Miracle World Media Blog

About two months ago a co-worker and friend of mine told me about a news article I’m sure most of you have read by now, about a 13 year old girl who sent over 14,000 text messages in one month. I will admit at first I brushed it off and thought, “big deal that’s what kids do these days”. But recently I began dwelling on it, thinking how out of control it was. 14,000 text messages? Wow can you say carpal tunnel syndrome in the making? She must have even texted people that were right next to her or in the same room. Just thinking about this story made me wonder about the generation that it is right after mine, the “millennials”.



I’m a 30 year old member of generation X, computers where around most of my life which eventually lead to me entering a career in the information technology field. However members of the millennial generation have been around computers their ENTIRE lives. The instant messaging, social networking, emailing, and texting became a part of their lives as soon as they gained the ability to use them. With that being said I really have to ask myself, are we headed toward a more anti-social society when it comes to actually physical conversing?


One Saturday during a youth meeting at my church, I asked two teens who where texting during the presentation, “why young people text so much?” One of them responded, “because you can chat with people that you might not feel like talking to”. I laughed and thought to myself, “this person is communicating with someone he really doesn’t want to talk to”, very interesting. Back in the day the telephone service AT&T encouraged us to reach out and touch someone, however now all we want to do is reach out and text someone. Today there are four major texting days for most people in our society, your birthday, Christmas, Thanksgiving, and New Years. I might sound a little sensitive but if we are supposedly close friends or family you need to call me on my birthday. I’m serious are we headed for a physically anti-social society?


I can just imagine future generations having trouble with traditional interpersonal conversations. My younger cousin once told me that texting or instant messaging allows her to say what she really wants to say to somebody, because she didn’t have to see the physical reaction of that person after she expressed herself. I always said that it’s so ironic how a cell phone is the most social and anti-social device all rolled it to one. Its a tool that can allow you to connect to friends and family all over the country, and it can also allow you to avoid conversations with strangers (girls can ignore guys trying to hit on them if they pretend to be concentrating on a cell phone conversation), as well as people you might know.


I am a tech geek and really enjoy the emerging technologies, like social media, smart phones, and video conferencing, they can be convenient and cost effective, but I also like being around and engaging the people. Sometimes I just wonder will things go too far? Its scary to think that children of the future may start having their birthday parties online. What do you think?? LOL

Tags: Cell Phones, social media