Rants on Social Media

The rules of communication are slowly being obliterated.

Supposedly 58% of communication is through body language and 35%through vocal tone, pitch, and emphasis. That leaves 7% for all our texting, emailing, and twittering...and I don't know the statistic on this, but judging from my own life, that 7% has to be over 60% of my communication in a day. 

In the 7%, I don't feel dishonest when I'm dishonest. I "like" things on facebook that I definitely hate, or at least feel indifferent towards, and I've also noticed that when I'm least interested in what someone says through text, I respond with "haha." How messed up is that. I say it because it's an easy statement that ends a conversation and requires no response.

It's messed up because, while I'm thinking, "I'm so glad to be blowing you off while appearing friendly," they are thinking they're funny.

I'm also fascinated by certain internet creepers. What is the return on investment for chatting a girl every day for a year with no response?

To be fair, it's not like previous generations had it better. Social media didn't exist in Pride and Prejudice times, but neither did deodorant. Still, it's kind of nice that girls could play "Pick-up-Sticks" without stopping to instagram the sticks, and the sticks from a cooler angle, to make the lord who lived 50 miles away want to date them. Because if the lord suddenly wished he was there playing pick up sticks too, he wouldn't be able to get there for another three days. People would travel for hours just to get into town, and to not buy anything nearly as needed as deodorant. Every little thing was inconvenient, and a big deal, and I don't want to whine abut how we're exiting a golden age - but nothing seems to be a big deal anymore.

There's more of everything and it's easier to get all of it. We have a zillion ways to communicate with anyone all over the world, but people are still people, like they were in the stone age, probably confusing each other with drawings in caves, except now we sit in our beds with computers, connected to facebook groups and tribes, managing 1753 "friends," online dating profiles, email, LinkedIn contacts, skype, chat, etc.

But let's be honest, with all our advanced technology, we are probably just communicating poorly with more people faster.