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Taylor Haggerson

Instructor: Malcolm Campbell

English 1104

November 8th, 2018

Why Chuck Loved Wilson: How Social Media is Changing Relationships

In 2016, five students in Tarporley England decided to go on a digital detox as an

experiment for a school project at their local high school. Their detox included giving up all

social media and instant messaging, except for methods of contacting their parents. According to

the article “An Anti-Social Experiment” posted by BBC news, students went the whole week

from Wednesday to Wednesday without using their phones for social media, and texting/instant

messaging. This included apps like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and even YouTube.

Students were wary about making it through the weekend without their phones for

support. As the author of the article Rory Cellan-Jones states, “…if your primary means of

communication is taken away that is bound to cause problems. Twenty-five years ago, teenagers

would have been furious if they had been told they could not use the home telephone.” (BBC

News). However, the students and teachers around them were interested to see what they would

learn.

One student found that without her phone she talked more with her family, rather than

using her parents as what she calls a ‘taxi service’. Without their phones, students resorted back

to landline phone calls, and emailing as means of communication. The librarian at their school

was happy to finally see people checking out books to read. One student even began reading
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newspapers and magazines. Jones states that overall, “…what this experiment has shown so far is

just how central to the lives of teenagers social networks and messaging tools have become”.

(BBC News)

One teacher before the experiment stated that, “The thought of having real conversations

and maybe even reading a book seems to be way too much to handle.” (BBC News). That has

become something many teenagers do not participate in. The digital age has changed the way

people interact with each other. Much like when the student began talking more to her parents

when her phone was removed from the equation.

A relationship is most generically defined in the Merriam-Webster dictionary, as a way in

which two or more people are connected. A relationship can consist of a significant other, but

also of a mother and daughter, a best friend, or a sibling. However, relationships are now

becoming virtual based, friends online, and ‘followers’. The term relationship is constantly

advancing to more platforms. So, how is and how has social media changed relationships?

The Beginning of the Social Media Pandemic

Before the digital age, teenagers used their landlines to call their friends to make plans for

the weekend. If they didn’t pick up, then they would drive to one of the three common hang-out

spots in their area and see who they ran into. If they wanted to contact a distant friend or relative,

they sent them a letter via snail mail (that was before email). If someone wanted to stay up to

date on the news, they read the paper, or watched the morning and/or evening news on

television. There was no Twitter or Facebook to rely on for current events and long-lost mutual

friends.
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Social media didn’t come into fruition until 1997 when a website called Six Degrees gave

users the ability to friend other users. This was the start of networking through the digital world.

“From Six Degrees, the internet moved into the era of blogging and instant messaging. Although

blogging may not seem like social media precisely, the term fits because people were suddenly

able to communicate [their thoughts] instantly [and to] other readers.” (Historycooperative.org).

From Six Degrees to Snapchat, with each changing media interface, people are conforming to

these changes.

There is a term ‘ontological design’ that best described the way in which society has

become more reliant on technology. Think of the Drawing Hands drawing by M.C. Escher, each

hand is drawing the other hand, so without

one the other would not exist and vice versa.

Without humans, technology wouldn’t exist,

but without technology, humans wouldn’t

exist. It’s a cycle coined the ontological

design. Society today has created

themselves to rely so heavily on social

media and other technologies, that without it

they wouldn’t know what to do. Figure 1:Drawing Hands,M.C. Escher

So, what was life like before social media? In an article posted by Social Media Week

written by Tereza Litsa, Litsa explains how the memories of her life before technology are

strange to think about, even though the memories are still there. “If I had to describe in one word

the first memory I have about life before the internet, I would choose ‘silence’. Silence was not

literal, but rather metaphorical, since we didn’t have to deal with all the social media buzz and
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the noise that may turn distracting from time to time.” Much like Litsa, people who remember

twenty-five years ago have a good understanding of how they and the people around them have

changed by social media influences.

So, who is Chuck?

A coffee house, named HotBlack Coffee Cafe in Toronto, has recently declined to offer

free Wi-Fi to its customers. The owner Jimson Bienenstock explains that, “his aim is to get

customers to talk with one another instead of being buried in their portable devices.” His

reasonings for this change derives from the correlation of health and longevity to social

interactions. Positive social interaction will lead to a longer, healthier, more fulfilled life.

Obviously, humans need relationships. This is evident in the movie Cast Away starring

Tom Hanks as Chuck Noland who becomes stranded alone on an island and develops a

relationship with a Wilson volleyball. Because there was no one else around him, the human

relationship he needed was instead compensated by the volleyball he named Wilson. As much as

humans need this connection to other people, this movie shows that humans are capable of

replacing people to whatever they think will make them happier. This is evident in more ways

than just social media. For example, people replaced their families with work. But in majority

cases, society is becoming consumed by social media. People are becoming replaced by the

superficial portrayal of themselves online. Rather than a one real friend, a person can have 560

thousand friends on Facebook or Instagram.

