In the expanse of my lifetime, mankind has progressed from the harbinger of an ominously beeping Soviet satellite to a Multinational Space Station with astronaut commuters from various countries. We have transitioned from big black rotary phones with seemingly 10-pound receivers and telephone numbers that began with prefixes such as “Pennsylvania One” or “Flemington Three” to smart phones that store the information once held by a thousand file cabinets or perhaps tens of thousands of file cabinets. When you wanted to inform a relative about the goings on in your household or a significant event you wrote a letter in the lost art of penmanship. The concept of an email or a text or a tweet, were about as realistic a notion as men from Mars.
The world of communication between individuals, families, students and schools, businesses and customers have been irrevocably changed and not necessarily for the better. What once were personal exchanges have been replaced by cold transactions effectuated with credit card numbers and remote computer terminals in an untouchable cyber-sky. So the question is what have we lost as a society and what have we gained? On balance, are we better off with this brave new world of these electronic and computer progressions?
Kids around America bounded down the stairs last Christmas Day not in anticipation of the bicycles, Lincoln Logs, and Hula-Hoops of my childhood but in the hopes of receiving I Pads, smart phones, laptop computers and advanced video games. Not only has simplicity become obsolete, but any gift requiring aerobic exercise or ones own imagination to operate has become extinct. As a result, our country’s kids have become more sedentary, self possessed and isolated. Furthermore, an average young person’s obsessive use of social media has concentrated one’s life on petty occurrences rather than substantive situations of possible interpersonal growth. Go outside and play has been replaced with the parental command go to your room and keep yourself entertained on your laptop. Consequently, young America has become increasingly more introverted and unhealthy. So much so, that countermanding the trend has become the pet project of America’s first lady Michele Obama.
In our electronic progression, our society has gained as much as it has lost. For along with the expedient efficiencies, have been an insidious and incremental loss of personalization, privacy and the natural formation of interpersonal relationships. One does not need to attend a dance or other type of social gathering to meet a potential mate. When a computer program can better analyze who might be most compatible, why should you leave those judgments to human emotion and perception?
Instead of the personal touch and heartfelt feelings conveyed by conceived and written words, real sentiment has been replaced by emoticons and abhorrent abbreviations transmitted in casual and easily dismissed emails, posts, and tweets.
Along with much greater ready access to a world of information via the Internet, comes much greater ready access to depravity, pornography and predatory malevolent criminals who prey upon our most impressionable and vulnerable. Our criminal justice system has been struggling to catch up with nascent cyber criminals who often hide behind First Amendment Rights. Accordingly, our legislators must parse constitutional concerns with new kinds of perpetrators who seek to circumvent social morality by using free speech laws as their shield.
Astounding advances in computerization and the Internet has led to a burgeoning new world of cyber-commerce. This virtual expansive world of selection offers a vast field of merchandise and services available instantly at anyone’s fingertips. Such diversity is unquestionably a convenience once beyond anyone’s imagination. However, what is lost is the personal relationship with the local brick and mortar retailer. Those independent store owners who pay municipal taxes which support your city or town, sponsor your child’s local ball team, and are always their when your local house of worship needs a hand, are left fallow and abandoned in favor of some unseen multi-million dollar cyber-store.
Additionally, adding insult to injury is the practice of “pirating”. This is where shoppers will visit their local store and record information regarding a specific item and then cruise the Internet for a better price. Thus, this unfair practice renders your local retailer as a non-profit showroom for corporate America and leaves him or her struggling to meet their overhead.
Simultaneously, while one shops on the Internet all information submitted is recorded and stored in the permanent memory of “clouds”. Unlike the local merchant who remembers your name and your children’s names when you frequent their store, clouds use your information by either selling it to interested entities, or formulating profiles of your purchasing habits to solicit you in the future. Also, cloud information is sometimes accessed by our government in matters of tax disputes or perceived national security. It has been said by computer scientists that anything typed into a computer lives forever.
Not only has commerce seen a revelatory transformation, but also academics are dealing with a whirlwind of change. What once were dismissed as “Mailbox Colleges” have now gained a suspect credibility in the world of cyber-space. Names like American Continental University, Western Governors University, and Washington International University were once considered laughable as schools of higher learning. Now they are considered as alternative institutions to venerated universities such as our own University of Rhode Island. These cyber-schools are proprietary, aggressive in their solicitation, and questionable in the intrinsic value of the degrees issued. Yet, over the past two decades, the ever-growing popularity of these schools has resulted in many students being burdened with astronomical student loan debt. The degrees conferred have been found wanting in their palatability. Without the progression of electronic and computer advancement, this revolution in education could never have transpired.
The world of my youth was simpler and more personalized, and respected the privacy of others. People connected at a much slower pace. However, the connections were more meaningful for they grew organically through neighborhoods and churches and schools. The value of the local retailer was greater. He or she was in a way part of our family life. Children’s perception of play had nothing to do with the screen of an electronic device, instead play involved bats and balls and basketball hoops at the end of the driveway. When one mentioned an aspiration to attend college they meant a physical destination and not a web address.
For all our progressions in current society, something intensely valuable has been lost. Communication is undoubtedly faster, with much more information available, some beneficial and some inherently dangerous. Yet, in all our advances we lost part of our American identity as neighbors, friends, students and fellow members of our society. Perhaps we were better off in the world of file cabinets, typewriters, and phones with rotary dials.
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