What we have here is a failure to communicate

I came to the realization the other day that human beings no longer communicate via actual thoughts, words, gestures, expressions or face-to-face social conversation.
No, now we all hide behind the new media. Facebook, Twitter, text messaging. Little blurbs that, in essence, are meaningless and, for the most part, keep us anonymous in that we are unseen. No facial expression, no tears, no laughter, no love. Just an alphabet of random ramblings.
The idea struck me as I logged on to my computer first thing one morning this past winter. Somehow things had seemed different for awhile. I wasn't really sure what it was. Then it hit me -- no email came flooding in to my inbox!
Used to be that when I logged on first thing in the morning there were emails from friends and relatives both on the continent and off. What changed? Did they get too busy? Did they suddenly find me dull and boring? (Surely not!) Had they joined a cult and were being held against their will? Were they dead!
Nope, none of the above....instead they were all on Facebook.
So now instead of a newsy email full of personal tidbits, sometimes sad, sometimes happy, sometimes poignant, I get to read two or three line descriptions of what people in my life are up to. Unfortunately everyone else they know gets to read the same thing. Not personal; not directed to me.
Sorry folks - it isn't enough.
We are becoming a generation of instant messengers. I really don't care if your baby just pooped or your sheep died on Farmville. (Yes, I sheepishly admit to being a Farmville farmerette for a couple of months, until I decided this was really, really not the best use of time. After harvesting 900 crops of soybeans I was not sure what more I could do! Stabbing myself with a gift pitchfork came to mind.)
As I scroll through the Facebook posts each day I learn that someone cleaned out their closet, someone else joined the Support William Shatner for Governor General campaign, someone else posted yet another cat picture.
Nothing wrong with that mind you. My last post was about a book I had read. I like to think the fact I read books has some redeeming qualities. But maybe not. It seems words don't much matter anymore.
I have a feeling though that this is just another cycle in human evolution. You can't fight progress -- blah, blah, blah.
We started out grunting and gesturing when we assumed an upright position. "Og, get dumb ass over here and skin mastadon." Followed by whatever the grunt equivalent for "Yes, dear" was back in caveman days.
Then we started making pictographs on cave walls. Crude drawings of animals, gods, and even each other. Progress! A thought process and communication was forming.
Time marched on; language developed. Writing evolved. The printing press was invented. And happily we lived for centuries thanking the dieties above that we had discovered words and reading and thoughts and ideas. From Socrates to Shakespeare to Salman Rushdie. Words, words, glorious words.
Can you imagine Shakespeare on Facebook or Twitter?! We would never have gotten beyond, "What light through yonder window breaks..." Juliet would have been left pacing her balcony wondering what the hell Romeo was talking about. Fie!
Life has become too cryptic. Facebook and even Twitter (even though I don't Tweet) are great ways to catch up, but most people seem to use social networking sites as their only communication outlet now. And I don't like it! It's lazy.
Sure, the quill pen and inkpot gave way to the ballpoint and the typewriter made way for the computer, but do we have to give up real interaction and communication in the name of so-called progress? Just insert a computer chip in my forehead and I won't even have to type ... I can just send thoughts your way. And you won't like the ones I am having now.
Words separate us from other life forms on this planet. Use them, cherish them. Or we shall all be left to grunt and point once again.
Meanwhile, I shall close my rant and post it on Facebook, because none of you heathens will read it anywhere else!

Two-FacedBook

Yes, I admit it -- I am on Facebook. Mind you I was dragged very slowly into this instant communication world.

And no, I do not and will not Twitter. (Well, apparently I did, but my ex husband used that word 30 years ago and I don't think he meant the same thing! Twittering was usually preceded by the word Stop when coming from his lips.)

It seems to me that it is the "instant" part of instant communication that is the problem. It is a far cry from when I was back in high school and we had pen friends. For anyone who remembers the Ed Sullivan Show, The Beatles, or huge chrome-encrusted cars, a pen friend was someone from another country or another province with whom you corresponded via a pen, a piece of paper and a stamp. Apparently this form of communication was used just after the wheel was invented according to anyone under 30. And it wasn't instant. I waited for weeks for a letter from that tanned handsome 17-year-old in Adelaide, Australia. And God, I was in heaven when it arrived (especially the one with the photo!).

But I digress. I am on Facebook because a friend of mine in the U.S. sent me an invite to join over a year ago. So I did ... and I promptly took myself off the next day. I was worried about my privacy. Then about five months ago, I checked the site out again. I found I had not "killed" myself off as I had thought. The residue of my profile was still lurking there.

So I thought what the hell, and dove in with gusto. It became a challenge to find anyone to add to my list and when I actually had THREE friends, I was overwhelmed at my own popularity. Then I started to look for other people I knew from the past...imagine when I checked some of their profiles and found they had 4,245,699 friends! OK, a slight exaggeration -- but Facebook users having 300 friends is not uncommon. Three-hundred friends...sure! Even the Dalai Lama doesn't have 300 friends. Followers maybe, but not friends.

Which brings us to the word "friend". Who are we kidding here...no one has that many friends. It has become a bit of a game on these social networking sites to see how many people you can add to your score list.

I am up to somewhere in the high 20s...I think I have 27 "friends" at this point. Some are former business contacts, others who just wandered into my world by accident, some are friends of friends. Out of the 27 people how many do I actually see face to face -- maybe three. Probably the original three!

Not that I haven't had a dozen invites to lunch or to meet for a drink. I now weigh just over 12 pounds waiting to be fed and watered. The invites never quite materialize into real food or libations. It seems there is a little flurry of messages back and forth when you first receive a "contact" and then you realize you have absolutely nothing in common and it peters out. But that person is still on your prized friend list adding to your popularity total.

Now if any of my Facebook friends reads this...please don't think I don't love you all dearly. Or at least five or six of you. :-)

As for the rest of you, let's do lunch!

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Sometimes you've just gotta laugh...