Dear Child Of The 1980’s –
In what may feel like eons but is instead just a few short
years hence, shit is about to get real. A phenomenon known as social media will pervade the
consciousness of the world you find familiar now. It will have the ability to
force every human closer in distance yet leagues apart in anything resembling
genuine emotion. For instance, someone you have never met [nor will you ever have
the displeasure of meeting] will discover a way to find you both
intolerable and repulsive simply because you look content with your own life in
a few photographs visible to the masses. Without warning, anything from enjoying
a relaxing vacation to dating that guy becomes a silent competition no one has
told you that you’ve entered. No matter how much you may think you are simply
living your life, you are consistently moments shy of losing some ubiquitous
and universally accepted foot-race towards Lord knows what: Seeming happier, thinner, or more in love
than the next person? The truth is, Reagan or Daddy Bush Era Child, even as
we upload photos and update statuses, those of us living in these uncertain
times are vastly uncertain of why these daily actions are such necessities.
Sure, we could say we do it to stay connected with that
friend who moved away in third grade, or to remove the creepiness of stalking
celebrities [because if they shout it from instagram/foursquare/twitter, it’s
fair game to know their whereabouts] but this voice from the future has a
sneaking suspicion that while each of us may rattle off a disparate rationale
for our obsession with virtual “likes”, it is the need to foster relationships
without actually fostering a relationship that motivates us. In the same
fashion that children born in this era will play “tennis”, “dance”, and “kick a
ball” on a virtual screen rather than do any of these actual activities in
three dimensional form, friends [as
well as the derivatives, friended, unfriended and to friend] become loosely associated with the definition of friend that you might come to understand
in your youth.
My advice to you is to enjoy the distance while you can. No
matter how annoyed you are at that girl [two rows over] who keeps making fun of
your Lisa Frank Trapper Keeper, trust me, one day you will be longing to engage
in an argument over something tangible. Rest easy that with the advent of
social media, you will never have to lose tabs on your best friend from ballet
class [even if you do not speak to her for the next fifteen years and she gets married, this thing called
Facebook will put her maiden name in a shaded gray color to make her accessible
to old friends like you]. And whatever you do, do not become that 21st
century individual who has nothing better to do than flounder in
her hatred of the happiness of others. Worst comes to worst, just click
elsewhere, because anonymity within your animosity is an angry person’s sole companion
in this brave new world.
Good Luck,
carter [of 2013]
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