...Does that really make up for meaningful, face to face, interaction? Interaction where you see, and feel, real caring attention to the fact that you matter to someone? Or that you matter to society at all?
I certainly don't think so.
And let's be clear here. It's not just the fact that we provide so little in funded social programs to offer isolated people aid (glaringly obvious thought that might be). Even more to the point is that our entire society is structurally organized to keep people apart; separation not only by the specialization of jobs, and whether you have a job or not, but also because everyone has to work harder and harder all of the time; either with simply more hours, or with both more hours and the pressure to work harder in every hour no matter the total hours. You add to that all of the other aspects of stress: the worry of losing your job, the worry of stretching what you're paid to make ends meet, the worry about your kids being educated enough to make it on their own, or the worry about what catastrophic illness, or natural disaster, or whatever else. You add all of that into the mix and you have to ask yourself how much can we expect to have left to give to other family members, or friends; either in face time, or emotional support.
The bottom line here is that this is what we get when a factory mentality of social organization meets the hyper competition that electrified technological change manifests. All in a world of dwindling resources and increasing global tensions.
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