Social media, over the past few years, has taken the world by storm, bringing many people closer together and connecting people to different parts of the world. Even in a sense, making other people famous by what they post.
But although or social media lives are great, our face to face interactions are dead. I guess for me, as a journalism major, I have no other choice but to have a face-to-face interactions on a daily. So I got lucky, but for the rest of the world, it’s not that simple.
There is nothing wrong with straying away from the outside world and being consumed into social media for a few. It takes your mind off the stress and the troubles that you are facing and brings you into a multidimensional world where you can do and be who you want to be with limited issues and everyone does what they please. So it’s not like people have to follow a certain rule, but it is causing us to lose touch with our own reality.
In many cases, we are so consumed by our social media lives and how we are presented to the world that when it comes to interacting with people off social media, it becomes extremely difficult. How did it come to this? How did we go from striking up a conversation without any issues to being more comfortable talking to a stranger online?
It’s to a point where it’s almost terrifying. It’s more than just the lack of social and interaction skills. You are basically living your life through a computer screen, a phone or a tablet. It’s even worse for those with little kids. How many times have you seen a young child with a tablet or a phone in their hands? Now I understand, this is probably the best way to keep them quiet, but then some parents let their children stay on these sites for hours at a time and then when they put them with other kids, they do not know how to respond. They become scared and confusing wondering what they are supposed to do with 10-15 other kids surrounding them when they are so used to being in front of a computer all day.
There was a time when social media was a not even a thought across anyone’s mind and the only way you could have a social life and create a new world for yourself was by communicating with people the old fashion way. The fact that it is even called the old fashion way is still mind blowing.
Think about how the future might look if face-to-face communication was no longer a norm. Our interactions, whether negative or positive, would be completely limited to electronics. Issues concerning the world (health, war, police brutality) would be handled via Face time, which limits the intimate and constructive conversations that can ultimately be the start of a better life for all. We all would meet our future soulmate on corny dating sites and have deep conversations via text messages.
Sounds limited if you ask me.