Open Letter to Social Media Luddites
(or, This is for You, GenX)
Launching SnapLikeFollow on Medium
I was born in the 60’s and came of age in the 80’s.
If you’re like me, you remember when communicating in middle and high school meant hanging out with friends face-to-face, passing handwritten notes in class or the school hallway, and talking on a phone that was usually connected to a wall. Guys didn’t pass notes to guys, but girls did to girls. And they usually did it in style –special folds, i’s dotted with stars and hearts. And if a girl passed a note to a guy (with her friend usually delivering it), things were probably verging on a serious crush.
It all sounds quaint now
Our kids today are either rocking a touchscreen smartphone or iPod Touch or a tablet of one kind or another. They grew up with an email account that will effectively last them a lifetime. Think about that — one email or even one phone number, tied to you for life. The effort it takes to send a shoutout to a friend, a parent, a sibling or even a complete stranger is so minimal that this shoutout’s inherent value is often minimal as well.
This convenience, however, often comes at a cost. In the past, it took more effort to write a handwritten note. Even making a phone call could feel like a hassle — remember rotary dial? Because of that effort, we invested a little more of ourselves. A similar phenomenon happened with the introduction of digital cameras at a time when film was limited to 24 or 36 shots per roll and you had to drop off a canister of film just to have prints made. Our mom and dad didn’t let us kids go crazy with their cameras. Now we let our little kids use our iPhones, taking hundreds of photos of their pets. Their toys. The wall. Doesn’t matter; it’s digital and storage is basically free.
If it sounds like I long for the old days of analog film and phones attached to the wall, it’s actually the opposite. I’m a tweeting, instagramming, texting, XBoxing fool of a dad. I love every tech advance and am amazed at the revolution happening during our lifetimes. I also realize that this tech desensitizes our values, how we feel about ourselves and what we put out in the world.
This is for you, GenX and GenY
If you’re like me, GenX or GenY, you remember a very different world. Outr generations are a bridge to that past and I feel like we owe it to our kids to instill in them a strong set of values to help them make the right choices in life; not just the easy ones. We should feel a bit burdened by the responsibility — we really are the last set of American generations that are old enough to have lived a good chunk of our lives in a pre-digital world yet still relatively young enough to embrace what’s happening now.
And as much as I’m a tweeting fool, it’s safe to say thousands, if not millions of my generation are quite the opposite. When Facebook opened access beyond .edu emails, I jumped in to explore. It’s 2016 now. My wife, Jennifer, has yet to sign up! Meanwhile our oldest daughter is fifteen going on eighteen and lives for SnapChat, Instagram and group iMessages. She’d been clamoring for an iPhone since she turned ten. I’m actually quite happy to say we resisted until life presented an actual need.
Just as I see Jennifer and myself being a bridge for our kids to the learn the values carried over from the pre-digital age, I want this publication to be a bridge for GenX and GenY Luddites to cross over into this world of always online and always connected. So I dedicate this pub to my loving wife who wants our two daughters to have everything the world offers but who doesn’t have the first clue how to post a photo on SnapChat or upload a YouTube video. This is for you, Jen. And for every other parent who wants to learn the world of social media so they’re not freaking out about what their kids are (and probably aren’t) doing when you’re not around.
