Searching for truth is a tiring journey. A great description of truth is that Rached Alimi presented in a recent post:
Truth is like a spark in the night, difficult to see but always present. Science is the path that leads us towards this spark, helping us to see the world with new eyes and to understand what exists.
Finding truth even between two ideas may require serious effort. For example, social media webs are they blessings or not? The illusion of social webs can have ill effects on our lives.
Let me ask simple questions
- Is a virtual tour of the pyramids in Egypt a substitute for being them and enjoying their greatness?
- Can the joy of a virtual tour to Venice be a substitute for being there physically?
Having been to both places I know from experience that being there physically is a much richer experience than taking virtual tours.
The Big Question
The big question then is why people get so addicted to virtual friends on social media at the expense even of their families. Social webs are changing our cultures and style of life.
Are we living in the illusion that virtual friends are more important than physical ones?
I read many posts by Dennis Pitocco in which he met physically with many of his virtual friends. He wrote a lot about there being nothing equal to hugging a friend.
The Bigger Question
If so, why are we stuck in the social web? A spider knows well how to produce sticky webs that stick to the victims but not themselves.
Are we allowing ourselves to be stuck in social webs and be their prays?
The social web is having a great impact on our lives. Not only do we spend most of the time clicking pages and hardly reading useful articles, but also doing activities like void chatting that only increase our shallowness.
The ill effects include bullying, addiction to the web, and spreading fake news.
How many people are trying to attract followers by spreading fake news so that they earn more money? Only yesterday, I read a story of an old mother who asked her teenage daughter to perform naked on the net to get subscribers to her website.
Morals are corroding. Shallowness is increasing. Misinformation is spreading. Useful articles are losing interest and they keep getting lesser attention.
Are humans becoming biased favoring what is not good for the health of their minds and hearts but good for their pockets?
The Stockholm Paradox is showing itself in another form. Humans are falling in love with the web makers who stick them to drain their time, minds, and pockets.
It seems, according to some studies, that 1 user out of 8 makes a compulsive use of social media, with implications that impact on the quality of life and interpersonal relationships.
The saddest thing in my opinion is that a tool of extraordinary utility and innovation can instead become a serious concern.
Indeed and that is the concern. Worse, if we extend support to those who hurt us.
I must confess that I feared, for some reflections made, of being prejudiced, given my age, due to perhaps unevolved considerations of the concept of morality.
And perhaps this is an opportunity for an open discussion on the subject.
As social networks seem to be used by a large part of users, I have the feeling that the web, or rather social networks, have significantly accelerated the speed of communication and are radically changing the way we think, read and remember.
To the possibility offered by PCs, tablets and smartphones, to be constantly in contact with others and with what is happening around us, in fact, we add the fact that tweets, comments and messages require minimum “digestion” times which are more and more getting used not only to quick communication, but also to similarly short and quick thinking.
The consequence could be a strong reduction in the importance attributed to morality and a considerable increase, on the contrary, in that attributed to hedonism and image.
In other words, those who use social media intensely tend to lose sight of the “moral content” of events and to concentrate their attention and energies on the pursuit of pleasure.
In summary: continuously exchanging tweets and messages makes us people less inclined to pursue the collective good and more oriented towards achieving ephemeral, hedonistic and image-related goals.
The consequence could be a strong reduction in the importance attributed to morality and a considerable increase, on the contrary, in that attributed to hedonism and image.
So true and profound I find your thoughts Aldo Delli Paoli
We are trending towards short messages and emojis. We are distracted by many irrelevant ads and fake news. Workers are disengaged spending work hours on social media. Bad news travel fast and contaminate the social fabric. We are spending lesser times with our families preferring to chat with virtual friends.
I completely sipport your comment.