Thread: Cell phones and internet -- hurting human relationships?

Originally Posted by wayninja

I would agree that social media is by far the more powerful tool compared to generations past. It is still a tool though.

When I was a kid, we spent hours learning safety in shop class before we were allowed to use the tablesaw and arc welders. Maybe we need safety classes for what seems to be just as powerfully dangerous a tool.

Damn! You had arc welders? :jealous:

Originally Posted by wayninja

I would agree that social media is by far the more powerful tool compared to generations past. It is still a tool though.

When I was a kid, we spent hours learning safety in shop class before we were allowed to use the tablesaw and arc welders. Maybe we need safety classes for what seems to be just as powerfully dangerous a tool.

Education needs to be more practical. I think this is a great example.

Also, unrelated but in the same vein as practicality, education needs to be more career driven. Universities and colleges need to offer professional sports degrees for athletes hellbent on playing professionally. It’s curriculum mostly about money management, business and social media use and awareness, rather than shoving some random degree path at them. It’s the same as a student taking a psychology degree, there’s a chance they can’t use it, but that’s their choice. I imagine most athletes would not take that path, but it needs to be an option.

Originally Posted by wayninja

I'm not sure I follow, can you elaborate?

Unfortunately no. Something I noticed in that oxford paper thing abe posted in the data section, but I might have misconstrued. I owe it to reexamine but nah. It kind of resonates with my intuition, so I'll just remain ignorant in this case.

Originally Posted by Tned

How many people can, or do, turn off the cell phones and go dark vs. by choice or work requirements, have it on 24/7?

Like with 'news', I keep it at a distance. Hard to tell how much purposeful disconnection is healthy vs. unhealthy.

Originally Posted by BroncoWave

I don't really think cell phones or the internet in general are a negative thing for kids today, but I do think social media is. I don't have kids obviously, but I feel like if I did I'd rather them sit and play video games for hours a day (the previous culprit of the eventual downfall of society) than spend even 10 minutes a day on social media. I remain thankful that I was out of school by the time social media became the monster it is today.

What happened to the good ole days of "borrowing" some shopping carts from Pathmark and lashing them into trees, with some strategic portions of the cart cut away (temporarily of course, as they are borrowed) with your fathers acetylene torch to make a shopping cart tree fort?

Originally Posted by BroncoJoe

Damn! You had arc welders? :jealous:

I don't think we did. The story sounds better with them though.

Originally Posted by wayninja

I don't think we did. The story sounds better with them though.

Damn you.

Originally Posted by wayninja

I would agree that social media is by far the more powerful tool compared to generations past. It is still a tool though.

When I was a kid, we spent hours learning safety in shop class before we were allowed to use the tablesaw and arc welders. Maybe we need safety classes for what seems to be just as powerfully dangerous a tool.

I don't know that 'tool' captures all of it. I think it almost does, but it feels like it's also the thing itself. Like the building or something.

If you are out there in high school making friends and expanding your circle or figuring out the pecking order thing, trying to impress a certain guy or girl, interacting with someone who just doesn't like you...at some point the 'everyone else' aspect of social media is out of your control no matter how safe you are with the 'tool'.

What I don't like is that it's just way too easy to say whatever or post whatever behind a screen. It can be artfully drafted, meticulously shot, and crafted for maximum impact. It misrepresents non-virtual life. It is not quotidian; by definition, it must be the opposite. It can create tension between how our life actually is and how we think it should be. And people say things behind screens that they wouldn't say in person--the more outrageous and offensive, the better.

Idk man. It is a tool if you stay in control of it. But can a teenager engaging with his or her peers truly do that? What about when they discover they want to mix it up with a group that are heavy users?

Plus like Wave said, it's permanent. We need to get our kids paranoid about deep state and NSA surveillance early!

Originally Posted by Hawgdriver

I don't know that 'tool' captures all of it. I think it almost does, but it feels like it's also the thing itself. Like the building or something.

If you are out there in high school making friends and expanding your circle or figuring out the pecking order thing, trying to impress a certain guy or girl, interacting with someone who just doesn't like you...at some point the 'everyone else' aspect of social media is out of your control no matter how safe you are with the 'tool'.

What I don't like is that it's just way too easy to say whatever or post whatever behind a screen. It can be artfully drafted, meticulously shot, and crafted for maximum impact. It misrepresents non-virtual life. It is not quotidian; by definition, it must be the opposite. It can create tension between how our life actually is and how we think it should be. And people say things behind screens that they wouldn't say in person--the more outrageous and offensive, the better.

