The Cirrus-ness of Mortality

Don DeLillo's White Noise consistently asserts the importance of the media in perception of an event and the significance of names and titles to how people perceive their surroundings. A critical example of this is in the section, “The Airborne Toxic Event.” In this section, the residents of Blacksmith experience the presence of a large black cloud supposedly full of “Nyodene D,” a chemical that can cause death after a maximum of thirty years within the human body. Throughout the chapter, the media gives different names to the cloud, each one eliciting a different response from Jack and the residents of Blacksmith: first, a “feathery plume” (109), which does not upset or worry too many people; then a “black billowing cloud” (113), which causes Jack to think that perhaps he should be more concerned with the situation; then finally, an “airborne toxic event,” which sends Jack and the rest of the town into a panic. Not only does the media’s description of the situation determine how people are going to react to it, but when the symptoms and effects of Nyodene D are listed, it makes me wonder if the cloud would even affect people if the media was not involved. Not only do Jack’s daughters begin experiencing symptoms immediately after the media announces which symptoms are to be expected, but the symptoms themselves are extremely commonplace and could be experienced for a variety of reasons. Among the expected symptoms are: skin irritation, sweaty palms, nausea, and miscarriage; all symptoms which can be experienced without a direct link to some specific disease or ailment. Additionally, when Heinrich describes the life of the poison, he says, “…No one seems to know exactly what it causes in humans or in the offspring of humans…it has a lifespan of 40 years…after ten years your screens will turn rusty and begin to pit and rot. Siding will warp” (127). Not only are the physical symptoms in humans relatively vague, but the effects of it on a house are just signs of normal wear and tear. The “airborne toxic event” is not so much a literal cloud full of lethal poison, it is a visible reminder of both the presence of death and the inevitability that death with occur. Jack’s overwhelming preoccupation with death and his desire for an answer to the question, “who will die first,” finally has an answer, even though there was always an answer there to begin with. The cloud, Nyodene D, and the inevitability of death make up some of the "white noise."