Sunday, June 3, 2012

Connected... but not

I attended a high school graduation ceremony last night (Congratulations, Jon!).

Watching all the kids saying their goodbyes, I was reminded of how different the world is from how it was when I graduated in the Dark Ages.

Back then, we meant it when we said, "Goodbye." We had house-phone numbers and physical addresses for the people who mattered most but, aside from them, the only chance we'd have of catching up with classmates was to run into them at the grocery store or something. If we called someone and he or she wasn't home, we didn't get to talk.

Even as kids left the ceremony last night with their families and friends, a great many were on their phones, sharing the night's excitement with the people on the other ends of the connections.

With cell phones and social media sites, kids of today don't really have to make much of an effort to stay in touch. Everyone's just... there. A few clicks away.

But are they really there?

In some ways, I think we had it better in the old days. When we did get around to engaging with someone, we really engaged.

Text messages and social media sites work great as supplemental forms of communication for people who see each other often. Social media sites also are great for strangers who've met rarely, if at all, and who first come to know each other through those sites.

I'm not so sure of their value when it comes to maintaining contact with people we used to know.

For people who want to keep the friendships, the new media can be an in-your-face reminder that friends have moved on. And for the friends moving on, the new media can prompt daily guilt pangs. They see their old friends right there in their lists but maybe lack the time or the inclination to talk to them. And some people are so wrapped up in maintaining their virtual lives that they don't have time for real ones.

When I was young, my world was small, but that made it easier to find my place within it. I didn't really have to worry that a clumsy or otherwise embarrassing moment would be captured for all posterity. I felt free to take chances, to try and to fail. People weren't as cruel, back then, as they are now. The rudeness that began with anonymous internet posting and evolved to by-name flame wars online has shattered the boundaries of acceptable treatment of others in the real world.

I can't help but wonder about the effects the Technological Revolution will have on today's kids as they mature and take their places in society. And what will the ripple effects mean for society?

I feel, in some ways, quality of communication has been sacrificed for quantity. Privacy has been slashed to pieces in the interest of sharing.

People scream their lives for the world to see. But, given that everybody's screaming, is anybody really listening? Are we paying attention in ways that can make a difference?

We learn what someone's dog ate for lunch. We read about the guy who cut someone off in traffic. We see pictures of shoes that are just so adorable to people we're never going to see wearing them.

I get frustrated with myself because I read the inane things people blast. It's disgusting to me that, with all the things I need to get done, I'm scrolling through screens and screens of NOTHING. But if I go online, I need to look for things that might be important. Because, if I don't, my friends there will know I came on and talked to other people but not them. And that might hurt their feelings. Especially if they posted something that really mattered.

And when I finally do get to posts about SOMETHING, I'm often sorry they're there.

We find out somebody's spouse or boss is a jerk. That kind of post can make a real difference... but usually not in a good way.

We find out someone's having health or financial problems and we don't know what to type. In the real world, we wouldn't need words. But when words are all we have, we desperately want to get them right. And, all too often, we fail.

The posts that most trouble me are the ones by parents publicly complaining about their kids. A lot of those kids have accounts and, even if they don't, they probably will at some point... and their friends and enemies might already. Nothing on the internet can be trusted to go away. How betrayed are children going to feel when they see proof of what their parents once said about them, for all the world to see?

And, of course, there's always the possibility that something meant for a select few gets blasted to the world. That kind of thing doesn't happen when you engage personally. You know who's at the table with you.

Once bitten, twice shy, they say. As people get burned with the public revelations, they become more careful. They take their private issues back to private places. The result is that, over time, the percentage of inanity goes up and up and up.

I think the free-for-all internet's days are numbered. Over time, people will increasingly find better things to do with their time than read about nothing. I think the mega-sites will increasingly have to cater to the true public interest and offer more possibilities for people to create small, private circles made up of people who have the same interests and who can trust each other to care when they really have something to say. At least, I hope so.

I long for the good old days, when being connected to someone really meant something.

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