In today's world people are consumed by technology and handheld devices. There are millions of gigabytes of information at the fingertips of society and accessible from anywhere in the world. The story "Videotape" written by Don DeLillo is about technology and its impact on lives. However to find the true meaning behind the story some investigating is required. DeLillo appears to be very straightforward with his story, but certain lines stand out in the text which make the reader look at the story from a different perspective. One of these lines is "This is a children's story about straying too far from home" (DeLillo 61). Throughout the story the author uses great imagery to convey to the reader exactly how the video looks by describing the film, he refers to the video as being "surrealistic" which is another point that required more looking into.

This story initially seems very straight forward until the author surprises the reader, he directly said as I have previously stated "This is a children's story about straying too far from home" (DeLillo 61). After digging into this quote it made sense, the author is saying the entire time that kids are losing their innocence by allowing themselves to be overrun by technology which in this case takes the form of a video camera. In multiple instances he talks about kids going recording everything from family dinners or celebrations to their elders eating food.      This causes kids to dig deeper into the meaning of things and forcing them to stray away from their original purpose, to be kid. DeLillo says "They investigate the meaning of inert objects and dumb pets and they poke at family privacy. They learn to see things twice" (59). What DeLillo is saying is that kids are being stripped of their childhoods by technology because they are too busy investigating the world around them. In the story though DeLillo talks about how the girl is playing a game with the man in the other car or at least thinks that she is by recording him, which seems to contradict his previous statements. Right before the man is killed is the quote "She wandered into it. The girl got lost and wondered clear-eyed into horror" (DeLillo 61).The author is suggesting that witnessing the murder was a result of the girl's desire to investigate, had she not investigated and filmed this man she would have never seen the crime. Had she just filmed him for a few seconds and moved on she would have been safe from the violence that happened.

Another strange part of this work is when the author describes the quality of the film he describes it as "There is something about the nature of the tape, the grain of the image, the sputtering black-and-white tones, the starkness  --  you think this is more real, truer to life than anything around you" (DeLillo 60). This is a very deep quote but how can a film which by his description sounds to be of poor quality be more realistic than life itself? In the authors biography it has a little blurb about how his works talk about the impact of technology on the human life. Perhaps the technology is so pertinent to the girl's life it has become part of her and what she sees through the camera lenses is more real to her than life. This story could also tie in to modern day society, if people turned off their devices for a few days they would miss out on global events and news that seem to be so pertinent to their lives when in reality it doesn't really matter to them, all it does is expose them to the violence and brutality of humans and how they can hate and destroy each other. As the story said if the girl had just stopped recording or moved on to another car she would have never noticed this impertinent detail that will surely haunt her for the rest of her life. The story really is all about the little girl losing he innocence due to here curiosity. This brings about a personal connection to the reader and forces them to think back on their lives to try and remember what they did as kids with their curiosity and their thirst for answers. This brings about a nostalgic feeling and a mild feeling of fear and curiosity, the nostalgia comes from making the reader delve deep into their past to try and remember if they did anything like the little girl or what kids do as the story describes it. The fear and curiosity come from the murder and trying to think about why the crime was committed and why the man was killed. The description really puts the reader in the place of the little girl and forces them to think back. Technology has become so intertwined with our society that reality has become blurred and the artificial images created by technology and the media are replacing reality. It is a rather terrifying thought but the author was known to talk about the impact of technology on society in his biography so it would not be surprising if he was simply incorporating his ideas about the impact in his work.

DeLillo makes another statement that further shows his ideas on how deeply technology is impacting society. He writes "the tape ends here, either because the girl stopped shooting or because some central authority, the police or the district attorney or the TV station, decided there was nothing else you had to see" (DeLillo 62). Once again he is hinting at the fact that humans are losing their independence and are being dictated by a superior force, in this case technology and the media. No one knows why the tape ended so abruptly but if people wanted to keep watching they should have had the choice or the option to. They should not have to be censored and denied access to information if they want it. This is again the human curiosity at work wanting to get to the bottom of the crime and figure out exactly what happened. However, due to a greater force denying people access they will never get the satisfaction of solving the crime or conducting their own brief mental investigation of the events that transpired. 

The story "Videotape" displays the effects that technology has on society and talks about the curiosity that lies within all human beings. The author also makes a point to show how technology in a sense is taking away the innocence of children by giving them access to all the information they could ever want. Had the girl simply stopped filming before the man was shot she would have never witnessed the violence and would not have to live with that memory, however because she was so absorbed in the technology and wanting to investigate the man she ended up being the sole witness to his murder.

