#21

Oh would Andy Kaufman be proud….

For those of you who do not know who Andy Kaufman is, he was a performance artist who used to blur the line between reality and fiction, and many have even ruled his death as a hoax. His story is what came to mind when reading this article. Debbie Swanson had essentially created a character, separate from herself, that she presented as an actual being. Ethical? No way! But intesresting? Very much so.

A community had formed around the fictional being of Kaycee Swanson, and many of the community was upset, even outraged when this turned out to be a hoax. I found this artice to be incredible interesting, because it discusses the communication theory that applies to this scenario, something that seemed to be lacking when the death was announced as a hoax. The article uses interesting concepts to describe the incident that might not have even gone through Debbie’s mind when conducting this entire “Show”.

What's real? What's not? That's what I do in my act, test how other people deal with reality.
Andy Kaufman