The Rise Of Antisocial Media
Professor Sherry Turkle, director of MIT’s Initiative on Technology and Self has stated that technology such as Facebook and Twitter threaten to dominate our lives, make us socially insular and ultimately make us “less human”.
Professor Turkle goes on to claim that the use of technology has become a form of “modern madness” and argues that we are under the illusion of communicating better while in fact we are becoming more socially retarded as we become divorced from ‘real’ social interaction, relying instead on cyber reality which is a poor imitation of real life.
In her book Alone Together Professor Turkle intimates that social networking can make us display “pathological behaviour”, behaviour which she herself has witnessed as mourners check their iPhones while attending a funeral.
Turkle’s book is seen as being part of the intellectual backlash against social media in the States which is calling for people to spend more time on their relationships with family and friends and less on updating their Twitter accounts.
Other academics are championing Professor Turkle’s cause. William Kist of Kent State draws attention to the suicide of Simone Back, a woman with a history of mental health issues who announced her suicide on her Facebook page. Instead of anybody calling on her or making any efforts to get her help all the post caused was vitriol and insults stating that these attempts were not uncommon. It was days later when her mother finally found her dead. None of Simone’s 1,000+ ‘friends’ had made any attempt to make sure she was alright.
Those who defend Facebook and Twitter, and social media on the whole point out that using this technology has many other social benefits such as allowing family members who are separated by distance to readily keep in touch with one another.
But what does that prove? While social media can help with keeping our geographically distant friends and relations close it pushes us closer to our machines and further from our more local community. Seven years ago in a book entitled Interpersonal Divide by Michael Bugeja picked up on observations that if social acceptance was sought in front of a computer monitor then the ‘vitality’ of our communities would be diminished.
Bugeja observed that people spending time in front of machines are spending more time away from their neighbours and friends. He states: “we visit home pages instead of homes but convince ourselves that we are interacting responsibly with family and friends simply because we are keeping up with their lives”
Dan Cash is a blogger and social commentator who uses social media as it’s easier than relying on mobility cars to see people all the time
I cannot speak for the rest of the world, but in Cincinnati, social media (especially Twitter) has become an aggregate for real world friendships. Time spent learning about each other and sharing information and opinions online during the day transforms into “tweet-ups” and often much more.
It’s extraordinarily limiting and self righteous to claim that utilizing technology as a substitute for “real” connections is the only way to use social media.
Like I tell my friends who don’t “get” Twitter, I would have been friends with these people anyway, we just happened to meet through social media.
see http://5chw4r7z.blogspot.com/2011/01/twitter-and-facebook-dont-connect.html
I think people just need to discipline themselves. Too much of anything can be bad.