The word addiction has a negative connotation, and expresses disapproval more than anything else. When people see a behavior that they somehow disapprove of, they label it an addiction and the media takes it and runs with it. I can just picture some psychologist who is annoyed that their child is spending too much time on Facebook, writing the first article on this new 'addiction'.
Now if this child were busy reading books, psychologists wouldn't label them as a book addict would they? Nope, instead it's their peers who would label them a book worm, with the same negative connotation. There is something to be learned here.
The label isn't about the activity, it's about acceptance. Your fellow Facebook users aren't going to call you an addict, because its an acceptable behaviour within your group. Your parents aren't going to dissuade you from reading because that's an acceptable behaviour for their generation.
The problem here is the gap between those who accept new ways of doing things, and those who don't. Someone who is 'addicted to the Internet' may really be craving knowledge; they may be no different from someone who loves reading. Someone who is 'addicted to social media' may just love connecting with people - virtually or in real life. And BBM addicts just love conversation, and probably used to get run out of class for talking too much.
What some fail to realize is that as the world moves forward, there are new ways to do old things. Reading books was about learning, keeping current, building the mind, and even entertainment and adventure. As new means of accomplishing all of this were developed and became popular, some dinosaurs couldn't adapt. They disdain what is new, often because they don't understand it, and sometimes because they don't care to.
I wonder if any of his contemporaries called Gutenberg a book addict?
I love this....
ReplyDeleteLOL!! Well, there is also the flip coin to this piece... the 'I can't live/breathe/survive without my BBM/Book/Computer/Internet...
ReplyDeleteI agree that the term is used way too loosely, but in its proper sense addicts do exist my brother.
Oh addicts do exist. My issue is that labeling someone an addict, or classifying an action as an addiction, seems more of a social sanction, than the culmination of a genuine evaluation of new developments in popular culture.
ReplyDeleteWell, then...that being clarified, I concur.
ReplyDeleteHas it occurred to you that both sides may be correct? An addiction is a preoccupation with an object material or immaterial that causes a dysfunction in interaction with society.
ReplyDeletePerhaps they are living in two different societies? So the preoccupation is fully accepted in the micro ism of one society and rejected in the other. In the case of the latter it really is an addiction since the person is nonfunctional.
Again, it's not that I think addictions don't exist. My issue is that it's become a loosely applied label. How many Facebook and Blackberry 'addicts' are nonfunctional?
ReplyDeleteAlso highlighting the subjectiveness of the term is that, in today's connected society, we all spend a large portion of our day on the Internet. Years ago, anyone spending such huge swathes of time online ran the risk of being committed to an institution :)
Technology marches forward, and everyone is eventually dragged along. The avant gardes are often the ones who get labeled, but eventually the rest of society catches up. Anyone who years ago suggested that we'd all have devices permanently connecting us to the Internet, would have been deemed "preoccupied" with the virtual world. Yet those same people who would have criticized such a preoccupation, all have cell phones today.