Electronic relationships between men, women, children & friends

Thinkhappy here -

Just wanted to share a little rant:-)

With the advent of texting and email, many important aspects of our society seem to be going by the wayside. What has happened to simple conversations, correct grammar, and facial expressions? In "the good old days", if our parents wanted to speak to one and other, they would wait until they were face to face to do so. Calling one and other at their place of business was something done only under duress, because the work place was a place of actual "work", not a social environment. 

Fifteen years ago, fax machines were making their way into our lives and we so adored the fast communication! But we still relied on good old fashion timing to have our conversations with those we cared about. Though cell phones were coming on the scene, they were not as widely used, and therefore a novelty, not a necessity.

These days, if you hire anyone between the ages of 15 and 40, about 30% of their day is spent texting, instant messengering, or emailing friends and/or family for non-work related conversations. These conversations often look something like this;

How R U?

Gr8!

Wat up  2nite?

Why on earth did these people go to school for so many years, only to revert back to communicating like a six year old child?  What can be so very important that teens have a need to text over 5000 text messages each month, or adults need to be receiving and sending messages during meetings, at the grocery store, or in a bank?

Can effective communications be held over texts, IMs and email? I see how clear communication can sort of be evident with emails - the words are at least all there. But you cannot see facial expressions, hear tones of voices, or read body language. For example, what does this mean to you?

I'm so excited to be here!

Clearly, this mean someone is very excited, right? Well, slip a lift of an eyebrow or a sarcastic drawl to the "so", and you have a totally different meaning.

How easy is it to misread an email, text, or other electronic message? How many times have you typed one and wished you could take it back - but there it was, on a hard drive for ever and ever. And you can't even show remorse because you can't reach out and touch someone's arm to say you are sorry. An apology would be read as a cold line of text.

How about flirting? Easy to do via electronic message, right? But are our kids learning how to really flirt? Or are they leaping into really fast relationships because of the ease of words being just that...words.

It seems to me, that teens are even hesitant to pick up the phone and actually speak to people, even their friends, these days. They'd much rather be on the computer or sending a text message. Our society, I fear, is going to become socially repressed. How sad that would be. To miss out on the subtle voice changes, body language, and even the laughter (LOL!).

My rant is over, but I wanted to share. Anyone else care to chime in?