Look Up!

[ThePilgrim]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Z7dLU6fk9QY

 

God bless,

Larry

[John81]

It's so bad that even if someone is with a person and their phone makes a noise (whether ringing, alerting them of a new text or email) the actual person they are with is ignored in favor of getting right to their smart phone. I've often seen this happen, and on a few occasions I've seen younger folks talking for a bit and then one by one their smart phones make a noise and they each motion to the others and wonder off a bit so they can concentrate on their texting.

 

I've heard many families talking about texting one another from one room of the house to another. They can spend most of the day in the same house without hardly seeing or directly talking to one another.

 

Families get together for an occasion and half of them are busy texting or wondering off talking on their smart phones.

 

I've had people tell not to tell them something in person but to instead email them later (they know I don't text).

 

It's annoying constantly hearing these smart phones ringing (usually with some loud and often strange music) or the constant sounds they make every time they receive a new text.

 

I saw a church group getting ready to depart for some event and nearly all of them were texting rather than talking to one another.

 

I finally bought a cheap "dumb phone" which is mostly for emergency use. I've no interest in a smart phone, learning to text or posting my every move on Facebook.

 

We just ate supper together as a family and in less than an hour we'll be together for family time. Earlier today I spent about five hours with my Dad and neither of us touched a cell phone! My son and I did a little handy-man stuff outside earlier and neither of us touched a cell phone either!

 

My sister and her children almost have their smart phones attached to their hands. They text and call one another, and who knows who else, more in a week than I prOBably talk on any phone in almost a whole year.

[candlelight]

*sigh* Pilgrim.  This is all part of the "Information Age."  When I bought my IPhone, I didn't get texting on it.  My son programmed it in for free for me.  I told him we would not text, we would talk on the phone and get together once a week for lunch.  I have got a few texts from two of my SIL's awhile back.  I answered them, but told them that I wouldn't text them again b/c of the very reasons shown in the video above.  I believe this is all part of the "dumbing down" of society.

[John81]

It's hard to talk to people in person when they have earbuds stuck in their ears or they are constantly checking their smart phone, texting, making another status update or answering their ring tone.

 

I was trying to talk with a neighbor of my Dad's one day outside her house on the front steps and her daughter kept texting her from the room right on the other side of the door to the steps! Why the lady didn't shut her phone off or just tell her daughter if she wanted to talk to step through the door, I haven't a clue. After a few minutes of the constant interruptions (didn't it used to be rude to ignore company?) I told her good-bye and went back to my Dad's.

[candlelight]

It's hard to talk to people in person when they have earbuds stuck in their ears or they are constantly checking their smart phone, texting, making another status update or answering their ring tone.

 

I was trying to talk with a neighbor of my Dad's one day outside her house on the front steps and her daughter kept texting her from the room right on the other side of the door to the steps! Why the lady didn't shut her phone off or just tell her daughter if she wanted to talk to step through the door, I haven't a clue. After a few minutes of the constant interruptions (didn't it used to be rude to ignore company?) I told her good-bye and went back to my Dad's.

It certainly is, John.  Like everything, this has been gradually seeping into society.  

People have retorted to bad manners.  It WAS considered rude to ignore company at one time.  I don't blame you for saying goodbye.  She prOBably won't get the message, though, as people are in their own little worlds.  

I have always enjoyed the simplicity of life, before technology.  The only reason I got a computer, was to do my grades for teaching.  Originally, I got an emergency cell phone, for protection, when I taught in the inner city.  Payphones were scarce, and I didn't want to get out of my car while driving home, in that area.  Now, you can't find a payphone anywhere.  It has been like this for years.  Sadly, this world will never get back to the way it was before technology.          

[Alimantado]

Telephones 'dumbed down' society too by causing us to write fewer letters, as did email. So a person from the 19th century could accuse us of the same thing. ;-)

 

On a slightly more serious note, I think it's wonderful that internet forums, chatrooms etc. can provide a means for those who are housebound and/or cannot easily socialise in person to make friends and enjoy the company of others. I take the point the video is making, but it completely ignores this aspect. 

 

If we, as a society, were constantly looking out for lonely people--visiting the elderly widow, inviting the person with no family over for Christmas dinner, hanging on after church to talk with the person who finds it hard to make friends--then I'd say that the video was bang on. But we all know that's not what happens. Last Christmas a charity in the UK reported that 450,000 elderly people would be spending Christmas alone and moreover that over half of over-75s live alone and cite the television as their main source of company.

 

Being able to chat to people online may not be better than in the flesh but it certainly is better than just watching the TV. I think that if a person's neighbours don't care about them but they manage to find people online who do, then good on that person.

[candlelight]

 

Telephones 'dumbed down' society too by causing us to write fewer letters, as did email. So a person from the 19th century could accuse us of the same thing. ;-)

 

On a slightly more serious note, I think it's wonderful that internet forums, chatrooms etc. can provide a means for those who are housebound and/or cannot easily socialise in person to make friends and enjoy the company of others. I take the point the video is making, but it completely ignores this aspect. 

