So in the comments from my Monday blog, Leigh from Five Acres and A Dream had one of those comments that makes sit back and think for a moment:
"I've come to the conclusion that nobody (except my like-minded blogging friends) really gives a fig for what I think and what I do. But I'm okay with that, since their world is increasingly foreign and non-desirable to me. Of course, I'm not forced to interact with others through the workforce, which you must still endure. That necessitates selective communication, doesn't it?"
A response in the "Comments" section did not seem to do justice to the thought.
1) I would concur - in my own life, no-one with the exception of three to five people (my father being one, Uisdean Ruadh my very old friend being another) cares what I think or what I do. If mention something like making yogurt or blacksmithing, that would be thought cool of course - but it is not the sort of communication that happens a great deal lately.
To be frank, people are not talking - or not talking much, anyway. If you are not on the social media, the chances (at least at my age and stage of life) that you are interacting with people on a regular basis is pretty slender because that is not how things are done any more. Social exchanges in other places - work, church, out and about - have largely disappeared due to The Plague; small talk prior to or during meetings, for example, has essentially disappeared. There is no gathering to chat before or after church or class: you go, you do your business, and you go home.
Add to this the zest and excitement of an election year and a rather frightening polarization and it turns out that most people have very little to discuss, at least in a civilized manner. It would seem - more and more - that anyone you do not fully know, or even those that you may know, are potentially someone who holds an opinion different from yours and would consider you to be a complete fool if they did not know you as a friend.
I wonder if there is also an element of protecting ourselves for the future: no matter what happens there will be screaming and unpleasantness; do I really want to give out an opinion or information on myself to someone who may remember it later?
2) "But I'm okay with that, since their world is increasingly foreign and non-desirable to me."
This is the thought that really rocked me back.
One does not think of the place one lives as becoming "foreign" to them. One thinks of foreign as countries and cultures far away, places that are exotic and have amazing pictures (not withstanding that in many ways, we have blended everything into a consumerism that makes everywhere look like here). Home is, well, home. Not foreign.
But not so much any more.
I can sense this in my discussion with certain folks - older than myself usually - that express they simply do not understand why what is happening is happening. I can see it and read it for myself, where people who live geographically in the same locale use thoughts and language that is as foreign to me as any language I have studied. I can realize it in the way that my interests and activities do not match with where things are announced as to where the future lies (e.g., I like blacksmithing and making things with hands, others are looking at Mars for colonization).
This place, too, is becoming foreign to me as well.
I do not wish so many of their things any more; the stores and InterWeb market places are filled with items that I have no need of. I do not wish for their words and their entertainment, which has become vulgar and crass. I do not wish for their spirituality, which in so many ways is wholly divorced from God and is based on how it makes them feel. I do not wish their morals and mores, which lead to nothing but emptiness, violence, and sadness.
I had expected none of this, but all of this is here. Perhaps the best thing to do - like, thankfully Leigh has been able to - is recognize that this is so and accept it rather than somehow pretend things are other than they are.
How odd to say, this world is becoming more foreign and undesirable to me as well. And yet, how relieving to be able to say it.
I have found myself there as well. I remember where it started: election night 2008. I could not understand how someone got elected that promised to make energy more expensive. That one point was beyond me. I hoped it would be okay, but deep down, my country had changed, and I hadn't.
ReplyDeleteI see some value in ordering parts online, as it allows me to schedule my work and not have to drive to get things. Interacting with the clerks is frowned up now, so personality is smothered. I don't like that at all.
But as you said, the world is foreign and undesirable, clearly.
I'm becoming an anachronism.
STxAR, I have been thinking a great deal about the Meiji Restoration and how - over a period of 10 years or so - the Japanese culture lurched from the 16th Century to the 19th Century. I wonder if it was the same way.
DeleteIndeed, I too have "become" an anachronism. Or more of one - I have been one for years. The world is just accelerating me towards that.
