An Inconvenient Truth: An Increase in Technological Communication

The increase in technology and the ways we use technology has a dramatic impact on the way we communicate with each other. Cell phones, video chatting, and emailing create new ways for us to communicate. We seem to be using these methods more and more often. As great and easy as these ways seem, it makes the old ways of communicating with each other that much harder.

Before texting, the way to break up with someone was either to call or tell them face to face. But now, you can send one message and end a relationship. We text instead of talking. What kind of relationships are we forming?

The truth is that it is easier to text someone instead of call, or video chat someone instead of meeting up with them. Once we stop putting in the effort to talk face to face with people, what have we become? Our lives are based on communication and our relationships with each other. The most important people in my life are the ones I see and talk to the most. The people I talk to on Facebook, or text, are far less important. These relationships are not the ones that last a lifetime. But they seem to be the ones we find the most interesting.

My generation seems to be obsessed with how many friends they have on Facebook and how many people text them. I probably have at least five friends who are addicted to texting, going on Facebook, etc. Some people just cannot leave their phone at home, and are constantly checking to see if someone has texted them. When you are trying to have a conversation with someone, and they are checking their phone, it feels like their other "friends" are more important than you are.

Another problem with all of these new ways of communicating is the distractions it creates. Instead of finishing our English blog early, we might be checking our email or Facebook page. Instead of spending quality time with the family, we might be video chatting our friends.

This makes me think about how I spend my time. If I cut out all of the hours I spent texting and talking to my friends on Facebook, I can only imagine all of the things I could do. Finding time to play guitar is hard, I could use the time I spend on Facebook to do that. I could spend time with my sister, getting ahead on my homework, working on an art project.

These new ways of communicating bother me because it takes away from all of the worth while things I could be doing. But, for some reason I feel like I have to use them. Facebook is now used for school, texting is the easiest way to communicate with someone quickly, and all of my friends video chat. This has become a part of our culture, and there is really no way to get around it. I just need to better limit my time using these ways of communicating. Maybe I need to make better choices of who I talk to also. Talking to someone I'm not that great of friends with is not a worth while use of my time.