5 Ways The Internet Is Killing Us
The internet is the enemy. I hate to be the one to romanticize the good ol’ days. That is a sure sign that one is no longer a spring chicken, but instead an, uh, old fogie? Well, call me what you want, although I must say I am much closer to the former category. Here is my rant about how the internet is killing us. See if you agree.
Online groups are always meeting
In the past, if you belonged to a group in real life, you met up with them at MOST, once a month. In today’s online groups somebody is starting a discussion 24 hours a day. What do you think about this? What do you think about that? Introduce yourself. What are you working on, how do you promote your business, how do you manage your employees, yourself, your time? Blah blah BLAAAHHH. No longer are you just a bad employee or manager in the actual workplace, but now you have some jerk reminding you about it 24 hours a day. Hey you Mr. Group administrator, see anything different in the group members list? Yeah, I left.
Drunk off celebrities
remember when you had to read trash magazines to get the latest celeb gossip? Yeah, I’ve almost forgotten those good ol’ days too. If you were like me you would never actually buy the magazine. You would read it in the supermarket line, read your friend’s, flip through it in the doctor’s office or at the hair salon. That’s it! So you only saw pictures or got “news” about once a week for a couple of minutes. And you usually didn’t get to finish reading the story before you had to pay for your groceries or go get felt up by the doctor.
Nakedness all over the internet!
But now, I can’t escape the creatures. They are in bed with me. The first thing I do when I wake up is check my phone. At first it’s for the time, but that quickly leads to other things. Email. Facebook. My YouTube channel. Text messages. Linkedin updates. Instagram likes. Oh what’s this, naked pictures? Now you see it. The tits, the ass, the crotch shots. So you take a look at the nastiness. And of course you skim the comments. And what do you know, someone mentions a related story, so you google it and find more nastiness. Minute by minute, blow by blow. And. I. Just. Woke. Up.
What the eff is app?
So these text apps have everyone acting like fools. Back in the days when you made a plan with your friends to meet up, it went something like this: “Hey you guys wanna meet at whatever bar on Friday at 6:00 for happy hour?” “Yeah, let’s do it”. And you wouldn’t hear anything else about it until you met up on Friday at the bar.
Gone are the days when this event started with a phone call and got around by word of mouth. Today someone starts a text group. Bwaaag, bwaaang, bwaaang. That’s my best impression of the freaking sound the text app makes. So everyone responds. And everyone keeps on responding. All week. Not only are you getting the blow by blow of their fickle feelings…one minute they’re going the next they’re not. But as a bonus, all of a sudden you gotta read about the kids getting sick or the damn dog getting lost or the husband is travelling so it depends on what time he gets home blah blah blah. Really? I don’t freaking care! I just want to go to happy hour! Can you handle it!? Two options, confirm or decline. Please.
Spoiler terrorism
Imagine being in Europe when the Super Bowl is on. Six hours ahead of the game. So kickoff is already past midnight for you. You hang in there like a champ, but by halftime you are waving the white flag and going to bed. Forget this, I’ll watch it tomorrow on my gamepass. Bahahaaaa.
So tomorrow comes and you are mega optimistic because everyone in your house has been threatened with their life and limbs to shut up about anything football related. So you know you are good to go, just pick up where we left off. Boot up the laptop, we are almost there baby, woohoo! But wait. What’s this I see? Payton Manning smiling, holding up a damn trophy?! Whaaaaat! Who can I kill? Do you know why I’m so pissed? I wasn’t even surfing the net. This was my desktop. Some genius at some stupid software company thought it was a good idea to make my desktop dynamic. So it is constantly moving and shifting news stories without me doing a darn thing. I don’t have to go out and find the news anymore, because the news is coming to find me! Really!? I can’t even talk about this anymore. It’s still too soon.
Social media syndrome
How many profiles do I have to have? Remember when you just had email? And if you were really advanced or talented then you had a MySpace. Nowadays the list is growing at epidemic rates, and don’t let it be you who doesn’t know what Snapchat is or its purpose. And don’t let it be you who doesn’t have a profile on all 50 trillion social media forums. Don’t let it be you who is the dinosaur who is not worth talking to because you don’t know what a hashtag is or how to use them.
Well guess what? It’s me! Yes boo, it’s me. I just found out about one week ago what a hashtag was and how to use it. And since then I am sure I have used them incorrectly at least 60% of the time. And guess what? Yeah. I don’t care. #ireallydontfreakingcare, #icouldntcareless, #ificaredlessidbedead, #effhashtags.
I really miss the old days when life was much more simple. Can we just go back to that?
The good old happy days!
Main Image: Lynn Friedman
