Technology offers people countless options for communicating with those they care about, however, this convenience can make the message conveyed confusing and void of emotion.
With all her faults, however, Technology doesn’t lie. What’s more, after that bleak moment you lost your college term paper because you forgot to “save, and save often,” you learned she also doesn’t have your back.
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My friend, we’ll call “Heather,” had been dating her boyfriend for a year, and by all accounts, she was happy. Though their relationship wasn’t ring-ready, it definitely wasn’t casual.
One morning while checking Facebook updates, she saw her boyfriend tagged in new photos posted by someone Heather didn’t know. Much to her dismay, there beamed her boyfriend, arms around a woman. He had apparently accompanied this woman to a party (as per the photo captions). Heather knew this woman was not Boyfriend’s relative. She clearly wasn’t a friend, either.
Boyfriend’s secret girlfriend tagged him in several photos taken while they were seeing each other on the sly. Note to Boyfriend: Never expect Technology to lie as well as you do. Either this other woman wanted Heather to know, or she also didn’t know Boyfriend belonged to someone else. Regardless, Heather suffered an emotional meltdown of humiliation and sadness.
In my own experience, I was reading my friends’ Facebook status updates. There, amid the requests for Mafia support and complaints about traffic was a status comment by the guy I had been dating exclusively for three months.
“Why don’t the ones you love ever love you back?”
My stomach dropped, I felt dizzy, and I wanted to beat the crap out of him. I knew he wasn’t talking about me. He updated his status with professions of continued love for his ex. Wow, warm fuzzies.
Before we started dating, I was aware that their breakup was not mutual. I urged him to try and win her love (and stop pursuing me) if that’s what his heart wanted. Naturally, he swore to me that he was over her and wanted to be with me.
His status comment exposed a great deal about his personality: He clearly didn’t even think of how humiliating this cyber-community revelation would be to the person he WAS seeing.
The honesty to which Technology restrains us isn’t isolated to the Web. Remember that sexy photo you sent your boyfriend when he couldn’t see you one weekend? He showed that to his friends. Why? Bragging rights, Girl! “Look how cool MY girlfriend is! And she’s hot!” Classy, that man.
How about the afternoon you blew a fuse using MapQuest on your boyfriend’s computer, only to circumvent an incoming instant message from his ex (the “one that got away”)?One that Got Away: “Hey, Baby! I see you’re online! Miss you! How are you?”
You: “This is his girlfriend. I’ll relay your message to him whilst I kick his ass.”
One that Got Away: [Log off notification transmitted.]
Technology is even known to party crash an evening out with your friends. Lindsay Lohan particularly hates Technology for narking on her activities.
Out one evening, I hit it off with my friend’s boyfriend’s best friend. He asked for my number when the evening ended and called me to make sure I wasn’t having any trouble finding my way home. Later that night, I let him know via text message that my friend and I made it home safely. By morning, I received a reply:
“Teddy is married and has a new baby at home. Don’t contact him again.”
First, I was confused. Was this a joke? Did I accidently text the wrong person with the same name? My reply:
“EW! He’s married? What a pig! I had no idea!”
A half-hour later, I received a more confusing text telling me that Teddy was separated and that he did not cheat on his wife. To spare you the ridiculousness that followed, in summary, both Teddy and his poor wife were texting me from the same phone. Of course, Teddy didn’t know his wife was sneaking in texts to me on his phone. Not right away anyhow.
At one point, I didn’t know who was texting me. I didn’t want to talk to either of these crazy people, and I had to send both of them more than one message telling them to leave me alone.
Technology doesn’t just placate we humble, regular people. Politicians have been caught cheating on everything from their wives to the Berlin Marathon.
Ode to Technology
Try to finish the marathon while shaving 57 minutes off your time?
Madrazo’s fast one wasn’t that swift: Technology kept him in line.
An evening out to celebrate, Lindsay swears she kept things dry.
What to do when SCRAM narks on you? Say it was some other guy.
“It wasn’t me,” “I wasn’t there,” “I didn’t get your call,”
Lie after lie, time and time again, Technology knows it all.
There’s not much worse than Technology’s curse to keep you on your toes.
Looking for shoes when you should be earning your dues?
You’re caught: Browser froze.
Then there’s the converse relationship Technology has with Communication. While Technology affords us more opportunities to communicate with each other, it also enables us more reasons to avoid doing so. What’s more, when the content and the medium are truncated, so, too, becomes the sentiment we attempt to convey.
We’re expected to feel that someone’s sun rises and sets on us by way of a text message in 160 characters or less. Sentiments are stripped down to clever emoticons and barely decipherable text shorthand.
Personally, I miss sitting down, holding hands, and sharing my life in words with someone I care about. I also enjoy listening to what someone chooses to share with me.
Perhaps it’s because I studied communication that I appreciate it so much? The gestures, eye contact or lack thereof, inflection, breathing patterns, facial flushing, a wink, a smile, eyebrows raising, laughter, and even marked silence. Interpersonal communication involves a verbal or nonverbal message being conveyed. And, technically, true communication includes "feedback."
How many emails sit in your inbox, opened, but with no follow up? If someone’s standing in front of you and you ask them a question, sure, you could just stare at them, but you would appear very, very strange.
Remember the days of making someone you love a tape of songs? Gone the way of the love note, once written and then rewritten in careful penmanship on tediously neat stationery.
With all the reminders Technology provides us, we have no excuses for not keeping up with birthdays, anniversaries, births, and even relationship statuses. Celebrating a milestone? Evite! No need to visit your friends anymore: You can find out how their dental visit went while you check out their kids’ latest school pictures online.
Sure, ever evolving social media have connected us instantaneously to news of everything from your friend’s job offer to the 7.8 earthquake in China
