I am sure that almost everyone can relate to this blog post,
just don’t let the title throw you off.
I was walking back home from the bus stop, today afternoon,
when I saw two trucks standing on the opposite sides of the road, leaving very
narrow road space for any vehicle to pass through. I was walking back home with
my flatmate, and I just made a comment about the road situation saying, “Look
at these idiots, they've parked right opposite each other and now that bus
cannot pass.”
But this, very general, casual comment, fell upon deaf ears.
Why?
She had her pink earphones on, with music in her ears.
A very common sight these days, among the youth, is
earphones in their ears and eyes on their smartphones. Either browsing through
their Instagram selfies, stalking on Facebook, or exercising their fingers on WhatsApp,
the youth today, if I may say so, is all about looking down.
Looking down on
their phones, cut off, completely from the events or the music in their
surroundings.
It’s not about us frantically scrolling on our smartphones,
with our fancy apps, talking to 50 people at once, but not building a
relationship with even one, ignoring the noise outside and tapping our feet to
the music in our ears, it’s about how we've created an illusionary world around
us, like a virtual bubble, and for anything outside of that bubble, we are deaf
and dumb, voluntarily. We are choosing
to be deaf and dumb, instead of using our gifted senses to make sense and be
aware of what’s happening around us.
I don’t blame when new comers join a new college or a new
school, and claim that it’s difficult to make new friends. Hell yeah, it’s
difficult. Everyone is bloody busy gawking at their smartphones, so dumb as to
even say a Hey, or pass a smile. They have the same music playing in their ears
over and over again, resulting in them being deaf to almost everything and
anything that goes around them.
I mean I get it, I’m bored waiting for the bus, I plug in my
iPod and I listen, but while crossing the road or walking alone, don’t be so
ignorant to the world, which is not as hunky dory as a Taylor Swift song may
express. Look around you, there are vehicles speeding, people crossing,
robbers, muggers, rapists, all around us, each time of the day, so for once,
just for your own safety, use those senses to look up and around, let them see
the world, than just your LCD screens.
I am very much a part of the same generation that is being
talked about here. I do have an iPod that I plug in while travelling in the bus or metro, I am an active Instagram and WhatsApp user, and I do own a
broken smartphone. But when my smartphone broke and stopped working except for
when it’s charging, I moved to an old, simple, Nokia handset, and after a few
days of exercising the natural instinct of flipping my phone to check my
notifications and then looking at my Nokia handset and realising that oh! This
isn't a smartphone, I came to a conclusion, that I don’t really need one. My old
Nokia handset performs the necessary functions of calling, receiving calls,
text messaging and music just as any other smartphone. Yes it doesn't support WhatsApp,
and I miss it, but I didn't die without it either. I am not on Facebook, and
not 24*7 active on WhatsApp, so a lot of times, people ask me, how do I stay
connected with friends? How do I get updates on classes or how do I stay socially
active?
Here’s the answer. I deleted my Facebook account in 2012
January, I was in class 11, I had deactivated it during my exams, and then when
I found peace and eternal bliss from the daily gossip in school about, who
liked who’s picture, or who commented what? How many times did someone change
their status, or who did they put up their latest profile picture with, when I
discovered a world beyond all this, I went ahead and deleted my account
forever. I moved outside of the virtual world bubble.
It’s been 3 years since I deleted my account, and I don’t
have a single complaint. I agree that I’m unable to stay in touch with a lot of
people, but I would rather talk and maintain relationships with just 10 people that
I know will help me out in a state of need, than hundreds of those who are only
there to comment, ‘Awwww’ on your profile picture one day and the next, say,
‘Hina who?’
I have a theory about real friends and relationships that
you should care about. During my semester end examinations and a month after
that, I switched to my Nokia phone completely and stopped using the smartphone,
to avoid the continuous notification distraction. I was inactive on my WhatsApp
for almost 40-50 days.
Texting someone and talking to them for hours together is
easy when it’s free, but as soon as you have to spend a few bucks to get in
touch and talk to a person, it pinches and you avoid it. But in those 40-50
days, I realised that the person who takes the pain of spending those few bucks
to message you or call you, to find out where you've been and how you are,
since your last seen on WhatsApp was about a month ago, that is the person you
should care about, because she/he is the one who will cross oceans if need be,
to help you when you need them. And of course there’s always my favourite,
Email. It’s free, more private and a lot more exciting. Almost all my friends
have my email id and they know that, that is the one space where they can
always get in touch with me and I’ll reply back instantly. I check my email
once or twice in a day, I have managed to keep in touch with my middle school,
high school and college friends just fine. I believe that if there’s someone
who really wants to get in touch with you, they’ll find a way, because there’s
always a door open, if Facebook is closed.
So why are we choosing to be in an illusionary world, where
pretence is the attitude of everything and everyone? We all choose filters
before uploading a selfie on Instagram, then what is so great about a person
looking so bright? Do we really care if someone has put up, ‘So Bored’ as their
Facebook status? I agree that social networking sites are a great way to
express your opinions, share your work or stay in touch with friends and have
fun. But do we really need to be that dependent on these sites, that we start
acting deaf and dumb towards the real world? Everyone raises their voice
against injustice by forwarding messages on WhatsApp or sharing it on Facebook,
but how many of us actually step out and voice in forms of active protests or
gatherings? How many times have we heard in the news that a group of youngsters
got together to spread awareness about any issue? It’s all going on in the
virtual space, but that’s not how the world works or how we live our lives. No
matter how fancy our cars are in our Facebook pictures, we still need to drive
on potholes on the road, but you'll just shout out two abuses and move on. No matter how bold
enough you are, to carry off that short LBD on your Instagram, we still live in
a world where women are objectified. How many times except for captioning your
pictures with quotes regarding feminism or anything along those lines, have we
actually gathered with our peers and done something to spread awareness or
discuss each other’s sexual assault experiences?
By just sharing a picture expressing your anger or
condolences towards the recent rape victim, you don’t become an active part of
society fighting this evil. You are still looking down while doing that. You
really need to look up, really up above to be able to see the same sky, the
same sun, the same moon, the same stars that all of us share, even though we
are so distinctly different.
I’m not even going to mention about how those days are gone
when you would find a person reading in the bus, sitting in the library to pass
time between two lectures or just simply
hanging out with friends, because the definition of ‘hanging out’ has changed
to friends sitting together, gawking at their smartphones and showing the other
person the new girl in town with her new cute boyfriend who changed her relationship
status on Facebook. When I look at groups of friends like that, I just feel
plain sad. Sad for them, for me, for all of us, that we've come to a point
where the battery life of a phone matters more than its functions, where people’s
relationship statuses on Facebook matter more than building your own, where
forwarding long WhatsApp messages matters more than educating yourself with a
novel, where people’s fake smiling selfies matter more than laughing with your
own friends. It’s just really sad.
And the worst part, the mass media, which is considered to
be the major source of spreading information and awareness is never going to
talk about this concern among our generation, because this pretence, virtual
bubble works just fine and in favour of them. Why wouldn't they want people
using their apps 24*7, talking about it, listening to it all the time? The song
by Britney Spears fits in perfectly for them, they want ‘More’, and
we are actually mentally just too dumb to realise how low we’re stooping. It just
saddens me and I hope someday, like the bell curve, this attitude towards
reality and the virtual world which is at it's peak right now, will descend, and we can go back to being a generation
which is smart, intellectual, curious, and a good listener.
I really, really hope.
