his family. ... if anything, the outpouring of grief shows just how obsessed we’ve become with our electronic toys." In other words, this amazing surge to canonize Jobs as a saint says more about us than him. It probably speaks to a yawning cultural emptiness that is nibbling away at the soul of an increasingly narcissistic society. But that is grist for another post. History will give Jobs his proper due. In the here and now, Apple fans might be wiser to follow the advice Jobs himself gave: "Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life." Or worshiping it.

Cartoon credit: Steve Breen (San Diego Union-Tribune)