IN THE MIDDLE: Technology can enhance our lives or enslave us

Posted 10/1/15

During a recent weekend, the conversation turned to our memories of an album of cowboy and western songs our grandfather used to listen to over and over. Most of us never minded the repetition. It gave us many opportunities to hear the songs he so …

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IN THE MIDDLE: Technology can enhance our lives or enslave us

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My siblings and I have been chatting online frequently in recent months. It’s been a welcome way to keep in touch with each other, since we have lived in places as far apart as Seattle and Atlanta.

During a recent weekend, the conversation turned to our memories of an album of cowboy and western songs our grandfather used to listen to over and over. Most of us never minded the repetition. It gave us many opportunities to hear the songs he so enjoyed. When we hear those songs today, they transport us instantly back into pleasant childhood memories.

For me, those memories consist not only of the harmonious music filling my grandparents’ home when I was visiting them, but they include the smells of my grandmother’s cooking, as well as my childish (and probably incessant) questions to her about the lyrics of the songs: “How can he be broke if he’s rich? What does he mean, ‘go off the cuff?’ Why does he call cows little dogies?”

Later, as I was talking to my husband about my online conversation with my siblings, I realized my grandchildren might not have the same experience in our home today. I still enjoy listening to the music I love — including the “Cattle Call” album I bought in memory of my grandfather — but I often play it from my cell phone through bluetooth headphones as I go about my daily business. Music of several genres fills and rejuvenates my soul — but not my home.

It’s interesting that the same technology that expands my world by allowing me to visit simultaneously with siblings in two different regions of the country also shrinks it by making me less aware of my own surroundings.

But that effect often seems magnified for our youth.

That was illustrated for me in July, when I took photos at the carnival during the Park County Fair. I snapped some shots of two of the more exciting, gravity-defying, stomach-jiggling rides, going directly from one ride to the other while both were in full swing, with kids laughing and screaming with the intense motion.

Imagine my surprise when I discovered while viewing the photos that each ride included a teenage girl looking down at her cell phone instead of interacting with her friends or just enjoying the moment and the thrill of the motion. I was both astounded and sad for those girls, who were letting a wonderful moment slip away from them.

Other challenges created by overuse, or over-reliance on technology, include:

• We’ve all seen people sitting across the table from each other at a restaurant, each of whom is looking down at their cell phone instead of at each other. I assume these are people who enjoy each other’s company; friends out for a good time together, couples on dates. But instead of talking to and interacting with each other, they’re off in their own digital worlds. They’re close in proximity, but still miles apart.

• Children and teens today sometimes forego sports and outdoor play in favor of sedentary electronic activities.

The Centers for Disease Control recommends that children get 60 minutes of exercise per day. But many children and teens spend more time playing games on their Xbox and over the Internet than playing outside. A 2013 CDC map showed 11 percent of high school students in Wyoming were obese. In some states, that percentage was as high as 17 percent.

I knew a young college student a few years ago who often failed to attend his classes because he had an addiction to video games. He often let real life pass him by in favor of living through the digital experiences of video game characters. He never did get his degree. I am saddened each time I think of the opportunities he missed.

• Pornography is rampant, largely due to easy access over the Internet. According to Focus on the Family, the average age of exposure to pornography is down to 8 years.

Enough.org cites statistics showing 79 percent of unwanted exposure to pornography occurs in the home.

In 2013, Internet Watch Foundation’s annual report states that 13,182 websites contained child sexual images, 54 percent of which are hosted in North America.

Eighty-one percent of child pornography victims were 10 years old or younger.

But, as I stated earlier, today’s easy access to the Internet also has its positive side.

One of the best illustrations of that is the difference the Internet has made for my husband, Gary, who has been blind all of his life. When we got married 40 years ago, he owned one Braille book — a dictionary. Braille is bulky; consequently, his dictionary consisted of 36 volumes that were about 1 foot tall, more than 1 foot wide, and 2 or 3 inches thick. Those volumes filled an entire metal shelf set.

If Gary wanted any information, he had to ask someone to find it for him. If he wanted to read his mail, someone had to read it to him.

When he was in school, Gary had to take notes in school by hand in Braille — a slow process — or he recorded his classes and transcribed them in the evenings on his Brailler — much faster and easier, but also noisier than writing Braille by punching dots with a molded slate and a stylus.

If a book wasn’t available in recorded form, he had to arrange for a volunteer reader.

He didn’t let that stop him, however. He graduated from high school, then earned a bachelor’s degree in sociology from the University of Wyoming, and a master’s degree in vocational rehabilitation counseling from the University of Northern Colorado.

Today, Gary is employed by the state of Wyoming as a consultant for the visually impaired. He reads his own email via a voice synthesizer on his computer, or on a Braille display. He conducts Internet searches and does research independently and writes reports without the help of a proofreader.

He keeps in touch with family and friends through Facebook, and he listens to Wyoming Cowboy and other football games through Internet radio apps.

In other words, most of the things that he needed help with years ago, he now can do independently. For Gary and other people with disabilities, the Internet, combined with adaptive technology, are liberating. Rather than limiting their contact with others, that technology has opened up a whole new world.

Today’s technology and the access to information it provides is both good and bad. It is up to us to make sure we use it to enhance our lives, not to enslave us.

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