In contrast to the movie Cast Away, societies usage of social media can soon become next

to exactly like the society portrayed in Wall-E. This is a movie that portrays a society in which

everyone knew everyone, yet nobody knew anyone. This cartoon movie about one robot being
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the only thing left on Earth, portrays how dirty humans have left their world. But in another less

portrayed lens, yet a still very relevant aspect of the movie, Wall-E shows how society has

conformed to floating around in a chair all day on social media and talking online with their

friends. It isn’t until two people bump into each other that they start to authentically notice one

another and notice the environment surrounding them.

With a more specific focus into human interactions and why relationships are important,

there are two examples provided in an article posted by Psychology Today titled, “Why We

Need Each Other”:

[Example 1] John lives alone but is very social. He has many friends with whom he

spends a lot of time and sees frequently. However, he feels sad and disappointed because

his friendships don’t seem to meet his needs. He doesn’t derive a sense of connection to

others and a feeling of satisfaction. Despite his busy social life, he feels alone and

lonely. (Psychology Today)

[Example 2] Albert lives alone and has two close friends whom he sees

occasionally. When he meets with them, he has a good time talking about current events

and sports as well as each other’s thoughts and feelings regarding their lives. When he

is not at work or in the company of others, Albert does not feel lonely because he spends

time engaging in activities that interest and energize him. (Psychology Today)

John and Albert both seem to live alone and have friends, Albert is fulfilled with the

minimal friends he has. According to the article, “how much social connectedness a person needs

influences how much aloneness they can tolerate.” (Psychology Today). John is not receiving

enough ‘social connectedness’ with the friends he has. Rather, his relationships, compared to
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Albert’s relationships are superficial. “Humans, because of necessity, evolved into social

beings.” Despite people thinking that they only need themselves, the nature of our desires to

affiliate with others will leave a void if not fulfilled. (Psychology Today).

Authentic relationships are the few friendships that fill the social connectedness. Social

media becomes many surface level relationships used to keep a person busy, that is until they are

left lone without a substantial amount of connection from their relationships.

What comes next?

The simplest solution would not be to remove social media all together. Social media

plays too large of a part in society to be suddenly taken away. Like the ontological design,

without these technologies, people would not know what to do.

Instead, people and especially young teens should be more aware of their actions on

social media. Teenagers specifically are an impressionable kind to work with. Their growing and

development will be influenced by the way in which they are introduced to the world. Parents,

adults and the teens themselves should be aware of their behavioral changes, and the amount of

virtual to authentic relationships they have. They should regularly practice the art of conversation

and make eye-contact. Most importantly, families and friends should take at least an hour out of

their day to turn off all technology and social media accounts. The more this action is done, the

more it becomes habitual. People should sit down with the ones they love, ask them about their

day, and have a conversation.

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Works Cited

Brody, Jane E. “Social Interaction Is Critical for Mental and Physical Health.” The New York

Times, The New York Times, 12 June 2017,

www.nytimes.com/2017/06/12/well/live/having-friends-is-good-for-you.html.

Cellan-Jones, Rory. “An Anti-Social Experiment.” BBC News, BBC, 8 Mar. 2016,

www.bbc.com/news/technology-35752625.

“Drawing Hands.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 6 Nov. 2018,

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drawing_Hands.

Keith. “The History of Social Media: Social Networking Evolution!” History Cooperative,

Jegtheme, 6 July 2018, historycooperative.org/the-history-of-social-media/.

Lapidot-Lefler, Noam, Barak, Azy, and Lapidot-Lefler, Noam. “Effects of Anonymity,

Invisibility, and Lack of Eye-Contact on Toxic Online Disinhibition.” Computers in

Human Behavior 28.2 434–443. 2012. Web. Accessed 23 Oct 2018.

Litsa, Tereza. “Do You Remember Life Before The Internet?” Social Media Week, 25 June 2015,

socialmediaweek.org/blog/2015/06/life-before-internet/.

"relationship." Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster, 2018. Web. 8 Nov 2018.

Stanton, Andrew, director. Wall-E. Pixar, 2008.

Tardanico, Susan. “Is Social Media Sabotaging Real Communication?” Forbes, Forbes

Magazine, 15 Apr. 2014, www.forbes.com/sites/susantardanico/2012/04/30/is-social-

media-sabotaging-real-communication/#6420f11f2b62. Accessed 23 Oct 2018.

Zemeckis, Robert, director. Cast Away. 20th Century Fox, 2000.