It took me 10 years to pick up the pen again today. And I was wondering about how easy it is to communicate today!
There was a time when expressing
oneself or communicating (by writing or talking) was a real slow and an expensive process. Words were measured.
Telephone or telegram were expensive and therefore often short. Each word you write in a telegram or each sentence you spoke on a long distance call mattered! Can you imagine yourself fighting through telegram or a long distance call?
The other option was for people to take time to write a letter, post it, and then wait for them to respond! Even if you send an angry letter you get enough time to settle your emotions. There was always the possibility for us to read the letter before sending. There was time to deliberate over what was written.
With advancement of telephone technology, we were then able to send short messages. Now these were longer than a telegram but it still had a character limitation for a single messgae.
We had to be creative to get the most in a single message which led to the invention of abbreviated words - Btw for by the way, btwn for between, lyk for like. Mobile phone was still not accessible to all and people would still would think twice before wasting too many characters/words to fight through a short message.
And then technology advanced and mobile phones became accessible and we started having access to high speed internet. This enabled us to speak and write freely. It helped us 'connect' to one another instantly.
But somewhere in the midst of fast and instant communication, we started to evolve as humans. Our language evolved. We now don't give ourselves time to deliberate or think through before saying/writing. We don't think twice before writing something hurtful. People are trolled mercilessly, saying things that can't taken back.
Missing the humane of human.
Is it really so easy to communicate these days?