For me, it isn't that the world is foreign but that it just moved on, much like it does for every generation. My grandparents were long retired before computers were a thing and trying to explain to explain to them how all that work was probably as easy as teaching a monkey to speak in Latin. I saw the same thing in my parent's generation. I've had conversations of why it is advantageous to do all my daily spending on a credit card that gives me 2% cash back than to pay with a check that does nothing for me. We've had discussions about why I invest money in stocks and they in a savings account. Like Leigh, I'm already seeing that the world has moved on with out me. My daughter's generation has no desire to own a home or drive a car. It bewilders me because all I wanted to do since I was old enough to ride a bicycle was to drive a car someday and own a house that is mine alone.
ReplyDeleteWith each generation, the world moves on. Right now, we are probably raising a generation that will think nothing of wearing a mask on a flight 20 years from now. Already they will never have known a landline or a country where reality television stars couldn't be president. It won't be foreign. It will still be the same world. It will just have moved on.
Agreed Ed - I myself am the cusp of the "smart phone" generation and struggle to use much of the technology. And in many ways - technological primarily - the world has always moved on.
DeleteAt the same time, I think it is a fair question to ask what the world is moving on to. From my point of view it is increased authoritarianism, decreased personal rights, decreased speech, and an increasing (and perhaps ultimately total) loss of privacy. In my mind that is not the same as a world of changing technologies; it is a world which fundamentally changes how we interact with each other. What we are allowed to do. What we are encouraged to do. The physical world may be the same; the interactions of humans with every part of their lives will be very different (and, I would argue, not greatly improved).
As always, thanks for the well reasoned comment!
I agree that as the world moves on, new bad things arise. But the optimist in me also knows that good things arise as well. As a kid, my grandparents retired from the Midwest to Florida and I literally saw them a handful of times in two decades. With social media, I was able to communicate with them daily as well as others whom I probably would have let drift out of my life. I am a woodworker who builds furniture and is self taught by YouTube of all things. Had it not been around, I would still be nailing two-by-fours with a hammer and ringshanks. I love to read and despite the dominance of Amazon that has driven so many out of business, it has also allowed me to find books to read that I might never have been exposed too. The world will always be moving and with it new good and bad things will always arise and hopefully balance out each other.
DeleteThere is always good and bad, as you indicate Ed. I suppose my question not that there is always benefit, but who benefits and the long term ramifications. For example, you use the example of Amazon. It is a good one, as I have done the same as you and purchase books I could never find at my local bookstore back in the day. On the counter side, Amazon has also taken the ability to remove products they consider objectionable for one reason or another - if that is the main outlet for those items, they can essentially become unavailable. IF I have a Kindle, I have access to any number of books at a reasonable price - except that if Amazon decides too, they can simply delete the book (Apple has done the same for me by magically not allowing music that I personally own on a playlist as I am "out of region".
DeleteThe job thing is the more quintessential example of course: more jobs overall, but lower paying and perhaps not as good jobs (and depending on how one considers it, more deleterious to the local tax base as well). Cui bono?
So much food for thought in both your post and the comments made. And I, also, have come to the conclusion recently that society can't stay as it is, but has to move on, so not to judge the younger generation for wanting to change things, but to acknowledge that we live in a different generation which has different view points. So I settle myself in to being who I am, and be glad that I am of an age when the world was generally more peaceful, before the use of media came along, when we didn't even have television.
ReplyDeleteVera - Thank you as always for your kind and gentle words.
DeleteI suppose my only thoughts would be that while society cannot remain as it is, there are only two choices: better or worse. Which one of those we reach will not be revealed by choices made now but by their impacts in the future. My biggest concern is that most people do not know or learn history anymore - we have been down these trails before in human history and if the past is any indication (and human nature has not changed), these do not end well.
You bring up a great thought as well - the world, once upon a time, had more courtesy. That is an attribute that has fallen completely out of fashion in a culture that demands immediate results and seems not to tolerate any sort of deviation from a decided narrative.
I remember having a TV with 3 main stations, 2 independents, and the Public Broadcasting Network. Trying to explain 6 choices now is like speaking a foreign language.
I wanted to be sure to make a comment because I felt extremely honored to have said anything thought-worthy! At least we still form a community of sorts, not necessarily with the same experiences, but with similar conclusions.
ReplyDeleteLeigh, it is funny: a year or two ago, I would have said that the blogosphere was dying. Now I have become more convinced than ever of how vital it is.
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