Love it, hate it, but can’t live without it

I should love the Internet, but I don’t. Well, call it a love-hate relationship.

It allows me to express myself about anything, at any time I want to. I don’t need a soapbox, or a column to get heard. Any message I put on Facebook is broadcast immediately, and the response is instantaneous. I get immediate feedback, even if it is only a “like.” However, it takes too much of my time scrolling down Facebook looking for a good read when I should be meeting deadlines.

Texting too is wonderful. It is immediate, convenient, and free if you’re using the same service provider. Mostly I use texts for short urgent messages needing quick responses. But I often spend too much time responding to texts from people who like to conduct long conversations using 250 characters on a small screen. Why don’t they just make a call?

I accept that social media has become an absolute necessity. I can no longer get my work done without it.  Stumped with word usage? Finding authors? The first line of a song or a poem? Information is a click away on Google. Research has never been this easy.  And I look forward to my Sunday meditation fix from Fr. Johnny Go SJ’s “Pins of Light” website and get my daily news reports on Facebook. I don’t even have to read the papers or watch TV news.

Social media has made it possible for social movements to flourish, ambitions to be realized, debates on crucial issues to be broadcast, and political campaigns to be launched.  But it has also infected the atmosphere with toxic political propaganda.

On the personal side, old friendships and romances have been rekindled, and families and classmates have been reunited. It has made our world smaller, cozier, friendlier, and our concerns more immediate.  Which is all good, but social media has also introduced an entire set of questionable values and behavior.

Everyone knows that it is dangerous to text or talk on the phone and drive, but this has not stopped people from doing so. Take any group of people sitting in a restaurant, waiting in a taxi line or riding a bus or a jeepney. Most of them will have their androids in hand, earphones on, either texting, chatting, playing games or surfing the net. They don’t look at each other, much less converse. Everyone is hunched over that small screen, totally into themselves in a crowded room.

Before the dawn of social media, we used the telephone to reach our families and friends; the post office delivered our letters and family pictures in the mail. We actually held books, newspapers and magazines in our hands. We set up dates and meetings and arrived on time in the right places. And we talked to one another. Life was simple, our needs were few, and everything worked.

But social media told us we were missing something and it did not take long for the revolution in communication to overtake us. We soon forgot how to write with a pen and actually mail letters at the post office; we junked the stationary telephone at home and relied mainly on cellphones that we could use anytime and anywhere; and we learned that from the safety of our computers and smart phones, we could say what we want and actually dis and damn anyone whose views we disagreed with. 

The Internet gave us power and convenience. But it took away civility and graciousness, not to mention certain pleasures from the “old ways.”  It was a joy receiving hand-written letters and Valentine cards in the mail, opening the envelope and seeing a familiar handwriting expressing love, joy, pain, grief, longing, passion. Despite the delay from writing to delivery, letters captured emotions that were fresh, raw, and worth preserving. E-mail has taken that romance out of letter writing. 

Nobody sends actual cards anymore. Birthday greetings come by the hundreds on Facebook and even condolences are expressed electronically, with people simply striking the “like” button to express sympathy. Can you think of anything more impersonal and perfunctory?

With instant communication comes instant gratification. People do not know how to wait anymore. Everything is urgent and due yesterday. While there are certain things we need to do in real time like electronic bank transfers or on-line shopping, there are matters that need to be thought over before we respond. Social media has done much damage to human relations. Sure we communicate more intensely now, but do we really actually talk to one another? 

Must everything be responded to with such urgency? Can we slow things down a bit? Time is moving too fast. I miss lazy afternoons in languid conversation, and stopping to smell the flowers. It is time to get away from my gadgets and get unwired, if only for a while. Lent would be a good time to de-toxify from the wiles of the Internet.

Social media. Love it or hate it. Unfortunately, we can’t live without it anymore.