Fyre Festival, the greatest party that never happened, has recently come back into the light of the media almost 3 years after the event. It was documented by both Netflix and Hulu, which both highlighted and “exposed” the infamous Billy McFarland, the mastermind behind it all. However, after watching these documentaries, more questions arose. Here are a few:
“What does the fiasco tell us about the culture of society and media today?”
It is clear that the prevailing theme of what happened with Fyre Festival is the falsity that can be portrayed through social media. Using tools of marketing, it is easy to create a specific perception of someone or something in today’s society, especially through sources such as Instagram. This teaches us to not believe in everything we see. We are gullible to visuals as we do not know what is actually occurring on the other side. This is something millennials must keep in mind as navigating through the technological world. Being aware is the first step to not falling into these traps that are all around us.
“If Billy McFarland was caught for such a huge scam, how many of these swindles are already around us?”
It took a potential music festival with top rated artists, a beautiful tropical island, supermodels, and 6,000 tickets sold for a single scammer to get caught. Even when McFarland was on trial for his crimes, he continued to hustle people through other small illegitimate businesses. This begs the question of how many potential hustlers and hustles are unknowningly around us.
“If the whole thing was a mass media exploitation, then what does that tell us about the documentaries?”
If we are already predisposing the question of how media is creating false images, then what about the Netflix and Hulu documentaries themselves? This documentary shined light on someone who was a master manipulator of the media, so this film that may reach millions of viewers, creates controversy itself. It makes one wonder the motives and sources of this exploitation.