A friend just included one of those "get off the internet (it makes people lonely!) and live in the Real World!" videos (here's a
link to the video) in one of her posts and after about a minute and a half I was distracted by having to direct a bee that had flown in through my window back outside (Hello little bee friend! I promise there are more pretty flowers on the other side of the window!) and before I went back to the video, I wondered.
(And if you're in a hurry or are like my mum and like to read the end of a book before starting it ^.~ the last two big paragraphs (or even just side note 1) will tell you the gist of it.)
Does this person live with a version of the internet where absolutely everything you do is a performance act?
Does this person live with a version of the internet where you somehow don't laugh with your friends (about how, if you vacuum a place where a cat lives, you end up with enough fur in the vacuum cleaner to make a new cat. About something ridiculous some person on a train next to one of you said yesterday. About how that bug in that video game where a horse walks upside down on a lake is the funniest thing ever. About the overly complicated metaphor you got yourself tangled up in while trying to explain why broccoli is the devil)?
Does this person live with a version of the internet where people don't band together to spent an amazing week together to raise money for charity, have fun and, yes, entertain other people with their evil, evil performance act while they're at it? Where people don't use the internet to plan out time to spend with their friends who live farther away, be it by meeting them offline or via the phone and chats (because hey dude, even train tickets are expensive and don't get me started on how I can't just hop on a plane to visit a friend who means the world to me but who happens to live on the other side of the planet)?
... I was going to go on but it boils down to, does this person live with a version of the internet where everything is superficial and friendship and emotions and all that don't exist?
But I hadn't even watched the whole video yet, so I decided to, well, watch on. Somewhere around the two minute mark, he starts going on about how when
he was young,
he used to
play outside and have REAL experiences! And I'm like... wait, is this one of those "if you don't live life the way I do/in a way that I approve of, I will do my best to shame you into agreeing that your kind of experiences are inferior" deals? But I wanted to watch the whole video before jumping to even more conclusions.
Of course he also subscribes to the school of "insult people - it's
provocative and will force them to think and re-examine their sad lives and it's totally a valid form of argument." (quote: "We're a generation of idiots - smart phones and dumb people") which doesn't exactly help the whole "not jumping to conclusions" thing. I don't even feel particularly insulted at this point (although I see why someone would be - and not because "they are forced to re-examine how sad and empty their life is" but in the same way one would feel insulted if videodude had instead made a video about how, I dunno, sports make people dumb because you don't use your brain in videodude-approved ways), but I would like to share my experience of rolling my eyes a lot before I'm even done with breakfast with someone, but everyone's either fast asleep or on their way to work and I'm not sure I won't have forgotten about it once someone's actually around.
Anyway, back to the video, because I recognised with a sigh of resignation that I was still only halfway done with it. I was holding out for a twist at the end.
Instead, we go on with a story about how some dude asks some girl on the street for directions and they are then used as an example of a happy healthy family with children and grandchildren and then the wife dies from old age and isn't it great that they had such a fulfilled life? (sidenote: I sigh again at choosing, of course, some very straight, very white, very able-bodied and presumably neurotypical family to illustrate this happy healthy fulfilled life, and telling it from the man's point of view.)
And then we lament that all of that never happened because the dude looked up directions on the phone instead and walked right past the girl (and then we get a shot of him staring down at his phone while dozens of people walk past him in a blur with him never noticing) and presumably lived some sad and empty life staring at his phone to do... what exactly?
I come back to those paragraphs above with all their examples taken from just my last week, and think of something else. I have an acquaintance who sometimes shares pictures of his daughter on twitter and sure, I don't know them that well but those pictures still radiate happiness and I'm happy that this person I sometimes talk to is happy. (But of course that's invalid, because he's not, I dunno, a workplace acquaintance who shows me these photos in person or something.)
