There’s an inspired YouTube video making the rounds that reminds us of all the wonderful events we can happen upon in life if we just pay attention. We’re likely to be distracted from them if we spend too much time glued to our smartphones, the video, called “Look Up,” tells us in verse.
“We’re a generation of idiots, smart phones and dumb people,” Gary Turk, the writer, performer and director says. “So look up from your phone, shut down the display. Take in your surroundings, make the most of today. Just one real connection is all it can take to show you the difference that being there can make.” In a scene from the B-roll of his life, he bumps into an attractive girl on the sidewalk and asks her for directions, a chance encounter that leads to love and marriage.
It’s a nice message. I agree with it.
By saying I agree with it, I’m also saying I prefer it, which is the fulcrum of these debates about how terrible and isolating or how wonderful and connecting these smartphones and their social media applications are.
Gary’s character in the video met his soulmate at random while wandering. Let’s imagine for a second that Gary could have been staring at his phone discovering his soulmate on a widely accepted, non-stigmatized dating app, of which there are several.
I prefer one, someone might prefer the other, and there is nothing wrong with either. It’s rather economic.
At the decrepit age of 28, I am possibly what one would call old-school. I enjoy the conversations that take place offline the most. The gap that separates my enthusiasm for face-time with old friends and new strangers and my attachment to the people I perceive as avatars is yawning. I smell the roses without Instagramming them.
Herein is a key point: There is absolutely nothing wrong or culturally eroding with Instagramming a sightly bed of flowers.
In this age of technology, which is better described as “ever-evolving” rather than “new,” the likes of Twitter, Facebook, et cetera are the neighborhood bar. (And in those times we do arrive at the actual neighborhood bar, we Foursquare it.) We communicate instantaneously over these channels, and hold simultaneous discussions. We share, and hell, if we feel like it, we share everything.
Super.
Humans are prone to assume the characteristics of the society of which they are a part. Technology is so prevalent, easily attainable and intuitive that it has absorbed younger generations. That’s the modern life, and to act as if we need to resist it because it’s depriving us wholesale of its more experiential qualities is silly. As it has been said numerous times in numerous places by numerous “dumb people” who champion those “smartphones,” social media and digital communication services have given us the opportunity to be in touch more than ever before.
What Gary Turk’s video and videos like it get right — absolutely right — is this: The point at which technology supplants, rather than complements or even enhances the human experience, is the point at which we need to unplug for a sec and think. No one should aspire to be the person fixed on a tiny hi-res display on a handheld device in a roomful of socializing people.
“These technologies connect us to the people that are far away from us, but they disconnect us from the people directly in front of us,” Nick Bilton, author of “I Live in the Future: & Here’s How It Works,” said on a TV panel last year. That can be true.
“With these technologies, you get the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship,” M.I.T. professor Sherry Turkle added. That also can be true.
So let’s not allow “these technologies” to replace that which is irreplaceable; to replace existence in nature with existence through radio waves. Let them live side-by-side, and if a person happens to prefer one to the other, so be it. It’s called balance.
