Birth of social lives disguised as death

Stop me if you've heard any of these before:

• "We're more connected now than we've ever been, and yet drifting ever further apart."
• "Nowadays kids just sit inside playing around on the computer instead of playing with their friends outside."
• "Today's children grow up without learning proper social communication due to spending less time with their peers face-to-face."
• "It's ironic that social networks make us less social"
• "Technology stops us from connecting with the world around us"

Now raise your hand if you've ever seen stock photos like this before, used in stories about any of the above topics:

It's most likely that most of us will either have said some of these things or heard it from their friends. Hell, it's likely that most of you will even agree that this sort of easily accessible technology has made our collective social lives stale, our attention spans shorter, and our lives just generally worse off for it, since we no longer connect with the outside world as we once did when we didn't have all sorts of gadgets to distract us.

I'd just like to give you a friendly neighbourhood reminder of what it's like on the other side of the fence.

I suffer from social anxiety. Although I've almost always had some trouble connecting to people especially my own age, the problem only became increasingly problematic when I moved from high school to university. I put it down to the very structured life kids generally lead, compared to the unstructured, build-your-own sort of life that university thrusts at you -- but that isn't really the point. The point is that at pretty much every given time in my life, I've felt somehow isolated. There are a million and one things that I've blamed for that feeling of isolation, not the least of them being myself, but they aren't important to this post.

The exception to this rule of isolation is the internet. As a preteen, I got fiercely into text-based roleplaying games, the types one sets up on a forum (offline) and in chat rooms (online). Alongside the in-game part, I also became strongly integrated in the off-game communities the most successful of these games nurtured. The funny thing is that though I was part of a competitive sports team for six or seven years of my life, these online communities were the ones I felt that I belonged most strongly in. I could talk to people who had the same love for creative writing and fantasy as I did, and who seemed to have shared in my experience of isolation.

See, I mentioned that I was in a sports team. Unlike the stereotype, I did actively try to engage in the social community around me. However, I didn't always feel like the community around me tried to engage with me. These people on the internet, they got me. I felt like I was in a place where I could truly be understood, where people were on the same wavelength as I was. And even when this was not the case, for there were of course people on the internet, too, who did not share the same experiences as I did, somehow it was simply easier to communicate via instant messaging or forum posts. Despite what a lot of people, especially adults, around me said, there are definite ways of expressing the nuances of tone and intent just by using writing, by the use of punctuation and emoticons and simply by careful word choices. Similarly, communication over the internet allowed a sort of grace period, a pause in conversation longer than that  in face-to-face communication, in which I could think about exactly the right thing to say.

The internet was an important communication tool for me even outside friends I knew only over the internet. When I moved into a new country and thus an entirely new social environment, for a long time I depended on the internet to share thoughts and feelings I didn't dare to share with new friends face-to-face. I have since learnt to be more brave and outright about expressing myself, but were it not for the internet, I may never have been able to show any desire in expressing myself in the first place. In fact, I could go so far as to say that in some ways, being able to communicate with people on the internet has been like training wheels for me in terms of communicating with people in person. I've had a safe environment in which to experiment in -- an environment where I could instantly back away if I felt uncomfortable. I will go so far as to say that I don't think I would be able to talk to people the way I do if it weren't for the internet, as well as some very patient people who would listen to what I had to say where I had the courage to say it.

So the next time someone tells you that advancements in technology are sure to kill our social lives, remember that all they mean is social lives as they know. Remember that there are flocks and flocks of people like me who, were it not for the ability to communicate over the internet, IM, twitter, facebook, e-mail, even text message, may have ended up very depressed and alone.

Perhaps the only thing that this scaremongering is all about is that increasingly, people are learning to communicate like us.

Oh no

Well, crap.

You guys, I did it again.

That thing where I get on a looong holiday and completely ignore absolutely everything I do on the internet, you ask? Yeah. That thing. Except this time, the holiday ended and I didn't come back.

You know, it's almost interesting how I seem to do it every single time. How come, when I actually DO have some free time and sometimes would even have interesting things to talk about, I don't seem to be able to muster up the motivation to get up on here and blather on about things. Then, just when I'm inundated with other things that urgently require my attention (as of now: sleep), I seem to turn up again?

Really, someone should do some sort of psychological study on me. And then lock me in a lab forever because nothing I do makes any sense and trying to puzzle out the logic in my (even if I say so myself) pretty little head might just crack a puzzle or two to do with the human condition.

Obligatory introductions

I've run a lot of blogs over the past few years.

Not all at once, of course, because that would just be madness and I can barely keep one of them going at a time, since I'm just so great at procrastinating. The one thing I have trouble with, every time I start a new one, is that I can have the clearest idea of what I want to post about, it's just actually getting to it that's the problem. What do you tell the internet about yourself, when you're just another budding blogger? How can you sell yourself and make yourself appear interesting next to the other five million people (note: I totally made this figure up) who talk about their mildly interesting lives and the brand of toast they had that morning? I guess I could mention that I had to fight an alien robot from outer space to actually have breakfast this morning, but that would be lying. It would also be lying to say that I even had toast. I had a donut for breakfast today, because I'm just that awesome. Or a stereotypical cop. You take your pick.

It's hard to introduce yourself in any conclusive manner when you're in that part of your life where every day, you seem to have a different idea of who you are and what you want to do with your life (current ambition: become the world's first sentient mushroom). That's actually exactly why I started this blog. I've always been a bit of an overachiever and a nerd (more about that in a later post when I whinge about the fact that Pottermore put me in Gryffindor instead of Ravenclaw), and I guess I've always been a bit of a geek too, what with my love for videogames and the fact that I went through pretty much the entire fantasy section of my local library as a child. And now, since I'm studying science on a tertiary level, I guess it's time and appropriate to start endorsing those qualities again. That, and I just really get bored a lot and like to geek out every now and then.

A few warnings before I get started: I don't know much about technology. I mean, I know how my computer works and I know when it doesn't work (key indicator: nothing happens when you press the power button) and I know how to use Windows and Mac OS's and various bunches of related software adequately, but don't expect me to start spewing technical jargon and get really excited when the next greatest gadget comes out. You never know, I might get into that sort of stuff at some point in my life, but right now, as long as it looks shiny and does what I want it to do, that's good enough for me.

I have also never seen Star Wars, or followed Star Trek extensively. Yes, yes, I know, I'm an absolutely horrific person and should have been stoned to death and/or strapped to a chair and forced to watch all of it in one sitting a long time ago, but somehow I've managed to avoid it, and I'm becoming so sick of everyone getting all shocked about it. I don't act that way when you tell me you haven't read Lord of the Rings, so you should have the courtesy not to do that to me! And chill out, I'm going to do it eventually. It's just not the most important thing in my life.

Lastly, I love writing. I write (and talk, as my significant other would point out) a LOT. I don't always have anything specific to say, but I just keep typing out of the sheer joy of churning out some words that mean some things. That's just the type of person I am. If you came here expecting two pictures for every hundred words, I'm sorry, but you're in the wrong place (at least until I manage to procure a reasonable camera to document every moment of my life with, mwah). Go read a magazine or something.

Oh, and I have a habit of abusing brackets.

So there you have it: this is who I am and this is what I am here to do. If you haven't dozed off somewhere between paragraphs, this might actually be a place you would want to come back to and check out more often. We can go on an adventure into my crazy little mind together, and when we come out at the other end of the tunnel, we can compare notes, decide conclusively that I am most definitely crazy and then maybe go on a journey into your mind.

I'll bring a camera, promise.