1 in 5 Americans Refuse to Go Online > Not so much income issue

reply to battleop

Re: Not so much income issue

I was at Steak n Shake yesterday and I noticed a family of five where not one of them ever looked up from their device between the time they ordered and the time their food arrived.
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I do not, have not, and will not work for AT&T/Comcast/Verizon/Charter or similar sized company.

Yep. So many connected, smart and "informed" people, and yet they actually know very little about their kids or parents, because they haven't had a real conversation in a long time.... face to face, eye to eye conversations.

reply to battleop
I used to do the same with a book when I was younger. The books were more interesting than my family. The same applies today, except the internet appeals to a lot more people.

reply to battleop
They were probably texting each other and using this approach, they might know a great deal about each other. So quick to judge. If the kids are growing up with basic ethics and the family supports itself without government assistance, why should we care if they are glued to their portable electronic devices?

While we probably don't fully understand the future ramifications of electronic socialization vs. the more old-fashioned kind, eventually it will probably be more normal than not. Although this is Hollywood, in the Demolition Man future, they outlawed physical intimacy and used a virtual substitute.

What "grinds my gears" is when folks try to say Internet access should be a "right" and start lobbying for government grants or corporate welfare. I'd love nothing more than for everyone to have cheap, affordable and unlimited high speed Internet access but let's figure out how to do it without printing more money and handing an even bigger IOU to our great, great, great, grandchildren.

regardless of what they were texting, that's not the point. having no face to face communication is unhealthy. common sense tells you that.

reply to mgbaker
sounds to me like you're projecting.

how could you possibly know anything about said alleged family from an anecdote made up of a single run-on sentence.

for all you know they were texting each other, likely wondering why some creepy 'battleop' dude kept staring at them from across the restaurant.

reply to battleop
Some time ago I went to a theater to see a show. I was seating about the middle of the room and the slope of the floor was steep enough for me to see that most people in the rows in front of me were glued to their phones before the show. I could see all those bright screens everywhere.

reply to Xioden

reply to chances14
Based on history I can see how that seems like "common sense". However, I don't think we know the ramifications of electronic socialization.

I read an article yesterday discussing the end of viral disease. It asked the question, what if we attained it? Would it be bad for the human race? It touched on the elimination of natural selection as a potential negative but in a world without disease, do we need the gene pool to pass on natural immunity? Based on historical fact, it said that the elimination of most bacterial and parasitic threats from Western worlds has not had a negative impact. In fact it mentioned that there are likely positives and pointed to Africa where significant numbers constantly battle Malaria and AIDS. They said a population that spends a lot of time being sick, seriously impairs productivity. They postulated that ridding the continent of killer bacteria and common parasites would likely enable millions to address other problems and might make put the continent on the road to being self-sufficient. It closed by saying that the elimination of virus from the planet is unknown. It questioned whether or not some virus contributed to the development of our organs as we grow. The article admitted there's no way to know until we eliminate them and "see what happens".

Bottom line: Is there really enough R&D/fact/proof regarding whether or not mass electronic socialization is good or bad? I think we might be trying to throw social media contact into the same bucket as general lack of human contact, which I believe has been proven to be negative. However, the two are quite different. When I grew up there was fierce competition for the telephone. Then came the kid line because mom and dad were tired of folks trying to call and always getting a busy signal (this is before call waiting). Is there any proof that kids raised 30 to 40 years ago are social deviants (not necessarily in an evil way) because they spent too much time on the phone?

reply to printscreen
is that a problem? they're about to sit in a dark room and watch a loud film for approximately 1.5 hours. what difference does catching up on your email for 5 minutes make? should they instead be intently focused on the advertisements presented on the screen before the feature presentation?

i suppose they could organize a debate society and discuss current sociopolitical news. but that seems unlikely.