And there's another couple I know, also with a small child (to, err, say nothing of the people in relationships I know that don't have children, or the people not in relationships, but the video chooses
straight white able-bodied neurotypical monogamous relationships to illustrate True Happiness so let's talk about that other couple with a kid for a moment. I've known them both for years and have been friends with them since before they got together and adopted a kid and I expect to be friends with them for a long, long time. ♥ Also, they met and got into their relationship years before they met in person, their kid is adorable and they send me photos and I could go on about, I dunno, little G's fantastic idea of trying a handstand and falling into the fridge and wanting to tell auntie Sternchen about it but I've spent more than enough time on this post already, so let's move on.
Now, I could give videodude and anyone involved in this production the benefit of the doubt and say, hey, they're obviously not talking about me and my friends (my family, my former co-workers) who use the internet as a tool for communication and to connect with one another, and that they're obviously talking about getting distracted by the internet and overusing it as a tool for procrastination, and about people who, I dunno, use the internet solely as a performance platform but never write back or something like that.
Thing is, the very last thing the video tells its audience is literally, and I quote, "live life the real way." So it
was just a case of "live life in a way that I approve of or else I will pity you and your sad empty life that I think you are living" with a dash of "I was one of these sad lonely people once but now I have found the One True Way". Aww, I was hoping for a twist.
Because let's face it, even if there are some people who'd like to make connections offline/procrastinate less using the internet (as opposed to, I dunno, making empty small talk? Cleaning the windows for the third time in a week? Re-arranging your sock drawer?) but needed a push to actually do it, but when it comes down to it, what the video ends up doing is, it regurgitates damaging stereotypes in the most condescending way possible and then pats itself on the shoulder for being so edgy.
Excuse me if I fail to be impressed.
- - -
Side note 1: Obligatory disclaimer that this is obviously just my reading of the text. If you got something positive out of this video, that's great! I'm not trying to say that there isn't a useful message somewhere in there for someone, but I really, really wish the video had been able to make its point without throwing people who communicate differently (who live their lives differently, who find happiness in different ways) under the bus.
Side note 2: "Make eye contact." What I think the video is
trying to say is, "don't be afraid to look people in the eye". However, while a "lack" of eye contact can certainly be a sign of anxiety (or even just nervousness), I am so, so tired of people insisting that it always is, or that "you're not making eye contact regularly while speaking to me" is some universal sign of anxiety/nervousness (also, shaming people for not making eye contact doesn't exactly help people with anxiety who already think poorly of themselves).
Because NO. No no no no
no. Eye contact doesn't come naturally to everyone. To use an easy example, many autistic people aren't exactly fond of eye contact and certainly don't appreciate being told this somehow makes them less human. (When my aunt [S] remarried, her husband once made the mistake of mentioning something like that where my cousin [J] ([S]'s son) could her him. [J] didn't talk to him for a full year.) And that's not even going into all the cultural differences that exist regarding eye contact. So. Please don't treat eye contact like another thing that has to mean the same thing to every person. Thank you.
- - -
[
Edit from a comment thread to illustrate something:
They could've made a video illustrating the kinds of experience that the internet doesn't quite offer, like, I dunno, an actual in-person hug or mountain climbing or the smell of a forest after the rain, and have a message like "If you want any of these experiences, why not try try to go & have them" (maybe even "and if you need help with that, that's okay and here's some resources"). Instead they made a video that implicitly tells people that the kinds of experience they're already having are worthless (or at least worth less) and explicitly not only prescribes them only one kind of experience as Real and good.
And they use insults to try and get people to listen to them. For some people, it might work. For some people, it might be annoying. For the people who
are using the internet as a coping mechanism and for whom a balanced approach might be the most important, that insult might be one too many.
(And hey. If you're trying to get me interested in table tennis, don't go on a rant about how table tennis is so much better than books and how I am not really living if I read books instead of playing table tennis. Explain to me what's awesome about table tennis and why I might enjoy it! To quote someone who'll recognise a sentence like this if sie reads this, Putting down the things I like to elevate the things you
think I should like will just make me think you're a jerk. (even if I might have an interest in table tennis.)]
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