Final Blog Post - Technology and Its Partnership with Humanity

Another final exam week, another opportunity to finish strong. It's been a wild ride, and the blog posts here are being finished off with a bang! Throughout this class, I have used technology for various things. I've used it to look up information, to watch videos for material, to take notes, and write these blog posts. Technology has given me the ability to spark a love for music, keep in contact with my cousin through video games, and have some people to chat with when it gets late and there's no one else around. However, technology has also grown and metastasize an addiction to porn, an increased level of distractions, and a much higher possibility to be bullied. Personally, I do not have any active social media accounts, but I know people who put tons of effort into their social media life, and I feel that's unhealthy. This semester has really allowed me to reflect on tech's role in the world. Most importantly, was technology ever in a healthy relationship with humans, has it continued, or is it now unhealthy?

That question is a little tough to answer. The advancement of technology has been one of the greatest things to happen to society. It allows us to keep in touch with family much more easily, music is much easier to consume, and the creation of new software has allowed for entire industries to not only adjust their focus, but also be created from the ground up. The best example of this is Netflix, Hulu, and the other streaming services. These concepts were inconceivable when I was a kid. If you missed an episode, you better hope that you recorded it. If you didn't, then good luck watching it. Now with streaming services, my suitemates were able to binge watch the entire Game of Thrones series and The Walking Dead season 1. This allows people to have more shows to talk about and it can be great for small talk. For me personally, streaming services like Spotify have allowed me to build a love for music I never would have found, along with being able to find dozens of artists I likely would have never heard of without it. I absolutely adore some of the positive things that have been brought into the world by technology, and I do feel that we are better now than we were 10 years ago in many aspects of life. However, this does not come without problems, and some of them are massive.

When talking about social media, one stat that rang around in my head constantly was the following: suicide rates amongst children. I found that the rate of suicide amongst girls between 15 and 19 increased by 70% since 2009, and for girls ages 10-14, it was up by an insane 151% (US Sun). When I saw this stat, I almost had a mental breakdown because I immediately thought about my younger sister. I wish that was where it ended, but it is far from over for consequences. From data being stolen, to corruption amongst massive tech companies, to a heavy push for censorship in America, there are a lot of things that technology has brought to the table in a negative way. During a TED Talk, comedian James Veitch said, "The internet gave us access to everything, but it also gave everything else access to us" (The Agony of Trying to Unsubscribe, 1:57). From the mundane and annoying to the terrifyingly important, it holds true to this very moment. I hope one day we can find it in ourselves to boycott the malicious practices seen in things like Instagram and Facebook, and see a reformation of sorts for internet. There have been efforts with VPNs and browsers like Brave and Tor, but there is far more that can be done.