Reading as transgressive act

On Friday the 22nd I had the great joy of showing a group of High School students the Twilight Zone episode "Time Enough at Last". This episode is one that is frequently lampooned and parodied throughout popular culture and concerns Harold Bemis a "reader". The title "reader" is in quotes not because he can read minds, or sees into the future but because that term is thrown at him like an epithet throughout the first act of the episode. This made my students laugh.
The idea that reading, that most heralded of activities by teachers and 'the more you know' commercials was being represented as a negative, unworthy pass time. The students could not believe that television was some how making reading seem like a detrimental activity.
The analog I think would be if all of the sudden there was an episode of some widely viewed sit com that denigrated eating healthful food and getting 90 minutes of exercise a day. The students just could not grasp the premise that Bemis was so enthralled by the act of reading that he was letting his life slip away from him.
Now, lets forget for a second that the Twilight Zone is where the ham-fisted metaphor was born. I am sure that Rod Serling was not actually writing about reading per se but it was still enough in the cultural lexicon that it was believable in this context.
Now the rest of the episode with its O. Henry plot twist certainly got the desired effect from the students. They got the ironic tragedy of it all (and if you have not seen it, by all means find some way to see it, it is deliciously over-acted, filled with purple prose but is still as effecting as it was when it aired...a real joy to watch). But it lead me to ask the question 'what role does reading play in a 21st century context? How do students engage in text and by extraction storytelling?
What I found from a brief survey of very bright, motivated and funny students is that reading has come to be almost counter-cultural. It is a sort of post-modern ironic way to pass the time. This in no way is said to minimize the students entertainment options, some are readers, some watchers, some play sports, some act, some sing, some draw others play video games...none of these things are greater than another none of the above pass times are in anyway more worthy than their list-mates I was just surprised at the place on the mantle that reading for pleasure took. Judging by my self-described 'readers' reading for fun (that is beyond reading text messages, reading for school or reading a bus table) is the equivalent to listening to new music on vinyl, having ironic frames on your non-corrective lenses and wearing jeans that are just on this side of indecently tight. Again, no judgment just never thought that the novel which was once the refuge of the socially maladjusted nerd is now the beret and clove cigarette of my generation.
The act of picking up a book, or ereader, or what have you has taken the prominence of wearing the teeshirt of a band of whom 95% of the people around you have not heard or being able to trace the continuity of superheroes and fantasy characters back to their origins or having conversations with your small enclave of friends speaking french or standing in a circle bouncing a hackey sack on your feet. It looks like kids have turned the corner and have made culture a counter-culture. I think its kind of neat.
No. I don't have a point really, I was just tickled that for a few minutes I was able to speak with students about stuff they like without their guard up. It mad me nostalgic for the times in my life where I was desperate to fit in a niche (all of my examples above were groups you could have found 17 year old Adam). Alright, back to the world of dreams. I appreciate the indulgence of a little un-edited thought on a Monday morning. Happy reading fellow hipsters :)