1 post tagged “revolution”
It's been quite a long time since I've been driven to write a blog. And a longer time before that since I've had the urge to actually write more than one without forgetting entirely about the idea, instead moving it into the back of my mind to resurface in roughly the same amount of time it takes for a baby to mature in the human womb (read: nine months). Still, I've written a few short essays in this little blue notebook I've been carrying around and I think it's probably time to type some out. Not like I've got much else to do anyway.
This one is the first part of who knows how many parts of a series of miniature essays (this one's probably 200 words, I've got another 400 word one) about Social Capital in America and the way it's developing. Here goes.
About two years ago I would have sworn I hated Myspace. In fact, I still do. It puts the emphasis on top friend selection and ranking instead of on the free flow of communication in a semi-organized fashion. It's frustrating to no end the length people will go to just to decide which one of their friends is their favorite. Still though, the idea that is Myspace is a going to be good for Americans. Maybe not Myspace itself, but if Generation Y is to amount to anything at all, it will almost certainly occur through an Internet based social networking service rather than in person. (Which I think is really sad, but I digress)
Because our lives are so fast and that we've spread that fast lifestyle to the rest of the world, we have killed the traditional style of social rlations. Myspace is a necessity to provide a replacement for services the generations before my own killed off with their insistence on speed, optimimation and beurocracy. As someone from the latter half of Generation Y, I feel like I got shafted in the area of Social Capital. The older generations (particularly Gen. X) have made it very difficult to escape from the hustle and bustle of the quick and speedy type of life they designed.
That in itself is not such a bad thing. The bad thing is that in doing so we have made ourselves dumber because we've killed our social capitol. Social capitol is, as defined by somewhere on the Internet as roughly "The individual and communal time and energy that is available for such things as community improvement, social networking, civic engagement, etc." And so, social capital is the basis on which communities are built. The problem with destorying it is that you destroy not just the community but the very way in which people are socialized, interact with others and fucntion in society. So basically what's happened is that in creating a society that makes doing work easier, they've destroyed the mechanism for creating workers. My genereation is effectively deaf, dumb and blind without without the mechanisms of social capital that every other generation before my own was entitled to.
Dinner parties, Family get togethers, participation in government, sitting down to eat (even if it's just at McDonalds!), going to a football game and even sleepovers are reduced or eliminated.
The only answer short of "Going Amish" is to adapt the mechanics on which social capital works. And we can only do that through something like Myspace. Because the time has been destoryed by modern speed of life, we must adapt to that and still maintain our ability to reach others and make connections. That's where Myspace comes in. It allows us to make connections to people that, due to the problems of modern life, just aren't physically possible to make any more! Myspace isn't the invention of Tom (its reported creator) but rather of the necessity to stay in contact. For our sanity, our intelligence, our education and our socialization.
Whether I hate it or not.
