We very much are both enabled and constrained by new mobile communication technology. Just this morning I was reading through a particularly hilarious AskReddit post on instances of extreme laziness and many of them involved use of mobile technology. For example, searching for an online textbook instead of getting the same textbook from the next room and downloading a movie that is on dvd in the basement, instead of actually going to get it. In a strange and funny way access to cellphones, laptops and wifi enable us to be that much more “effective”. I believe the constraint comes with time, when such behaviors become chronic for instance one extreme case in the same string of responses on Reddit was someone who spent an entire three day weekend in bed with nothing else but several bags of sour cream and onion chips, only leaving the confines of their bed twice to urinate. Sounds incredibly boring pre 1995, but in this day and age it is clearly plausible. Beyond this instance, behaviors such as this left unchecked can lead to some serious isolation issues. As many of the readings explain, this technology and its usage changes how we interact with each other.
Our access to almost anything online has affected how I communicate. I do my best to maintain a constant persona across all realms of communication, however, the anonymity offered by internet communication has created some foul beasts of men and women. The technology itself lends me to follow a path of least resistance, usually texting and ignoring most calls from strange numbers. Choice in who you communicate with is complicated. Depending on who is on Facebook or not, for me, is a significant factor in keeping in touch with many friends. Using myself as an example, If certain friends of mine do not use Facebook I can expect significant strain on those relationships, while it is much easier to at least maintain a connection via Facebook. Because of this I’ve made an effort to participate in many different social media technologies to keep these connections. Not because I feel a need to be a part of the technology or have that online persona to the world. I just want to maintain connections.
In my youth I was tasked with explaining this phenomenon of texting over calling to a couple senior citizens and we both left the conversation confused. Them still wondering why youth today insists on such a muted method of communication when a call takes a similar amount of effort and I wondering just the same. Yet my cohort still does it, and its even grown in a sense. Facebook and Instagram personas are particularly fascinating and definitely propagate the “need” to communicate and not just through texting, your whole life must now be displayed online and its all very much keeping up with the Joneses. I really do not like it at all yet grossly attached to it like so many others because we’ve all adopted it so wholeheartedly. I want to end saying how strange I think this attachment is, and in the back of my head I want to throw it all out and experience life face-to-face, but I can help but to think what I'd be missing out on.
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