Birth of an Epidemic

Aliza Abarbanel and Chelsea BrandweinStaff WritersAN EPIDEMIC - (επι (epi)- meaning "upon or above" and δεμος (demos)- meaning "people" refers to a disease brutally affecting a population to the point of widespread sickness. The originally medical definition has been transformed to a label for both disease and social trends that rapidly spread and have massive effects.In 1348, Europe was ravaged by a vicious pandemic known as the Black Plague. It is estimated to have killed between 30 to 60 percent of Europe’s population, causing burning fevers and puss filled boils before creating enough corpses to flood the streets. Then, the HIV AIDS virus grew to epidemic standards in the 1980s. A combination of low health care and increased unprotected sexual activity led to the rampage of the disease, and hysteria increased.Recently, the word epidemic has taken on another meaning. Social epidemics, or waves of widespread trends, affect our lives, influencing everything from fashion to class electives. Of course, our model social epidemic is key, Facebook.Prior to the rise of the social network one would have to literally follow someone around if they had any intention of stalking them. One had to ask if the apple of their eye was “in a relationship.” Now with Facebook taking control of our social lives, anyone can claim to be married to another social networker without actually eloping. Facebook is contagious among teenagers, its like the Black Plague ─only more menacing. While the symptoms may take a while longer to appear, face it, they do. Late homework assignments, cyber bullying and an increased obsession to be “in the know” are the new symptoms of a social epidemic.Writer Malcolm Gladwell has created three rules of epidemics, the three key factors to the start of an epidemic. These are the Law of the Few, the Stickiness Factor and the Power of Context —they are responsible for everything from the enormous popularity of Facebook to the HIV AIDS virus.The Law of the Few states that social epidemics are driven by a small group of exceptional people. The classic example is the so-called “Patient Zero” of AIDS, a French-Canadian flight attendant named Gaetan Dugas. He claimed to have had 2,500 sexual partners all over North America, and was linked to at least 40 of the earliest cases of AIDS in both California and New York. His sexual prowess is assumed to have infected hundreds, and each infected partner infected another until the virus snowballed, becoming a worldwide deadly disease.Social epidemics start the same way, they are also driven upwards by the efforts of a few influential people, whose wide social circle or intense peer influence mark them as the people who have the ability to start a social epidemic. These people are strikingly similar to Regina George from the movie “Mean Girls,” whose high social status enables her to start the most ridiculous trends, such as wearing hole-ridden shirts that exposed bras.The Stickiness Factor expands on the Law of the Few, stating that epidemics have even more staying power when something unusual happens to transform the person who starts the epidemic. The factor means that the message that is transmitted makes an impact, and that slight changes in how an idea is presented can make the difference between a widespread epidemic and a fickle fad. A classic example would be the enormous popularity of The Beatles. The band and their free feeling music hit American shores shortly before the Vietnam war, and their equality and love preaching songs became the anthem of the pacifist effort and a generation.The Harry Potter Series is the textbook example of the Power of Context. The thick, hardcover books lined the shelves of Barnes and Noble, spanning 422 pages of magical adventure. When J.K. Rowling approached publishers with a hefty novel designed for preteens, she was turned down on the principle that no young reader would brave several hundred pages of text. However, the series has achieved mass levels of popularity unheard of in children’s literature.What the publishers had forgotten was the timing of their potential reader’s birth. Raised on Sesame Street and the idea that books were one’s friend, these budding intellectuals refused to be daunted by the length of Rowling’s novels. Her books found a home on nightstands across the world due in part to the highly literate mindset that her readers learned to read in. And so, the Power of Context helped jump-start a literary revolutionThus, an epidemic is born. A disease is spread. A society is changed.aabarbanel@thesamohi.com