I am not a tech junkie. However, I have not been one to chagrin some new fancy gadget. This is the reason I have an iPod and it is also the reason that iPod is the mini from 2004. Some of my friends get the newest when they come out, I just like to have the best I can afford until it breaks. These serve me as tools for how I live my life and not the realm within I live my life.Yesterday Facebook celebrated its 5 year birthday. I suppose that is something that is momentous for the social networking guru. I am sure it spawned quite a bit of conversation in praise for its success and I know it was a moment to draw criticism for its flaws. However here is my take on Facebook and its friends.
I joined Facebook about a year or two ago just because plenty of the youth and college students we worked with constantly on it. It soon became a daily ritual for me to check my account and see if I received a wall post or if someone had posted something new. Here I was able to reconnect with childhood friends as well as share the lives of my friends now. For me it became, and is, a medium in which I can extend the relationships in my life a little further.
Since this is how I use it of course I think it is the balanced view of this site and those like it. However, I have friends (I think we all do) whose usage of it goes far beyond a medium for extending relationships to a world in which relationships exist. We have seen them holding their blackberry’s, and iPhones waiting for the next status update or Tweet to come through oblivious to the world around them. In an instant they can “relate” to a variety of people in ways normal communication cannot.
This ability seems like it should be lauded. It is a momentous day in information. It is like reaching the new world, taking the first flight, landing on the Moon. It is a great advance to be able to communicate so rapidly and broadly. However in its advancement it has left the substance of what it was enhancing behind and created a world of shallow relationships and meaningless tripe, a second life prone to fantasy.
2 Comments:
Thanks for the reflection. We don't want to gloss over the local contexts and relationships in which God has placed us in His providence.
Additionally, I think that technology is like an amplifier for the soul. It amplifies both strengths and weaknesses, sanctification and depravity. New technologies enable us to communicate information more efficiently and effectively than previous ones. In many ways it increases the need for dependence upon God's grace, Christian accountability, and a renewed sense fear and trepidation. These devices underscore the standing biblical mandate to guard our lips and pens with vigilance, knowing that more people than ever will take in the fruit that they produce.
J
Facebook (especially status updates), Twitter, and texting have lessened what was human communication. One parent noted to me that a teen boy interested in her daughter was a stud in text messages, but couldn't hold a real conversation face to face. I don't think he's the exception.
Communication is two humans connecting. Through technology, those connections have become shallower (shorter and less meaningful) in order to become wider (as frequent communications as possible to as many friends as possible).
And teenagers will blaze through this with blinding speed and no consideration except the novelty of that latest thing. We need to step back and evaluate the situation, in order to make sure we are helping and not hindering the development of the next generation.
And then we should communicate that to them. Face to face.
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