What is the role of interpersonal communication in our lives? How does technology shape society and transform the future (good or bad)? Why do we have relationships with others? To what extent do we need them? What do our relationships with others say about who we are? What rules or morals guide what we say to other people? How important is it to think about how others see and think of us? How does that shape how we think of ourselves?
A major stepping stone in my life that greatly transformed and expanded interpersonal communication was the creation of Facebook. This creation greatly affected my life in numerous ways. I quickly became addicted to the website because I was so intrigued by it. I always wanted to see what my friends were doing at all times when I was at home. I also always wanted to see what pictures and statuses my friends posted to see what they were doing. I also liked posting pictures and posting my own statuses. Facebook became a website that people used to show off and show what they were doing at all times. People tried to have as many friends as possible even if they didn’t really know who they were. People tried to post cool statuses and cool pictures to try to be cool. This is because people in society care a lot about how others perceive them. People care a lot about their social status. Most people want to have that “cool” person persona, so they try to post pictures to try to be cool. I also loved talking to my friends online on Facebook chat. Everyone always went online after school or at night to talk. I have used Facebook as a source for school projects as well because almost everyone has it, so it is an easy source to communicate about the project. I also got in the habit of doing my homework by my laptop. I always had Facebook up while I was doing my homework. Every couple minutes I would check Facebook to see who was online, what new statuses were posted, or what new pictures were uploaded. I loved being so interconnected to my friends at all time. I thought it was a wonderful thing. However, the negative of all this is multi-tasking/doing so many things all at once (Facebook, music, and homework all at the same time), which made it hard to do as well on my homework because I was distracted by Facebook and other things. However, I got accustomed to it quickly. I also put off my homework sometimes just to go on Facebook and see the homepage. I got addicted to it very quickly, which was good in some sense and bad in some ways as well. Another negative was wasting so many hours on Facebook daily, when I could be using my time more wisely. Some positives of Facebook and the update of technology was that I always had a wonderful source of information that I could use on my schoolwork. Also, I could talk to my friends in a more efficient way, instead of always calling or texting them on the phone. Technology was expanding so quickly, and Facebook was changing and expanding (becoming better) every day. Facebook has greatly expanded communication and technology in so many wonderful ways for our society. However, it has caused some problems as well. It has shaped society in positive ways by giving people an easy way to communicate, post pictures, talk to friends, post what you are doing at all times, and way more. Some negatives, however, are having such a complex technological source at your fingertips at all times. Nothing is private anymore. Anything on the internet is there forever. You can post inappropriate pictures of other people, and that person in the picture would get in trouble. Past generations would never have to worry about any of this because they never had so complex technology. Also, humans have access to communication at all times, which may not be a good thing. This is because you are always active doing something and always feel the need to use technology. You don’t get alone time or privacy anymore. People always feel the need to use technology and can’t go any days or hours without it because people have gotten so used to it and accustomed to it. The overall message that I have learned from the invention of Facebook is just how amazing technology has become in the past few decades. The improvements of technology have greatly helped society because people are able to look up anything on the Internet, talk to their friends/family at any point in time, and just be able to connect with the world and see what is new with society whenever they want. Technology has given people a chance to always stay connected with the world whenever you want. Technology has improved the functioning of businesses, daily life, and has helped catch more criminals. Technology has done so many wonderful things to this world. However, the updated technology has changed everyones’ privacy. Nothing is private anymore; you can’t keep secrets from anyone. Everything is uploaded and posted on the Internet. For example, celebrities can’t keep secrets from anyone. If Adam Sandler bought a new car, then that would be posted on the Internet a second later from a Facebook post or a Tweet on Twitter. It is kind of scary how technology has done that to society, but for the most part, the updated technology has done wonders to society.
Our morals guide what we say to other people. For example, I would tell my girlfriend everything that was on my mind, my beliefs, thoughts, likes, dislikes, etc., and I wouldn’t tell my parents most of this stuff. I would just be really brief to my parents. This is because human beings don’t tell everyone the same thing. We pick and choose what we tell to certain people. This is because I don’t want my parents knowing everything about me because they are my parents. Even though we are extremely close, I wouldn’t tell them some things about my personal life or what I was thinking inside my head all the time because I could get in trouble. However, I would tell my girlfriend everything because we are extremely close and are going out. We would tell each other everything because we really liked each other, and we knew we wouldn’t get in trouble if we told each other certain things, like who we didn’t like at the school, what teachers we didn’t like, or jokes about certain people. I wouldn’t go tell my parents what teachers I didn’t like, what students I didn’t like, or jokes about my friends because that would be inappropriate to tell my parents. There are just certain things you can and can’t tell certain people depending on who they are and what their status in society is. For example, I wouldn’t tell my soccer or track coach what events or what position I should be playing because they decide that, but I could tell my friends what position I should be playing or what events I should be doing. I also wouldn’t tell my teacher an inside joke about a student, but I could tell that joke to a friend. There are so many examples and instances where you can’t tell someone something because you could get in trouble or hurt their feelings. Nature is designed so that you can tell certain people certain things and there are certain places that you can do certain things that you can’t do at other places. I would use better manners with my family and act a certain way because they expect that out of me and that is proper. If I didn’t act in that way I would get in trouble. For example. I would put my napkin in my lap and I wouldn’t swear because I would get in trouble if I was with my parents at a family dinner. However, if I was with my friends at a laid back dinner, I probably wouldn’t put my napkin in my lap if girls weren’t around and I would swear every now and then because that is how my friends and I talk with one another. Every environment is different and you have to act in different ways in different surroundings. We have relationships with different people and act in different ways with different people because that is the way society works and is the way nature is designed. We need this different relationships because if we didn’t have these different relationships with different people, then society would be extremely boring and the structure of society wouldn’t work. We need our parents because they are our family, they brought us up/raised us, they love us and we love them very much, they provide us with shelter, food/water, and we need each other to survive. We need our friends (guys, girls, relationships, etc.) because we have a lot of fun with each other, tell each other really important things, joke around, hang out, make us laugh, we can tell them anything, etc. We need teachers because they educate us. Our different relationships tell a lot about who we are because the types of people you hang around describe your personality. People usually hang around people that have similar interests/personalities that they do. The jocks hang around one another for the most part and the nerds hang around one another; it is just how society works. It makes you feel happy if you hang around people that are similar to you because usually that makes you have fun, laugh, etc. because their jokes are probably similar to your sense of humor. People should feel happy with the people they hang out with because you love who they are, and you aren’t just hanging out with them to be cool/popular. However, a lot of people care about how others see/perceive them, so they hang out with the “cool” crowd to be cool. If you do that, you may feel accomplished within yourself, but you really aren’t happy. If they aren’t similar to you and you don’t have fun with them, then you shouldn’t be hanging out with them because you won’t be happy otherwise. We have relationships with others because we love socializing and being around other people (it makes us laugh, have fun, and be ourselves/be happy). We need relationships with other people because if you didn’t have relationships, then you would be sad and lonely. Relationships guide happiness and bring out the good in people.
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