Socially Removed

Something I like to observe when I'm sitting with a group of my friends is how many of them are involed in separate activities using their technology. I touched upon this topic in the post about 'screens' so I took it upon myself so observe some of my friends closer.

My roommates and I have dinner together often. We all like to cook and we invite our other friends over for dinner pretty often. Recently there were about 7 of us sitting at the dinner table. Usually it is silent because everyone is eating, but this time I looked around and 5 out of 7 people were on their phones. I had just put my phone down so only me and one other friend wasn't engaged with their technology. I made two or three comments before anyone really looked up and reacted. I said something like "what is going on?" assuming there might be something interesting going on.

One of the most common reactions when everyone looks up from their phones at the same time is something along the lines of "did you see what 'so and so' tweeted?" or " did you see her status?". Even though a large group of my friends could be sitting in the same room, everyone is still contsantly occupied with knowing what everyone ELSE is doing. Although everyone is engaging in the same social activity of sitting together at the dinner table, people are socially removed from this specific situation and are entering themselves socially through their phones or other forms of technology.

I find myself doing this and get mad. If we continue to be so involved with our screens, the future will look quite depressing. There is a scene in Wall-E that reminds me of what the future could come to if we are constantly involved in our screens. Everyone is large and round sitting on motorized chairs with screens surrounding their heads. No effort needed at all. It's a scary though.