Technology is meant to make our lives easier by allowing necessary but mundane tasks easier, efficient and speedier. It is meant to increase our free time so that we can utilize that free time for more important tasks such as friends, family, hobbies. Instead the reverse is true, technology has overtaken our lives and eats into our day giving us less free time for leisure activities. Our method of socializing has become instant and lightening fast but at what price and at what gratification. We now measure our self worth with the number of facebook friends we have, but how many of these so called friends are real friends? how many of our virtual friends will cry at our funeral? Not many I suspect. We meet strangers on a train and add them to our friends list without a second thought, not realising tat we may never meet that person again. We receive friend requests from friends of friends or strangers and feel a false sense of popularity. The virtual world can it really replace a Sunday afternoon tea with a friend to catch up and share in privacy without sharing our thoughts and pictures with all and sundry. Does it make us important or feel like a celebrity that we can post our video of washing the car on YouTube and wait anxiously to see how many hits it received. Yes, technology has taken over our lives and sucked the blood out of our souls and yet we need to keep up with the Jones or feel alienated and ridiculed by modern society. So we remained glued with Google and ponder how our neighbours house looks like from space or follow pointless tweets or......well I could go on for ever and ever blogging but really I have emails to check.....
On a more serious note from my ramblings we need to consider this epidemic in society with grave thought as rather than enriching it becomes a disease where we measure our worth by how busy we are. Idle time of resting in the backyard is now equated with an unsuccessful person. This brings in mind the novel, Hunger. The protagonist always seems to pretend to society around him that he is productively engaged in purposeful activity. He feels ashamed of his lowly circumstance of being poor and not having a job so he puts on a charade of being busy to all he meets. It frustrates me that when applying for a job or meeting an acquaintance why cannot he be honest and garner help and sympathy instead of putting on a show and false bravado. Even when he has nothing to do he seems in a great hurry to walk and pretend to be going someplace. Has society created an environment where we are ashamed of falling from grace in a hierarchy that worships success. The protagonist even goes as far as hiding his blanket in a packet to hide the fact he is homeless and therefore out of work. Though the novel is not set in a time that involves technological advances in communication it still dwells on the theme of being busy. Though the protagonist writes to put food on the table rather than an technological addiction.
Should we blame the advent of technology or humans? Well you cannot blame the gun manufacturer but the person pulling the trigger. Technology can enhance our lives but we must control it and not the other way around. Relax and remember to take a stroll in the park with your iPad and Blackberry safely at home!
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