Everyone By Stanley Eitzen Summary

People in the world today depend on technology to help them succeed through life. However, the rate of its use among young kids and teen customers is increasing at a rapid pace. The reason being is that they would rather text a class friend and use social media rather than meeting up with them. In Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury, the scenario is similar to the world today, because nobody communicates or connects with people personally, leaving them isolated and alone. Also, in the article called “Tasking Multitasking To Task”, by Mark Harris, he explains that technology is affecting the human mind to lack interest in social skills and hobbies. Harris’ claim that technology is corrupting our lives is correct because many people have lost their attention span for anything beyond a simple phrase.

Though digital technologies allow us to accomplish many things, we also have lost the ability to give each other our full attention. We prefer texting rather than fully engage in a conversation. An example in the book is Aubrey. Aubrey believes that texting allows her to stay in contact with more people at once because she can bounce from conversation to conversation. We as human beings, both children and adults, have identical patterns of compulsive disorders. We are obsessed with our devices. We never leave the house without our cell phones and what’s worse, we text or call people who are in the same house as us. While we are with our family and friends, we are also living in another world, where everyone accepts us for who we are through our cellular devices. Using our mobile devices, we can transport ourselves to different realities that we wish to have. These are online games that allow us to create our own avatar and live the life that we want to live. In that world, no one will be able to judge us for how we are. We are embracing ourselves through simulated lives with avatars and simulated relationships through virtual connections. Digital technologies have become the center of our social, economic, and professional

Tannen believes that much of this breakdown is caused by the lack of people interacting face to face. She feels that our high tech world infused with social networking, email, cell phones, texting and more has given people a way to communicate without actually connecting with each other. “The proliferation and increasing portability of technology isolates people in a bubble-” warns Tannen.

Ever since technology began so prominent in the modern world, can anyone remember going outside for more than 30 minutes and not see a cell phone or computer? Probably not, as these pieces of technology have become so ingrained in people’s lives, no one wants to leave their home without still being connected. And there is no reason to, as friends, family, and strangers share the same sentiments. Unplugging from technology is not only a decision people don’t make for personal reasons, it simply isn’t conducive to a productive life, as many people’s work and social lives wouldn’t be the same, if exist at all, without being connected to other people or the internet with just a single touch.

Today in America, income and wealth inequality has continued to grow at an unsettling pace. The rich continue to get richer, while the number of people categorized as lower class grows exponentially. As Joseph Stiglitz has explained, many theories that are seen as strongly Republican, such as the trickle-down effect, has caused the rich to take money from the poor, and as a result the lower class grows and the middle class disintegrates. The top 1 percent of America’s households currently holds 30 percent of America’s economy, which is much more than other first-world countries and helps to emphasize the extremity of inequality currently in America today. This increased inequality has in turn caused America to become a much more divided society; those born in poverty typically stay in poverty, with little to no chance of self-improvement due to a lack of education provided in their areas. In contrast, those that are born wealthy typically go to better schools, have better health care, and are all but spoon fed information on how to remain wealthy. These two sides of society almost never cross, and this causes the country to be more divided than ever. In order to limit this inequality, drastic changes must be made, such as large corporations paying their fair share of taxes and giving back to the lower class, and minimum wage should be raised. If everyone in America works together, we can raise social mobility and re-unite what has become an increasingly divided country.

Technology is advancing with every year that pasts. This helps us live our lives easier but is that what we need? Technology is fun to play with but it’s also ruining our abilities to communicate with each other. Human contact is decreased and social isolation is increased. With every advancement in technology, we are advancing in social isolation as well.

A major social problem in America today is its inequality of the distribution of income. "Income inequality refers to the gap between the rich and the poor. The United States has the most unequal income distribution in the industrialized world, and it is growing at a faster rate than any other industrialized country" (Eitzen & Leedham, pg. 37). The main reason as to why income is distributed so unequally is because of the gap between social classes.