Idk man. It is a tool if you stay in control of it. But can a teenager engaging with his or her peers truly do that? What about when they discover they want to mix it up with a group that are heavy users?

Plus like Wave said, it's permanent. We need to get our kids paranoid about deep state and NSA surveillance early!

That's true, but the same could be said of opinion pieces in newspapers in ages past. The access to the delivery system is just much more... quotidian (sorry, could NOT resist).

It's a tool, used for communication. I get your concerns about the abstract and oftentimes anonymous nature of that communication, as I share them. But teaching safety in this instance may not just be about those writing content, but those consuming it.

It's powerful. The like of which we haven't seen before. But we will adapt. Social media has already gone through several revisions, and fads are starting emerge within it. It's fluid, so the "control" for it needs to not be at a technological level, necessarily, but at a mentality level. If the user isn't ready for that tool, maybe it is a good idea to limit access to it, just like you wouldn't necessarily hand a 13 year old a chainsaw. That's a rough analogy given the complexities of social media, but I think you get what I'm saying.

Ultimately some kids are responsible enough and some aren't. The maturity level and equivalent safety lessons the child has learned shape what the right answer is there, I think.

Fully agree that parents need to teach their kids the dangers of it and restrict access until the kids are ready. Which is probably difficult for today's age of parents since this isn't something they grew up with themselves. I would imagine this issue will more naturally correct itself when people who grew up in the social media era themselves become parents and can more knowledgeably guide their kids though those issues.

https://www.theguardian.com/technolo...one-jon-ronson

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/b...bullying-girls

Originally Posted by wayninja

That's true, but the same could be said of opinion pieces in newspapers in ages past. The access to the delivery system is just much more... quotidian (sorry, could NOT resist).

It's a tool, used for communication. I get your concerns about the abstract and oftentimes anonymous nature of that communication, as I share them. But teaching safety in this instance may not just be about those writing content, but those consuming it.

It's powerful. The like of which we haven't seen before. But we will adapt. Social media has already gone through several revisions, and fads are starting emerge within it. It's fluid, so the "control" for it needs to not be at a technological level, necessarily, but at a mentality level. If the user isn't ready for that tool, maybe it is a good idea to limit access to it, just like you wouldn't necessarily hand a 13 year old a chainsaw. That's a rough analogy given the complexities of social media, but I think you get what I'm saying.

Ultimately some kids are responsible enough and some aren't. The maturity level and equivalent safety lessons the child has learned shape what the right answer is there, I think.

BTW one can never have enough quotidian! I get mine on the reg.

Originally Posted by Hawgdriver

https://www.theguardian.com/technolo...one-jon-ronson

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/b...bullying-girls

Fascinating. Now I'm wondering if I'm speaking to Hawg, or his infomorph.

Originally Posted by Hawgdriver

One of the things that stuck out to me from the article that Abe posted was that social media and Adolescent well-being seems you have a strong negative relationship

It's just a highway of accessibility. Now, as opposed to hearing about so and so being (insert bad thing here) it's either online in some form via recording or photo, or just gossiping about it is delivered to your doorstep. It's a ubiquitous form of misery.

Originally Posted by underrated29

As we know I am the most tech savvy person there is. I do not have any problem with any of this. I do not see technology doing anything with regards to human interaction aside from two things:

1. A major lack of professionalism. It astounds me. The people these days that are younger than I, even same age, have absolutely no clue when and how to put their filter on. Just incredible. Maybe it has to do with the trend of trying to be a savage or pretend like things do not really matter, I do not know. But they suck at it.

2. Degradation of the English language. People speak with slang, even professionally. They also seem only able to regurgitate what they read/see on social media. I made a thread about this (maybe it was Facebook) about the rampant viral spreading of the phrase "I mean". EVERYONE says that now. Last year it was "You know". The year before that was the word "Craft" ( I did make a thread on that)........but holy shit "I mean"...Come on. I see it here too, a lot by our resident Linguist too. Are you not smart enough to start a sentence with what you intend to talk about? Or should we interpret that everything you had said previously was not what you meant?

It is becoming a rapid way for people to brainwash themselves. Count how many times someone says I mean. Listen for it. You will see. It always comes at the start of a sentence or when they pause mid sentence. It is the new "um" or "uh".....Social media spawns this. However, this has no effect on human interaction as far as I can tell. People are still people and they are becoming easier to read. Less poker faces about these days.

Don't forget people interjecting the word "like" into everything in place of um or uh.