Is social networking harmful?

[Raneth]

My roommate got a smart phone recently (I can't afford one) and our movie nights and gaming nights have turned into his playing scrabble on the smart phone whenever he has a moment. At work, people mess around on their phones. When I go out with people, invariably, someone will turn to their phone, during a lull in the conversation if they're trying to be polite but most of the time doing it regardless of whether or not someone is speaking.

I find this incredibly rude. I can understand the argument that "I only do it when the conversations die" but having the phone as an option is what keeps the conversations dead and shuts out the possibility for more of it.

It's not just phones, of course. It's Facebook, twitter, and other social networking sites, where for many people, the "friends" are just "fans" who they have never actually interacted with in years. Texting has replaced talking on the phone, to the point where many of my friends are often too intimidated to even call for a damn pizza. If they can't order it online, they often won't bother ordering.

Is social networking and increasing reliance on technology for communication (which by it's nature keeps us at a distance from others, only interacting with them at our convenience) harming social interaction? Are we losing empathy or social skill as we confine our interactions to chatrooms and comments on the internet? (Youtube comments would suggest this to be true).

Now, the internet has also done great things for people. I would be a complete failure in life were it not for computers. But I think these issues are worth discussing.

[GamingGal]

I see social networking overall as a good thing. I've kept in contact with friends who live in different states, and we make plans to hang out together and whatnot via Facebook. Without it, plans wouldn't be made and we'd drift apart.

I only add people I know on Facebook.

I still enjoy a good long conversation either in person or on the phone, but texting is nice too. It lets you talk when you don't have time to sit down and talk, like if your in a loud place. And sometimes things are easier to say through text. Pathetic excuse, but I know it's true for me.

As for friends texting when we're all hanging out, not many of us do that. Sure, sometimes we do, but it's usually not constant. We carry on a conversation together while tending quickly to text messages. None of us ever mind.

[Kestrad]

I treat facebook as a useful tool. I add people I know and then use it to keep in touch with them. And by keep in touch with them, I mean I'll hop on every other month or so and see what I've missed. The people I really care about are on my chat list anyway. (And these are people I live 300 or so miles away from, so it's pretty hard for me to talk to them face-to-face.)

And I don't take out my phone during a conversation unless something really urgent is going on and I *need* to be updated. Otherwise it's just rude. I might try to end the conversation a bit earlier, or sometimes I'll excuse myself for a moment to see what's up, but then I'll carry right on. I don't text much anyway.

I also don't have an internet plan for my phone. There was no point--it's an extra $30 a month, when I have an ipod touch and free wifi everywhere on campus already.

[shiann]

I don't truly see Facebook and Twitter as a threat, but technology is ruining the communication skills of teenagers and young adults. It's so bad where we live guys can't ask girls out on dates. I've been asked out via text before, and the guy was sitting right beside me (I turned him down). On the other hand this (FB and Twitter) is a great way to communicate with family and friends. My family is in a feud right now that I'm not involved in, and I use Facebook to stay in touch. Though I do see how it would be rude and even insulting for someone to take out their phone and start playing games while I was talking to them. Though I'm headstrong and, um, a bit opinionated, I suppose, so I would probably walk outside and leave as soon as they looked up and started talking to give them a taste of their own medicine.

Just my opinion~

[Ktanaqui]

I don't believe that social networking is harmful in itself. However, I do think for those people who grow up on nothing but technology, period, it is harmful. Namely because they don't learn how to hold a proper conversation and tend to talk only in chatspeak, slang, and the like. This drives me bloody nuts because chatspeak or no, I have always talked mostly proper. Any who, I believe that the only people that social networking is harmful to is the weak-minded people of our species. Unfortunately, that means that most of our populace falls under that category. So I guess my vote goes to "it depends on the person".

[Kestrad]

I don't believe that social networking is harmful in itself. However, I do think for those people who grow up on nothing but technology, period, it is harmful. Namely because they don't learn how to hold a proper conversation and tend to talk only in chatspeak, slang, and the like. This drives me bloody nuts because chatspeak or no, I have always talked mostly proper. Any who, I believe that the only people that social networking is harmful to is the weak-minded people of our species. Unfortunately, that means that most of our populace falls under that category. So I guess my vote goes to "it depends on the person".

Ah. Unfortunately, we ourselves are always one of the "strong-minded people." If everyone thinks he or she is great, where do all the screwups come from, unless someone is wrong about themselves being great?

[MistyoC]

I don't think social networking itself is harmful. As with anything, the problems come with misuse. When a person is more interested in texting than face-to-face conversation, the problem is with the person, not the network.

[Fennir]

Social Networking in and of itself is a fairly new, and decent invention. It allows people to connect through long distances and stay in touch when they may not necessarily normally be able to; or at least with much more ease and comfort than previously.

However, I would have to argue that the overall social networking effect is fairly detrimental to our entire society. As previously stated, social networking (and I'd argue the Internet in general) has nearly ruined our face to face communication skills.

Along with this such effect I would also like to point out several more issues with "social networking". Not only are employers able to now "friend" their employees on Facebook and keep tabs on them, just in the news this week a teacher was fired after she posted herself with a glass of beer while on holiday in Ireland. Social Networking I would argue has also rid ourselves of a certain sense of privacy, making ourselves more open to identity theft (after all some people are stupid enough to post their cell numbers, and addresses on their Facebook accounts) and loose their rights to their photos once posted to Facebook in particular.

However, I will say that your friend's using his smart phone to access Scrabble as you hold a conversation with you is very rude and uncalled for. To be blunt, I'd have probably called my friend out if he did anything of the sort to me.

But heck, what do I know?

[Soleil]

I don't think social networking itself is harmful. As with anything, the problems come with misuse. When a person is more interested in texting than face-to-face conversation, the problem is with the person, not the network.

100% agreement.

It isn't the social networking site that is becoming the problem, it's the people using it. There seems to be less and less common sense used online as we enter these sites because they are "safe" and we get comfortable using them so we stop thinking.

Example: I had my cell number on Facebook for about.. a month? two months? something like that. Well, it never really hit that everyone on my friends list could see it (including the ones I didn't want seeing it). It hit the night I got 4 prank calls at 2 am to 3 am. That was the last time my number was on Facebook.

[Aerrow]

I don't think social networking itself is harmful. As with anything, the problems come with misuse. When a person is more interested in texting than face-to-face conversation, the problem is with the person, not the network.

In agreement: There are studies that those who text a lot are unable to handle certain emotions properly when in real face-to-face situations compared to someone who texts minimally. Of course, this mainly depends on the person them self, but the number is increasing exponentially due to the dependency on phones, computers, and other electronic devices. Of course, we cannot blame the technology itself (it didn't create itself after all) but those who use it instead.