“Little by little, Internet and mobile technology seems to be subtly destroying the meaningfulness of interactions we have with others, disconnecting us from the world around us, and leading to an imminent sense of isolation in today’s society.” (Melissa Nilles “Technology is Destroying the Quality of Human Interaction”) Because of technology, the interactions with other people have no meaning, and that we are no longer in touch with the world that we live in. Since technology makes it easier to connect and converse with friends, family, etc. it gives people the opportunity to avoid face to face interaction at all, which leads to isolation and loneliness. This is because as human beings, physical touch is something that we

Technology and social isolation are connected and have become more widespread in the world. Awareness of the problems caused by technology need to be put out into the world and help people

In our future, our use of technology is just going to get worse. There is going to be more and more devices that we use to make our lives easier as humans. Think about Google for instance, they are coming out with glasses that have TV screens in them. This technology is called Google Glass and it is still in the testing phase. The glasses have Wi-Fi built into them which is another reason it will cause social isolation. Instead of having people being on there phones, they are now going to be watching TV and interacting with the glasses. It is technology like this that we have to learn how to control our urges and prevent it from consuming our lives. We need to be able to determine when enough is enough and to take a break.

The occurrence of alterations beginning from the former generations to the contemporary society is evident in a numerous sum of possibilities; an example being the technological advancements in which have recently transpired. Technology has tremendously revamped the concept of socialization. A face-to-face conversation was once the only form of communication where humans had the ability to interact with each other. In the present, people prefer to exchange information with one another by utilizing the devices of smart phones, tablets, and laptops. Statistics have proven that depression and suicide numbers have increased dramatically over the last few years. This matter is due to online bullying and the fact that humans isolate themselves from the rest of the society while technology is in use. Furthermore, healthcare has greatly improved consequently to technology. Overtime, the internet has emerged as one of the primary sources for

Over the past few years, technology has become a significant part of people’s every day lives. It helps people connect with those far away, but in the process, disconnects themselves from others close with them. Technology has helped improve the lives of many people through transportation and more, but overall has torn us apart. The constant usage of technology has people’s eyes glued to a small screen; they often forget to communicate with those around them.

Social media causes isolation because it makes people not fully engage with others. Social media has made us become more interested in our phones and computers than the real world. Many people would be more interested to interact on social media rather than interacting with others in person. As Wency Leung points out in her essay Does Social Media Bring Us Closer- or Make Us Loners, “While we are connected, we are rarely fully engaged with those immediately around us” (687). As Leung points out, we are more engage to our devices than being fully engaged with the people around us. For example, we see this all over the place like in colleges, parks, and even in your own house. Most people would prefer to engage over the phone that to be engaged in a conversation with the person in front of them.

Technology has revolutionized communication and the world like nothing before. The Internet has given the world a freedom never explored in the past. The Internet has broken communication barriers to an extreme level. Now day’s two people from two different countries can talk or chat without interactions. Internet has given people the ability to connect forever through social networking. Some of the biggest world social networking services are Facebook and Twitter. Through technology communication is made much easier, but the communication with the people that are right next to us might be getting weak. Technology has its positive and negative impacts on society. It could keep us informed, but it could also affect anyone’s communication life. Even though it’s an easy communication barrier it’s being over used by society every day. The Internet has charge everyone and everything over the years, it has giving us the ability to be informed on a much deeper level. Families are losing their communication, but not just because of technology. Not everything is positive when it’s about technology. It could help us connect no matter the distance, but we could lose communication and relationships. The world has not yet notice that losing important face to face communication because of technology it’s important.

Instead of walking around to places we find ourselves using cars to travel, each day removing ourselves more and more from greeting and contacting new people. We have furthered this isolation through working in cubicles, and automation through computers and factories. Tv creates another scenario where we watch fake realities instead of being around other people. Even in a movie theatre we are isolated because we stare at the big screen instead of holding a true conversation with someone else.