Why there's nothing social about Social Media

Photo from Pixabay - by Geralt

You can’t have Social without people. Without human interaction. Its original root word means – companion.

Do you think there is any human interaction on Social Media?

Let me clarify.

During my teenage years and beyond, issues were resolved with face to face communication. Or they weren’t resolved at all. You sucked it up, went home and never mentioned it. You bore the scars on the inside and hoped nobody noticed.

Or you met in the schoolyard. You met on the corner. You asked a friend to ask the friend of the other guy and you met somewhere to discuss the problem.

If you’re thinking all of this led to a fight – you’d be wrong. Oh, sure there were some. Never major. But yeah, blood was spilled from time to time. But that’s not the point. The point was that there was human interaction. There was yelling. There was disagreement. There was human emotion, usually lots of it and in the end, there was a resolution. No treaty signed. No swords exchanged. Just a nod or a hand shaken and that was it.

It wasn’t all that long ago. But in technology years, it seems like forever. We now have cell phones that are more powerful than the launch technology used at Cape Canaveral in the 1960s.

I can take a picture of my cat sleeping upside down and have my third cousin on my mother’s aunt’s side in New Zealand, laughing in 3 minutes.

But there’s no human interaction there. Just technology taking the handoff and running with it. The phone’s computer and the almighty algorithm does the rest. We simply take the picture, punch in a few keystrokes and go back to our Seinfeld reruns.

Me having a phone and the other guy having a phone, still does not bring about actual social interaction.

That’s the problem, we have neatly sidestepped the whole human element in this equation and have instead inserted electronics in between, so that we don’t actually have to deal with the real fallout from being an asshole or doing something mean to someone who didn’t deserve it.

In the schoolyard or backyard or alley behind the bar, people who were doing something stupid, just because, or who were actually defending something worthwhile, had to confront the live wire that human emotions are.

They had to deal with the hostility and spittle that came flying out of mouths distorted with righteous anger or whiskey.

They had to deal with it, however messy it may have been, and from that experience learn quickly how to avoid doing whatever it was that got them into that situation.

Today, we troll.

We anonymously spit in people’s faces and laugh at their distress.

We bully with vast distances of anonymity between us and our victims.

We text, that we’re sorry.

We send a “sorry kitty” photo across Instagram when we ghosted our date, and hooked up with their friend instead and now feel bad for being a dick.

I am not advocating violent contact or staged fights on street corners. Trust me, that’s already been done and it didn’t work. Look around us, at what’s happening, at what happened on January 6. It speaks to the fact that there is way too much distance already between us and the reality of others. Especially those who have a hand in governing us or influencing what direction our lives go in.

No, I’m advocating actual social interaction. I’m suggesting that we not take Social Media too seriously, because it’s not really doing us much good in the social understanding department.

When did the smart phone first come out? When did the first smart TV hit the stores? When did 3G, 4G and 5G start ruling the airwaves? Plenty of might right there to relay more communication today, than was written or uttered in the last 10,000 years combined.

So, how are we doing in social understanding and responsibility today?

Social Distancing – now that’s doing alright, thank you very much. And of all the things we don’t need right now, it’s more distance between people. But hey, that one is important. But the others, who’s taking care of them?

Social Media, if it was actually conceived of and brought into being here and not through borrowed technology picked up from Aliens in Alamogordo, New Mexico (mostly kidding here) then, somewhere downstream it seems like it was hijacked for other purposes.

Meaning, we’ve opened up a new age Pandora’s Box. We made it okay to influence people wholesale through false information. To accuse others of infinite wrongs and never have to prove it. We get to attack people, long distance and laugh, while stuffing our faces with pizza and beer and never worry about meeting that guy in the schoolyard to just sort a few things out.

Actions have consequences. Isn’t that what we were taught … hell, wasn’t Plato and Socrates teaching that same thing 2500 years ago. Didn’t we get the memo? Or did it get deleted?

Social Media ain’t very social because it is removing the one element that makes it so potentially important – actual human interaction. Hands touching as an act of agreement. Heads nodding in assent, as eyes make contact to read another person’s intentions.

Did you know that the act of shaking hands comes from a very old attempt at controlling where the other’s guy’s right hand went? Maybe to grab that sword being carried on his hip. By shaking hands for a moment and locking eyes, people could begin to sort things out.

I’ve seen couples break up via a text. A 30-year business vet get fired via an email. And a man ask his girlfriend to marry him via skywriting. At least that had flair. Plus, he had the ring ready to go.

Social Media has been giving us a head fake for over a decade now. It lulls us into believing that man, we are communicating up a shit storm here and getting it done. But getting what done?

Fifty years ago, when TV was young and bold and had all of six channels, understanding all the information that was coming out of that box was hard enough. It took attention and focus and a fair amount of belief or faith (your choice) in the people doing the talking.

Today with 12,783 channels to choose from and 5 quadrillion words being transmitted every day, much of it on smart phones and tablets, we are expected to keep up with it, understand its impact on us and our environment and make sure it’s accurate, so we can make informed decisions. Now, who’s smoking the dope?

The solution - start going more old school. Start actually talking to people. If nothing else, it will slow down the flood of information coming at you – through Social Media. The onslaught of ideas and suggestions of what button to push and what person to believe.

Love your phone. Sleep with it, if it assuages your separation anxiety. Just don’t believe everything it says.

Redefine Social Media to include human interaction. Meet up. Lose the phone. Have a beer – you can’t drink via any of the Apps.

Humans are messy, sure, but do we have a choice? They’re emotional and emotions as we all know create drama. But drama is real. And on the other side of it – is resolution.