Upsides of Technology

I don’t think it’s fair that teenagers are basically being condemned for our frequent (okay…obsessive, addictive) use of technology. Yeah, I don’t think it’s healthy to send thousands of text messages each month. Or to substitute all studying for phone conversations. But I do think those claims that we don’t know how to communicate anymore are ridiculous and false.

If anything we communicate better than any previous generation. Isn’t the complaint that we’re in constant communication? Just because it’s not oral communication (although by no means has my generation lost the ability to communicate verbally…) doesn’t mean it’s not communication.

And just to defend verbal communication—we don’t just use our cell phones for text messaging. And skype is completely verbal, whether it’s using the phone feature or the actual video chatting.

Our generation has brought networking to a new level- networking, which is one of the main problems associated with why women don’t succeed in business like men do. Networking sites like Facebook and Myspace (if you’re 5 years behind) have taught so many teenage girls about networking without them ever having realized it.

We’re able to make new friends that we woudn’t have met otherwise. (I realize the dangers associated with this- but not all cases are the ones where it’s a 40 year old man pretending to be a 16 year old guy. It’s hard to do that on Facebook, also).

More importantly, we’re able to make groups/events/fan pages, so we can more effectively support causes we believe in or gain support for our own passions/projects. Just look at how many bands have made it because of Myspace- most of them just barely out of their teens.

I think all technology, ranging from cell-phones to social networking sites, has great benefits for teenage girls. Of course there are the down sides, but these have been so over-cted I think it would be too repetitive to list here. Maybe the real problem is the one that every single generation has had with the previous: it’s not what the older generation is used to, and therefore hooks onto the bad.