 

If we, as a society, were constantly looking out for lonely people--visiting the elderly widow, inviting the person with no family over for Christmas dinner, hanging on after church to talk with the person who finds it hard to make friends--then I'd say that the video was bang on. But we all know that's not what happens. Last Christmas a charity in the UK reported that 450,000 elderly people would be spending Christmas alone and moreover that over half of over-75s live alone and cite the television as their main source of company.

 

Being able to chat to people online may not be better than in the flesh but it certainly is better than just watching the TV. I think that if a person's neighbours don't care about them but they manage to find people online who do, then good on that person.

 

Excellent points, Al!

[John81]

No doubt technological communications has it's good points, I don't think anyone here would argue against those. It's when smart phones or texting or email takes the place of or prevents personal communication that could be happening when the prOBlems come forth.

 

With the internet I'm able to keep in touch with family and friends hundreds and thousands of miles away. Without this, there would be little or not connection.

 

My sister lives two blocks away. We can visit one another and talk in person; which we do. However, others in the family are now so hooked on these things if you don't text with them, you don't get much communication with them even though they live within a mile of one another. I don't text, or even have anything to text with.

 

It's a shame when folks won't walk a couple blocks to talk with someone or visit a lonely person.

[Alimantado]

Sure thing, John, I think the video makes that point well and I agree with it. But it also seems to be saying that a] widespread loneliness and isolation is a modern phenomenon caused by social media and b] online friendships aren't 'real' friendships. I think it's wrong on both counts, especially the last point.

[John81]

I get your point. While in the past much of the loneliness and isolation was due to vast distances and limited travel abilities (such conditions are where modern technology can be a real aid!) the modern phenomenon is more rooted in people choosing to avoid those in close proximity to them, those they could easily visit, in favor of spending their days "connecting" through their phones and computers.

 

It's not uncommon to see a family or group of people together somewhere but they are each so busy texting someone else there is no interaction though they are sitting with one another.

 

There has always been loneliness and isolation, but today much of it is a result of people avoiding interpersonal contact that could easily be achieved rather than due to peoples inability to get together.

[Alimantado]

Well that's where I disagree, John. It might well be different in the USA, but in the UK most people live in urban and suburban areas and I expect that at least half of the old people in the figures I cited, to focus on an example, will be living in estates and blocks of flats, i.e. with people all around them. The breakdown of community relations, leaving people living alongside each other but not with one another, has been going on for decades.

 

I grew up in a village where prior to the 1960s I suspect most of the people would have worked on farms and in businesses within the village and they'd have bought their groceries from the village high street and used the local post office to send letters etc. And of course most went to church.

 

By the time I was growing up there in the 1980s, most people had jOBs they would drive to--the factory or the office 25 miles away--and most families shopped at supermarkets. Church attendance was about 25, for a village of 3,000. I lived in a suburban street of 25 houses and my family knew the names of some of the neighbours and that was all. We certainly didn't socialise with them nor they with each other (it was OBvious). But why would they, when their 'community' was no more than the address of their real estate?

 

I think it's against this backdrop that people find themselves totally alone so easily. If they lose their spouse, family and work colleagues, there's no-one else. And if they become largely housebound, it means few options to do anything about it. I remember a couple of years ago the remains of a woman were found in her flat (apartment block) on the sofa where she'd lain dead for two years--the telly was still on.

 

Social media might make this worse of course, but plenty has been eroded already, caused by so many other aspects of our modern lives.

[ThePilgrim]

Well that's where I disagree, John. It might well be different in the USA, but in the UK most people live in urban and suburban areas and I expect that at least half of the old people in the figures I cited, to focus on an example, will be living in estates and blocks of flats, i.e. with people all around them. The breakdown of community relations, leaving people living alongside each other but not with one another, has been going on for decades.

 

I grew up in a village where prior to the 1960s I suspect most of the people would have worked on farms and in businesses within the village and they'd have bought their groceries from the village high street and used the local post office to send letters etc. And of course most went to church.

 

By the time I was growing up there in the 1980s, most people had jOBs they would drive to--the factory or the office 25 miles away--and most families shopped at supermarkets. Church attendance was about 25, for a village of 3,000. I lived in a suburban street of 25 houses and my family knew the names of some of the neighbours and that was all. We certainly didn't socialise with them nor they with each other (it was OBvious). But why would they, when their 'community' was no more than the address of their real estate?

 

I think it's against this backdrop that people find themselves totally alone so easily. If they lose their spouse, family and work colleagues, there's no-one else. And if they become largely housebound, it means few options to do anything about it. I remember a couple of years ago the remains of a woman were found in her flat (apartment block) on the sofa where she'd lain dead for two years--the telly was still on.

 

Social media might make this worse of course, but plenty has been eroded already, caused by so many other aspects of our modern lives.

Sounds like city living here to.  If I had my druthers I would have spent my whole life in a small town.  However if your work is such that you can only earn a living by living in the city or suburbs, that is what you get stuck with.

 

God bless.

Larry

[candlelight]

Sounds like city living here to.  If I had my druthers I would have spent my whole life in a small town.  However if your work is such that you can only earn a living by living in the city or suburbs, that is what you get stuck with.

 

God bless.

Larry

 

My area is diverse including city and country areas; however, much of the country has been getting built up over the last several decades.  The further west, east and south one drives the more small towns there are.  When we move we will be in a vast area with many small towns.  Although we can get to the bigger cities if we drive a ways.