Technology, The Root of Depression and Loneliness?
How could technology ruin some people’s life when all it has done is given people relationships, help them meet friends, and even given some people relationships? Some people manifest that technology has damaged social skills, it has shut some off the world and life, and that it ruins their relationships and are no longer able to focus on what matters in their life. Others believe that it has fostered many doors for people giving them many opportunities to the world and life, that it brings happiness and love. As for me though, technology has greatened many people’s life in more ways then one, it has amplified wealth, and helped social skills to the point where people kindle relationships.
So how could technology ruin someone’s social skills? People who believe that technology is bad and point out that it harms our society in today America, the more time people spend on their computer the less time people spend with their families. Bob Alfonso writes on his homepage,” The appropriately named HomeNetproject studied a sample of 169 people in Pittsburg during their first year or two online” (1). Then later states that most of the subjects later came encountered with stress, loneliness, and some depression. That once they got to the Internet they started spending less time with their family and friends. Neil Postman says that classes on line cant instill morals like in a kindergarten class, that the Internet doesn’t instill those things like you need to know for life. He quotes ” … though new technologies may be a solution to the learning of “subjects,” they work against the learning of what are called ” social values,” including an understanding of democratic processes” (Postman 1).
Even though kindergartners don’t take classes online, he still points out that the internet doesn’t teach you to ” share everything, play fair, don’t hit people, put things back where you found them, clean up your own mess, wash your hands before you eat, and of course flush” (Postman 1). Also that the major source of technology in the music genre, the iPod ” preoccupies you so you are no longer obligated to interact with the uncontrollable factors of everyday life” (Song 1). She says that the longer people use their iPods just walking around, the more it is coming to the time where we will all be “isolated beings”. And points out that we are greatly decreasing the interaction between each other the more we turn iPods and turn ourselves off from the world. Yes the opposition gives a good argument on how certain technologies ruin our society, but there is a flaw in all.
They input that the Internet leads to daily stress, and depression but how can they prove that when only tested 169 people. That is a logical fallacy of unreliable testimony, they didn’t tell us whether the subjects were all teenagers or all middle aged adults, maybe it was all girls or all boys, they could be living in a desolate town or a big city. You can never trust a source that doesn’t give you full details. Postman even argues that online Internet classes can’t teach you what you learned in kindergarten, its just a faulty analogy, how could you compare kindergarten to online classes mainly for high school and college students. In modern times it’s not usual to see five and six year olds taking classes on the Internet let alone knowing how to work a computer.
So there is no proof that online classes cant instill those social skills for life. Whenever you see people with their headphones on listening to music doesn’t mean they are wandering in their own world being discrete. Song says that the longer you’re on your iPod the lonelier you become and the lonelier you are you become depressed. She is making one gesture into a slippery slope. Just because you see that doesn’t mean a thing when people listen to music it is to escape the distractions going on around them, or to feel a mood that comforts them through their day, they don’t do it to ignore others or shut them off but to sometimes give them contentment through life. A lot of the time the Internet is a common place to meet people and start a relationship.
Some people might be t shy to open themselves up in the world but when they get on the internet it suddenly opens up a new range of exploration and once that door is open then there is no way someone couldn’t gain confidence in their life. That is why in some ways technology can foster lives as if they were cocoons and became butterflies making them aware that they go out their with the ample amount of social skills provided for them. What if there was no technology, there has to be at least one thing that keeps you going through the day, for me it’s my cell phone and without that communication to others would be gone and I’m sure that it is the same for a lot of other people. So technology is not always bad it can help our modern day society and our social skills in more way then one.
