here’s the thing that pisses me off whenever people whine and moan about how the amount of time teenagers spend texting, instant messaging and otherwise talking to people via technology = The End Of Civilisation As We Know It:
as a teenager, the people you have the most amount of actual, physical contact with outside your immediate family - your neighbours and classmates and hometown locals? you know them RANDOMLY, which is to say, you’re forced to interact with them, not because they’re kind, or good, or sympathetic to your interests, or funny, or interesting, or kindred spirits - though if you’re very, very lucky, a few of them might be some or all of these things. no: your interactions are based entirely on GEOGRAPHY, and i’m sorry, but that is overwhelmingly a suboptimal method of choosing friends.
i mean, at least when you’re an adult, you potentially have SOME choice of association - where you live, where you work, what you study - but as a teenager? you’re pretty much stuck with whoever’s closest, even if that means a bunch of people who think you’re a freak, or who a perfectly nice but have nothing in common with you whatsoever, or who fall somewhere between those extremes.
or at least, you WERE stuck, prior to the internet. now, though, we can make friends online on the basis of - gasp! - ACTUAL MUTUAL INTERESTS AND COMPATIBLE PERSONALITIES. your peer group is no longer defined by a random selection of humans who just so happen to be stuck in the same physical place as you; instead, you can have a rich, thriving community of people who genuinely give a shit about you, your passions, your struggles and your life, and who may well care even more about the details of all those things than the people who live near you, because they want to hear how your day was. you can become friends with someone, CONNECT with someone, before ever knowing their age, race, gender, religion, physical appearance or even their name - or alternatively, you can seek our friends on the basis of exactly those things, which is really, really important if you’re in a minority in your home town, or needing support, or otherwise feeling alienated and lonely. technology means you can find and befriend other people like YOU.
so yeah, Kids These Days tend to be online a lot, and i get that you’re worried about predators. but please, don’t make the mistake of assuming screens are a barrier to social interaction, rather than a gateway to the type of genuine friendship that makes socialising worthwhile.
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I was one of the last pre-internet teenagers. The internet changed my life.
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