Multiple Realities Collide
The blur between virtual reality and reality itself
I wake up every morning like every other twenty something person that I know. I wake up, roll out of bed, brush my teeth, wash my face, and then rush to my cell phone. Sometimes, I skip the process all together and scroll from my bed. I will then spend the next few minutes (or maybe hours) sucked into an intoxicating world of exploration, where the next hit of dopamine is only three or four taps away. From funny dog videos to the news of the real world around me, this device acts as a portal to another world. A world that would bend to my will and interests, to the point of lost connection from reality itself. If only I truly knew what would happen when I was accepted into this other fantasy world.
What started out as funny pictures of dogs and cats, has changed into controlling “personas” in both realities.
While I did not always run to my phone or the internet, I was privileged enough to have a family well versed in the technological sphere. My father works for British Telecom, one of the largest telecommunications companies in the world. My mother works for the VT iDirect (now named ST Engineering), which runs most of the satellites that provide internet for the United States and its military. Having both parents in a technological field gave me the opportunity to grow with the advances of the internet, giving me a unique perspective of its effects.
While I watched all my friends and classmates getting smartphones, I vividly remember both my parents adamantly arguing against it. I was astonished by the capabilities that they now possessed, considering most of the people were getting phones around 6th grade. One of my most vivid memories of this is from the third release of the iPhone; when the first smartphone was released for widespread consumption to the public. When compared to my LG Slide, the iPhone was a marvel of technology.
My jealousy focused around the new applications that these smartphones could now run. While they are rudimentary compared to today’s standards, nothing caught my attention more than Facebook and Instagram. Finally, a way to validate all the friends and companions that I had acuminated over my years. I was ecstatic when I had finally convinced my parents it was time for an upgrade.
Unfortunately, I soon discovered that these virtual friends were not always as friendly in person as they were online. I was walking to class as most middle school kids do, and out of nowhere I hear “Why didn’t you like my Insta pic?!”, shouted at me from across the hallway. In a panic, I whip around and say “Sorry, I must not have seen it”. That was unquestionably the wrong response.
When I turned around, the furious voice I had heard was from a kid twice my age and size I had believed I had never seen before in my life. “What, it wasn’t good enough for you?” he yelled as he was sprinting closer to me. “Dude, I don’t know who you are!” I replied, realizing what was most likely about to happen.
As he continued to approach, I started to notice more and more things that were familiar about him. Then I realized, I had just seen this guy’s picture just as he was yelling at me. With the fastest speed I have ever moved in my entire life, I opened up my phone and liked every single one of his pictures. “Thanks, I guess,” was all he said as I recoiled from the possible pummeling I could have received.
This kid, who I still do not remember the name of, was willing to physically beat me into liking his pictures on the online social platform. This other world had consumed him so much, that he was willing to not only get in trouble for injuring me, but also willing to harass me just for not liking a picture he had posted mire seconds ago. He was fully engrossed in this other world, and there was no way of distinguishing the two. While I would love to say that I am any different, this is a perfect example of how social media affects us all these days.
There is no way of avoiding it, social media, and technology in general, is an integrated part of our advanced society. The culture of likes and shares now controls most of our actions, whether we mean it or not. What started out as funny pictures of dogs and cats, has changed into controlling “personas” in both realities. While the advent of new technologies has most certainly brought people together virtually, and provided new and exciting ways to interact, these interactions must be made by a person. And with the complexity of developing two personalities, reality and virtual, which one is the real one?
