The Art of Communication

Image by dannysullivan via Flickr

Have you ever noticed that older people are far more likely to strike up a conversation in a public place?  In my experience that seems to be the case and I thought I would write about some of the reasons I think this might be.

I.          Modern Technology

I guess that’s the most obvious, though by no means the only, culprit.  Surfing online, answering Blackberry messages, watching a movie on your notebook, and working remotely are all profoundly isolating activities.  They are convenient, the way junk food and 24/7 stores are convenient but they don’t teach us how to interact with real people in a real public space.  And since all must learn how to communicate with people over the course of a lifetime, every time we “skip a lesson” we loose a little of our ability to communicate.  And the younger we are the more such lessons we are likely to have skipped.

II.       Learning Fear not Interactions

Unfortunately, what most of us learn instead is that we should fear people.  Remember that commercial, “Never Talk to Strangers”?  It was aimed at children and the point was to prevent children from being kidnapped, abused, and worse.  All worthwhile goals.  But it also taught too many that strangers should be shunned because they are (almost by definition) dangerous.  And so, today whether you are in a public park, a coffee shop, the library, or the hospital waiting room, the younger generation buries itself in their laptops and other electronic gadgets while the older generation takes the time to talk to people passing by or sitting at a nearby table. 

III.   Supervised Interactions

But it’s not fear alone.  For members of the younger generation were never really allowed to interact spontaneously with their peers as they were growing up.  Consider: only 15 percent of kids today walk to school and the consequences of that are more than increased risk of obesity.  As Amy Graff points out, because kids are carted around everywhere, they are less active, less independent and less healthy.  They also don’t get a chance to skip in the puddles and goof off.  I am not advocating truancy; merely pointing out that goofing off also has its place.  Goofing off is not fun if you do it by yourself; but it is fun if you sneak off with your best friend and partner in crime.  Remember those surreptitious trips to the candy store or the ice cream shop?  They were fun, yes.  But they also taught us something important: how to communicate with our friends (you have to talk your friend into braving a parent’s wrath) and how to communicate with adults (our parents sent us here; we’re not sneaking off from school—honest!).  And remember the spontaneous activities after school we enjoyed—things like paintball in the park or the woods, or a game of basketball in the street—those have almost entirely disappeared.  They have been replaced by supervised interactions at after-school activities and summer camp.  Now, there is nothing wrong with either after-school activities or summer camp per se; both serve worthwhile goals.  The problem is that they are not spontaneous.  They are not necessarily what kids want to do.  They are aimed at keeping kids out of trouble; at keeping kids occupied while their parents work.  As a result, the supervisors in camp and in school expect their charges to act in certain ways.  The kids, in short, are given a kind of script and are expected to abide by it.