An academic wrote a newspaper column decrying the rapid increase in the use of electronic communication among college students. I feel rather left out in this changing world. Several students have asked me why I am not on Facebook. I asked them in return, “How much time do you spend on Facebook each day?” After only a moment’s thought, they decided that a couple of hours a day would be average. To add a two-commitment to my life right now
Photo by mconnors
would mean that something would be shoved off my plate onto the floor. I have a cell phone, but don’t publish the number. I know how to text, but I don’t. Neither do I tweet (or follow those who do). What is driving this mad dash to connect with people electronically?
Is this a substitute for real relationships? I’ve written in earlier posts about the decline in close friendships over then past thirty years. Today nearly a third of the population has no person outside the immediate family that could be described as a close friend. The question is: is this dearth of face-to-face relationships the cause or the result of electronic communication explosion?
There are good reasons to believe that it is a cause. First, it is far easier to remain in control of the image one projects when communication is electronic. We know the horror stories about predators who surf the web looking for willing victims because it is easy to disguise one’s self in that environment. The recipient knows no more about a contact than the predator wants to reveal. Less threatening, but not much less problematic is the spread of Internet support groups for all kinds of life problems: divorce, drug abuse, grief, and unemployment. While such groups do provide a place to be heard, there is still the problem of honesty: so much can be hidden, misrepresented, or fabricated about one’s problems–and many of the clues that face-to-face conversation reveals (such as body language) are hidden. Who is going to tell the hard truth when it is so easy to create scenarios that make one look good? Then there is online dating–but I’ll leave that one alone.
There is also good reason to believe that this explosion of electronic communication is fueled by a desperate need to be connected. But why resort to indirect communication? Could it be that something else is going on in modern culture that hinders the development of close friendships? I think there is. The pace of life for American teenagers in incredible: school, extracurricular activities in sports, music, volunteer work, part time jobs, maybe church and church activities, plus pressure to do well in order to “make the grade” to a prestigious college. For young adults there
Photo by phaewilk
is the pressure of two-career families, commuting, children, daycare, school and community activities, maybe some church activities on top. Perhaps there simply is no time to sit down and visit face-to-face with our friends. Maybe we have bought the badly flawed idea that “busy” proves we are competent, valuable, responsible, organized, and hip.
If the communication explosion is the result of our lifestyles and mistaken beliefs about what is valuable, isn’t it time to reorganize our lives around relationships that promote reality, honesty, integrity, and full(er) self disclosure? What if we deliberately scheduled into our lives an hour a day to talk face-to-face with a friend, neighbor, shut-in, child, colleague, spouse, or beggar?
Reader Remarks