Relevance is not found online
It has taken me a while to get back on here and write. Life is nothing without chaos and lately there has been plenty. I am going through transitions with my job which are exciting and terrifying at times, but through it all I remain pessimistically optimistic; I hope for the best and prepare for the worst. As I work through the transitions I often do research online. The Interweb is a fantastic tool that puts an infinite amount of information at your fingertips and, when used properly, can be the difference between success and what has become known as an Epic Fail. YouTube has an entire channel devoted to Epic Fails, and if they were not so ridiculously painful to watch they would be entertaining.
Invariably, while getting online to do research or conduct some type of business, I find myself dropping on Facebook more often than I should. I will read through the things my friends post, as well as the things their friends post, as well as the articles with headlines telling me how far my jaw will drop when I read what this guy did, or some video about some family acting crazy. All the while I am wondering why is everything so sensational? Why would anyone care enough about what I am cooking for dinner? Why would anyone care which shoes I wear today? Why would ANYONE care what kind of drama is happening in my life?
It was only after a long moment of complete honesty with myself that I came to understand that most people on the internet and Social Media platforms are motivated by the attention. It is exciting when your relatively boring and unexciting life becomes a stage. With enough time, a reasonably good smart phone camera, and Photoshop skills the most unassuming person can “Go Viral” and people will swarm to their page and “like” them and they will have “Internet Fame” which, as I understand, is just about as meaningful as being the most popular person in the State Mental Hospital.
Please don’t misunderstand. I was, and to some degree still am, one of those people. I look at Social Media and think about the ways I could use it to further my business ideas and I look at the ways I could use it to help those in need, but at the same time I also think about how nice it would be to have the praise and admiration of my social peers….as well as the admiration of the people in social groups way above my particular region of the stratosphere. It’s not a bad thing. In Maslows Hierarchy of needs we all have a basic human need for validation. The question arises, however, as to how far people are willing to go for that validation.
There are many people who just use Social Media and the Internet at large to connect and maintain contact with the people they like and care about but do not necessarily have direct contact with them on a frequent basis. Some, however, have different motives. Some use the internet to recreate themselves and bolster their own insecurities by playing on the sympathies of others or fishing for compliments. Others will use the internet as a gallery of the things they are most proud of about themselves (guilty), while still others use the internet to further social justice/political causes.
These are the relatively benign motivations. There exists a dark and seedy under-belly of the internet that exists to corrupt and destroy the fabric of humanity that binds us together. I am not even talking about porn. The commercials I see on cable tv on most days convinces me that porn is more generally accepted than what many consider a “Higher Power.” I am referring specifically to the Internet Trolls. They are the ones who lurk in the shadows of relative anonymity and take pleasure in just being nasty and negative to others. The comments from these trolls are enough to drive some to depression, self-loathing, and in some unfortunate cases suicide. These trolls will stalk Facebook and Tinder posts and lay down some of the harshest and crudest comments for little more reason than wanting to be cheered on by their social peers. They are driven to shocking behavior in their quest for internet fame. Congratulations.
Social media has destroyed borders and thrust cultures together haphazardly. Again, this is not a bad thing, but most people are entirely incapable of appreciating the levels of maturity needed to blend and live in a multi-cultural environment. Acceptance and patience are the binding agents while courtesy, compassion, and respect (from all parties involved) help establish permanence. There is a good bit of that taking place on the Internet, but not enough to counteract the corruption and rot taking place from the inside and working it’s way out.
The means and methods of communication afforded us by the internet and social media are wonderful and useful tools, but that is all they are. Once they become a means of establishing and reinforcing self-worth it becomes a crutch. The bad thing about a crutch is that after you have used a crutch for much longer than it was intended to help mend that broken part of you it becomes almost impossible to ever walk on your own without it. You find yourself justifying it’s existence and you eventually become a defender of crutches and proclaim it loudly to the world, even while you curse your dependency on it. Ask yourself how many times you told yourself you are walking away from Facebook forever and cannot. When you can answer that question honestly you will understand the Social Experiment that is Social Media. Life and reality will only ever exist outside.
Comments