If you are a regular reader, you know that I both emphasize community (especially our need for the human interaction in these early years of the 21st century) and my concern over technology (again, especially to rapid disruption in the early 21st century). More so, I think and have written several times that I think the two things are connected. We have lost community, lost the human interaction vital for successful civic interaction, and technology, rather than helping us deal with this need actually makes it worse.
In the end, we grow further and further apart as a society, as a culture, and divisiveness is paramount these days. We are now one month from our presidential election and the rancor has not subsided in the past two years leading to this point. Open violence has happened at several places along the journey to the election, and our verbal intensity has simply increased day by day. Our loss of the long term interaction with others, especially others not exactly like myself—something that was normal in communities through history–makes it more likely that we find ourselves being more coarse, more crude.
Historically, technology provided us a framework for gathering, for interacting together in human connection. A great illustration of this is something many of you in the north are now getting to use (or are preparing for colder days ahead)…a fireplace. The idea of a fire inside a dwelling was something that historically provided a central locale that drew people together. It did not used to necessarily work this way.
Of course, there had been fires in the vicinity of the people in a dwelling far back into antiquity, but the chimney that actually drafted the smoke out of the house didn’t emerge till roughly the 11th century. Take a look at this infographic for the point.
Infographic via: CompactAppliance.com
Once the technology was developed that allowed for the venting of smoke, then the fireplace really became the central gathering place. Technology fostered community, human gathering together. This is how Old House online puts it: “The fireplace was a necessity in early America. As the hub of the house, a burning hearth provided heat, housed multiple fires for cooking and baking, and served as the nucleus of family gatherings….By the second quarter of the 18th century, the fireplace had become the centerpiece of the main gathering room. ”
Today, our technology instead puts us where most of us have our face in our screen. The allure and draw of the technology is inescapable…at least not easily. I got a smarter smartphone. I could more easily get online. When, back in the spring, we went to a baseball game, rather than just watching the game as I would have with my older phone, I now could fiddle with apps and wi-fi and connecting to mlb.com….and in the process, lose out on simply being with my wife. After a few pictures posted online, I put the phone into my pocket…but the allure remained to pull it out to check.
We aren’t getting rid of technology. And yes, I am well aware that I am using technology right now in typing this…and in hoping that others will read what I type, perhaps on a smartphone. Some technology has indeed fostered our ability to connect, or reconnect, with friends and family. It can be a good thing…and yet, it is also clear that we have lost something vital.
I think 100 years from now, sociologist and historians will write about this time with some dismay. Something fundamental, something deep and internal, is being altered in us. As a people we are changing. Maybe, there will be enough positive that those experts will conclude that the good outweighed the bad. But, if we don’t rediscover the fireplace, find again the need to be human with each other…I don’t see how anyone writing in 2116 will be pleased with the world we gave them.