How important is communication these days? How many ways of communicating do we know? If I started to write down answers for these questions, I think that this post would be very, very long. But, let’s be honest, can you imagine one day being without your phone, tablet, laptop or what is worse without Facebook, Twitter, Skype or WhatsApp? Probably not. Is this the right way of communication and aren’t we paying too much attention to it?
One of my best friends was very angry with me couple of months ago. She said that I just don’t pay attention to our conversations and I spend my time checking my phone or answering messages from other people. I sadly realized that it is true. I am not going to defend myself and will say, ‘no it is not like that’. It is. And what is worse, I am not alone.
The death of conversation
After this one-way argument I have started to look at people in public places like pubs, restaurants, clubs even people on buses or queuing somewhere. Everybody is completely hooked to their phones. People can share one table, have a glass of beer in front of them, and not talk to each other, preferring to check what’s going on in some fake cyberspace. All this raises a question: Doesn’t modern communication kill the real communication?
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| Picture is from the website: http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/ |
Of course, I can’t generalize too much and see things only in black and white. And I don’t even want to. There are people that can appreciate the charm of a real conversation and still can find topics that are more interesting than phones or internet. But have you tried to leave your phone in your bag while you are having a nice time with your friends? If not, try it and you might find out something that you will never find on Facebook.
The theme of 'communication' in our class
James, one of our English teachers, had a class recently on the theme of ‘communication’. He asked our students what they thought about technologies and communication and their ideas were very similar to mine. Most of the students think that technology has made people lazier than they were in the past. People don’t need to think too much about what they want to say and maybe don’t even know how to express themselves. They have applications where they can send lots of messages which might be completely absent of meaning. In the past, if you wanted to say what happened in one month, you needed to choose the words and write them down very carefully, because you could only use a couple of pieces of paper.
Another idea is that people were closer to each other and even phone calls were more personal because now people send only a text. However, the new technologies have good uses as well, especially if our friends or families are far from us. We can call them and see them anytime, share our new experiences and still stay very close, which can makes our relationships more special.
What is your opinion about the modern way of communicating?
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