Devolving

When the internet first started becoming popular, I immediately protested and said I wanted nothing to do with it.  As far as I could tell, this was yet another stupid fad and people were spending entirely too much time - in 1997, mind you - staring at computer screens.  But then I started college, and with all of the wonderful free software they provided me and the size of the reports I had to write, I relented and decided to get a computer.

Admittedly, I was quite fascinated with the large electronic setup now hanging out on my old desk, whining its way through its very first dial-up connection while my mind began entertaining the various possibilities available to me via internet searches.  I'd heard of chatrooms, and I did find myself in a Korn one (don't hate) with a bunch of kids who thought they were, like, so totally awesome because they knew their way around a few simple commands.  That scene lost its luster real quickly.  I suppose I had this exciting, utopian view of the social networking world being much more like it is now, with people sharing real things and having meaningful debates.  I didn't consider the endless, monotonous stream of location check-ins, pictures of various unappetizing food fare, or the incredible number of parents willing to post inappropriate and humiliating pictures of their own children; but, truth be told, I do enjoy many of the interactions I have through social media.

Eventually, in the days before MySpace and Facebook, I did find some interesting message boards to participate in; I even designed my own Webpage, which was popular for more than a decade and brought literally thousands of people into my life.  I certainly spend more time online than I care to admit to, and I wonder how many valuable hours of my life have been wasted laughing at cat pictures featuring funny captions or reading satire.  However, the internet has afforded me an outlet for my desire to write and research.  It has also been an invaluable source of information on a vast array of topics of personal interest, including Monsanto, organic gardening, health, DIY projects, and home remedies.  Just in the past two weeks alone, I learned how to do hair highlights at home, format my SD card on my Mac, and how to get the Mac to see the SD card.  Money and time saved.  The internet helped me to discover that my migraines were aspartame poisoning, when all of modern medicine failed me, and I got my life back by simply not drinking diet beverages ever again.  It allows me to homeschool my children through K12.  It provides the convenience of shopping online, so I don't have to spend a day walking around some mall that I hate, looking for something they might not even have; I can now accomplish in minutes what might have taken hours or longer.  So maybe those cat memes aren't so terrible after all.

But there is the dark side of the internet.  We are new to this, the 30-somethings.  We don't really grasp the full reach of this new cyber world and how "out there" we've really become.  It ranges from annoying to downright dangerous.  That post of your drunk ass in a trash can in a bar might be funny while you're still wasted, but in the morning when your boss that you don't recall "friending" sees it, you might be out of a job.  And the "sexting", how many lives, relationships, and reputations has that destroyed?  We don't always make good choices, but the internet is a permanent record of things that were once lost with the sands of time.  I'm very glad I'm not a teenager right now.

While I generally avoid the more heinous social faux pas of the online world, the great joy I once took in being able to do in minutes in the convenience of my home what once took hours upon hours in a library is also taking a turn for the sewer.  A Google search now turns up search engines within search engines and pages which are nothing more than a collection of keywords, because people buy URLs so they can get paid-per-click, and they will spam you half to death to get you to click.  I feel as if I have been relegated to a few of the better-known sites I found when the internet was far more searchable than it is now, though even many of those have sold out to the point that their pages are 80% ads and 20% content.  The flashing ones, or those featuring particularly shocking or disgusting photos are the real slums and back alleys of the internet.  Even YouTube, which still remains fairly user-friendly, no longer uses the ratings in their search; you have to actually click on the videos before you find out whether it's total garbage, like a fake video telling you to follow a URL to an actual video...supposedly.

The internet is devolving, like the rest of things that humans have a hand in.  We find fossil fuels?  We use them all up.  We find beautiful land?  We destroy it for profit and erect concrete societies.  Locally grown?  Why, when we can be selfish and destroy the planet so we can eat that out-of-season food and run our local farmers right out of their livelihoods?  It's about want, not need, right?  Why improve our health with exercise when we can pop a pill for each health concern?  Why look on the bright side when there's an SSRI to boost your mood?  Why pay the farmer when you can simply pay the doctor and the pharmacy?

Human beings are a disease.  We consume everything we come in contact with.  Just look at Superfund sites, Monsanto, oil spills, nuclear accidents, and any of the other sad atrocities we're responsible for.  We have this amazing technological gift of the internet, and we're turning it into yet another cesspool.  It's sad, really.  But that's okay.  Something better will come along, right?  Something more advanced and higher-tech, and we can leave this lay in ruin behind us as we advance to the next thing we can build up just to destroy.

Waste

Yesterday, I took my children on a road trip to one of the big cities we live in fairly close proximity to.  It was a mixture of fun and git-r-done; the new headboard we ordered to match Reezle's bedroom set, well, didn't.  And since it weighed somewhere in the neighborhood of 956,422 pounds, shipping it back would have cost the rough approximate of a decent down payment on a house; it was easier, albeit not by much, to just load it up and drive it to the store.  And we really needed a day out after the miserable bout of stomach virus that gripped our household for almost three solid weeks.  Hell, let me tell you.

The first thing I noticed about the city was that everyone was in such a big damn hurry to get absolutely nowhere.  I had several people take exceptional risks to pass me (I am not a slow driver, my past speeding tickets can attest to this - but I'm also not a stupid driver), one guy almost causing two massive wrecks to get about four car lengths ahead of me to a red light.  And for what?

I laughed a little to myself, both when I thought this yesterday and as I typed it just now.  I used to be the person in the big damn hurry.  I used to be more than a little impatient as I would sit behind the wheel offering expletive-filled driving instructions and advice to the so-and-sos in front of me.  I guess 12 years in the rural Midwest has changed my perspective on a lot of things.

The other thing I noticed was waste; from the shopping carts that were replaced despite being in near-new condition compared to the ones that work just fine at our local stores to the destruction of acres upon acres of land to put up more concrete structures.  We can't maintain this, whether it's the fossil fuels we're haphazardly wasting, or the buildings that will all lay in ruin once our economy collapses and no one can afford to care for them, we're going to eventually be catapulted rather painfully back to a simpler life.  That in mind, why not scale back now?  Why not take care of what we have and work harder, all of us, on a more sustainable way of life?

On the drive home, I appreciated the simplicity of our little corner of the map.  As houses grew farther apart and farms and fields of corn and grapes became the norm, I thought back a few years to a time when I wanted to live in the city more than just about anything in the world.  I had thoroughly loved Houston, Texas when we visited in 2005 and 2006, and was quite insistent that it was worth dropping everything here and heading down there.  I'm so glad we didn't, for I would now be a part of exactly what I've come to realize must change.

My perspective on many things has changed substantially in the past 7 years.  While the thought of having stores within walking distance and all kinds of fun buildings to go isolate myself from nature and entertain myself within once appealed to me very much, raising children and realizing the state of our world has caused me to re-evaluate how life should be lived.  I've developed a new appreciation for locally-grown, natural, earth-friendly, and non-polluted.  We can enjoy modern conveniences in moderation without destroying the one place we have to call home.  But largely, we don't.  We waste like it's our job, from the overpriced gas-guzzling Hummers to the three serving sizes of beef that supports animal cruelty, Monsanto, Big Pharma, and that new cardiology wing at the hospital all at once.

Sadly, I realized that, while change is coming, it's coming slowly.  It's going to take the skyrocketing price of fuels, getting knocked off-grid by some solar flare, or who knows what kind of mess for people to realize - too late - that we should have done something while we still could.  I fear for a society where modern conveniences have become life-sustaining necessities.  We're devolving.