Honestly, I don’t know if my relationship with technology is healthy. How can we define healthy? I would guess our eyes and our bodies would say that, no, technology isn’t good for us. But, then It makes me think about how negatively impact i would be if i was behind the rest of society. Would that be healthy for my social life which, what additional challenges would I have to overcome? I think the way we should be thinking about this is relative to the rest of society. I think compared to a majority of people in developed nations (that have access to technology) my relationship with it is on the healthier side. As I’ve said before in other blogs, I'm very careful about what information I give to the public, and what my online persona looks like. I also don’t spend a huge chunk of my day browsing through social media on my phone. My major (and intended career) has a lot to do with technology, so I do spend most of my time using computers and different types of advanced software, but I’m using it in a way to learn and hopefully further my opportunities in life.
I think technology can be a real curse for some people though. Generations that have grown up after me are going to be the most impacted. From the time they were born, they have been almost completely reliant on technology and I don’t think that’s healthy. My fear isn’t that one day they’ll have to learn how to live without it, my fear is that they don’t have a choice anymore. They cannot live without technology because they don’t know any other life. That to me as a scary thought, but we can’t blame them. We invented the world that they were born into, we created what the social norms are, and we continue to allow them to let technology seep into every single aspect of their life.
After watching the second animated video, I don’t even think I have a full grasp of all the ways technology has impacted us. The social skills that people possess today would be a disgrace even 20 or 30 years ago. If you’re not impacted by the world of technology I bet our society does appear to be made up of mindless, oblivious, and socially awkward individuals. Technology has impacted our social lives, our careers, our education, our sports, our leisure activities, our hobbies, and even our relationships with ourselves. In my opinion it’s naïve to think that we won’t continue to see negative effects caused by technology as generations continue to get older.
And yet even all these horrible (and honestly scary) impacts technology has had on us I still don’t think it’s completely bad. Technology has given us the opportunity to do things we never even thought were possible. You can have a conversation with somebody across the world in real time, while seeing their face. You can send and receive money on the fly right from your cell phone, and you can even find a community online of like-minded people who have the same interests as you. These are things that people dreamed about and now it’s a reality. I don’t think it’s fair to say that technology is completely good or completely bad. I think each generation, and more importantly each individual, is responsible for creating a positive technological impact. If we use it for the right reasons and we limit our time and attachment to it, I think this can kick off putting a positive spin on technology in the world today.
