| We live in an age of technology that claims it is keeping us more connected than ever before via social networking websites, blogs, unlimited long distance calling, and instant messages of all kinds. And thanks to these fabulous advances in science, we and our peers are blessed/cursed to be the very first generation rendered virtually incapable of putting the past behind us. Names and faces from our former high schools, summer camps, jobs, and lost weekends now flair up out of nowhere like a bad case of herpes--deserved or undeserved; invited or uninvited. In addition to these parades of skeletons, emerging from our closets fun and fancy-free, we have also been granted the priviledge of free press--literally. By pressing a few buttons and keys and completely without a book deal, we are able to publish our life stories and provide photographic evidence that we DID eventually grow into our large ears and bony shoulders, and furthermore, our kids DID NOT turn out looking like the elephant man. All of this clarity and vindication is bestowed upon us and we are not required to make physical or vocal contact with a soul. In other words, we can, with the click of a mouse, discover who married the head cheer leader or dumped the class clown and never set foot in a high school reunion. Yes, clearly we are becoming a more intimate and close knit society. I mean, am I alone here? Does this freak anyone else out? We are so immune to noise that we no longer hear each other, so desensitized to visual stimulation that we no longer see each other. The amount of advertisements that we ingest in a single day is literally so extreme that even billboards--towering 30 foot posters of larger than life women in bikinis--aren't effective anymore. Companies must now spend millions of dollars on pop up ads that hit us directly in our line of sight just so we will notice what they're selling, and even these must be so cleverly designed that it takes us a good 15 seconds to find out how to get rid of them. I read somewhere that a study released by people in the recording industry revealed the amount of silence in the world is rapidly decreasing. Sound technicians can no longer record a fraction of the amount of uninterrupted silence that they could 40 years ago due to increased air travel, spreading population, and inventions like cell phones, laptops, and ipods. This shouldn't be that hard to believe, considering we can't even sit through an hour of church without hearing Kanye West announce that someone nearby has received a text message. But come on, silence? Really? Did you ever think that you would have to worry about whether we would run out of silence? It seems like something we should be able to take completely for granted; an intangible idea that only runs out when we do. Like hope. Or trust. Or peace. Silence. I'm not saying technology is bad. I am writing this on a laptop, while cuddled up under my electric blanket, and when I'm finished I will probably check my facebook messages to see if I heard back from my long lost jr. high boyfriend. (J/K...kinda). Like most things, these advances can be used for good or bad, but I do think we are kidding ourselves if we believe we are becoming a more connected society because we are reading blogs, snooping photos, and tracking status updates on twitter. There's something to be said for "face time" that does not involve edited photos, laughter that you don't have to spell out with letters (lol), and the honesty you won't find posted all over a metaphorical wall. |
