Virtual Communication

She sees herself as being in constant contact with the world, and in a way, she is right! Whether it be Facebook or texting or e-mail or even the rare telephone call, there is an increasing amount of communication between individuals. Today we can look at the role Twitter played in major political events, or pictures not otherwise available which were sent be cell-phone, and realize that the forms of communication are in flux from moment to moment. It is moving so fast, it is akin to the report of an observer of the world's fastest train: "Here it comes here it is there it goes!"
So what is the issue? People through the new social media are less inhibited, less restricted, more apt to talk about incredibly intimate and formerly private things and therefore the person we are dealing with seems more open, more real, more trustworthy than those we deal with in real life. If anything, because we have the protective shield of the internet or the phone, we tend to be more direct, even ruthless in what we say or the way we say it.
But the result is that we tend to fall into a untrusting stance. We will not go into the separate issue of knowing whether the person we are communicating with is really who he or she claims to be, It is simply that we no longer deal with each other face to face, in person. It is safer to tell someone off on-line than to look them in the eye.
This is why people fall into the traps on line. With internet porn, a man is assured that a woman will never say no. College courses on-line almost guarantee a passing grade. And let us not mention the various gimmicks, products, services that are for sale for such a reasonable price on line (until the next bank statement comes in.) It catches us by our human desire for the quick and easy answer.
It may seem hypocritical for the writer of a blog to criticize the internet, but the point is not the form of communication. It is the people who escape into a protected virtual world where all one has to do with those who upset us is to un-Friend them.