Internet and texts ‘ruining community and family life’
Tuesday 11th August 2009, 2:00PM BST.
SOCIAL networking sites and text messaging are damaging community and family life, according to the Catholic Dean of Guernsey. 
Father Michael Hore has condemned the modern traditions and said ‘they have a hold on the mind’.
His comments have come after Archbishop of Westminster Vincent Nichols said excessive use of email and mobile phone text messaging was creating shallow friendships.
‘He was voicing his opinion and I think they are capable of damaging community life,’ said Father Michael.
‘They may seem very innocent, but can be harmful.’
He said many young people were now becoming addicted to the technology, which was bad for their health.
‘They are very isolating and create something almost like a faceless person,’ said Father Michael.
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He has a point, although emails, mobiles and the Internet are only tools. Like all tools, they can be used for good, or abused for evil. The tools themselves aren’t evil.
It’s like saying a carving knife is evil if it was used as a murder weapon. It could equally have been used to carve a Christmas turkey at a family dinner. It wasn’t the knife that murdered, it was the person who used it.
What is important is that we educate young people about the benefits and dangers of technology, as well as promoting the benefits of face to face contact and community life – not resort to scaremongering.
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And religion is the correct path to follow as it doesn’t cause any social divides, wars general unrest, oh yes, i forgot, it does!!!!
‘They have a hold on the mind’ what about all the brainwashed people in the world through religious leaders/beliefs!!!!
I find it all a little unbelievable!!!!
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‘They are very isolating and create something almost like a faceless person,’ said Father Michael.
Like God then!
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“Father Michael Hore has condemned the modern traditions and said ‘they have a hold on the mind’.”
Funny enough I condemn religion for exactly the same reason.
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Nothing like alienating the next generation of your congreation.
Surely the church would better showing how they are relevant to young people as opposed to proving how out of touch some of they are.
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Baffled
I am not a bit religious but totally disagree with your comment. Its people who cause all those things and use religion as a tool. If a person corrupts the minds of others then that person is evil not the religion. It is easy to brainwash the minds of millions but that does not prove or disprove the existence of a god, all it proves is that there`s a lot of crazy people around and a lot of sheep.
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bcb
If you think it is not the religeon that causes the problem read the headline on the BBC news website re Pakistan, muslim christian tensions. j good point
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Through blogging sites and e-mail I correspond with half a dozen people in various parts of the world. They may be shallow friendships but I don’t have pretensions that they are otherwise. It may also be mildly annoying to wake to a gloating e-mail from Sydney after the 4th Test but I can’t see how I’m being harmed?
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well he has a point just look at are english football team the reason there know good and have not won anythink since 1969 is because before all this technology came in the kids would kick a ball agaist the wall just look at brazil know money but good at football!!!
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Doug, you confirm my point completely – providing we see these tools for what they are, there isn’t a problem. Like all tools, when they are in the hands of people who know how to handle them there isn’t a problem. That’s why education is important – not scaremongering. I do however sympathise with you getting such a devastating message from Sydney….
J – As a Christian, the timeless message of Christ is the most important thing, not the vehicle delivering it, although I do agree that using the culture’s preferred means of communication is definitely the way to go.
This is why, far from being out of touch you will find many churches (including the one I attend) are making full use of the latest technology to get that message out….
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John
sorry mate i still dont agree. What i dont understand is this, if there is no God then religion has no meaning, so the people telling others to fight for a cause in the name of somthing that doesen`t exist must be a lie? and who are telling the lies? people. So how can you blame religion when religion doesen`t really tell us to do anything?. We all know how a story told for good or bad can be changed over time. It can be used as a very useful tool to cause great harm by those who seek out thier own agenda. I would rather lay blame at the feet of the extremist nutters than THEIR corrupted religious lies they spill out. The message is only as reliable as the messenger, what was the original message? (if there ever was one)and do you believe the likes of mr Bin Laden to tell you the truth?.
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Oh no’s!
Last night I was inocently browsing the internet on my specially specified secular computer and was assaulted by a wave of social networkingness emanating from just off the Grange.
I assume that in light of this new information both the Dean’s http://catholic.org.gg and the link off it to the “Guernsey Catholic Youth on Facebook” are going to be immediately taken down????????
Not like the church to suffer from hypocrisy…………
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I should stress that, being an atheist, I don’t really care about the impact that modern technology has on the Church – however, I think this story raises some real issues.
A very significant number of people (particularly in the finance industry) now go to work, log on to their computer and that’s it – their entire day is then spent in front of the screen. Many of those same people will go home and spend the evening surfing the net, or playing computer games, or emailing, or going on Facebook or whatever. Those unfortunate enough to own a Blackberry cannot even escape work emails in their leisure time while everyone under the age of 20 seems compelled to text their friends every 15 minutes just in case some earth shattering event has occurred since they last corresponded.
My point is that we are all becoming addicted to technology to such a degree that it is replacing ordinary social interaction. Where I work, people don’t even get up form their desks to talk to a colleague at the other end of the room any more, they would rather send an email.
Kids in particular are growing up in a world of instant technological gratification – a lot of them don’t read books and cannot express themselves verbally because they no longer learn how to string a sentence together. We have school leavers who come to work for us who are brilliant at resolving IT issues but who have no social skills whatsoever, they cannot write a letter or answer the phone and many have the attention span of a gnat.
I will be the first to admit that modern technology has achieved some great things and it will no doubt continue to do so but, as a society, I fear that in the long term it will make us ever more lazy, stupid and illiterate.
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CD – all your points are completely valid however it’s not technology to blame – it’s the people who allow it to rule their lives. There are times when I’ve got home tired from work (I work in an IT Department) and have spent ages in front of my laptop instead of social interaction with my wife. It’s not my laptop’s fault – it’s mine. To blame technology for social problems is abdicating responsibility – now there’s a REAL social problem.
It’s a simply principle really: Master technology, don’t let technology master you.
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Good point Paul Le P, you are quite right that it is the users of technology who are to blame and not the technology itself.
Nevertheless, one could put forward the same argument for – say – heroin use. It is not the drug but the drug user who is the problem. I would suggest that there is however a fundamental difference. The damaging aspects associated with drug misuse are well known and legislation exists to limit their negative impact on society. Technology addiction (if I may call it that) is seen in a far more positive light and is even encouraged (e.g. the UK government’s drive to ensure all homes have high speed broadband access).
I note that one of the most depressing aspects of the recent “Baby P” case was that the child’s mother left him completely unattended for days at a time while she trawled the internet for pornography. A horrible and extreme example I admit, but the addictive and anti-social aspects of technology are very real and their potential damage is unquantified.
On a more day to day level I wonder how many hours of precious childhood our kids losing in “The World of Warcraft” when they could actually be interacting with the real world?
Or to take another far more mundane example, the fact that many of us no longer bother with punctuation because we communicate in “text speak” is, I would argue, a step backwards. Punctuation allows us to communicate meaning concisely and succinctly and if we do away with such rules it stands to reason that we can only communicate less effectively.
I appreciate that I am a bit of a dinosaur in such matters and I am sure many people see no problem with a dumbing down of society – after all why use your brain when you have a computer to think for you?
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CD – your point about “technology addiction” is extremely valid and I don’t think you’re a dinosaur at all! I agree entirely with many of your points – I just think the emphasis should be placed on the users not the technology.
Your example of the “Baby P” case highlights one of the greatest dangers of the information age, which is the ease of accessibility to the most extreme illegal material – mostly pornography, not to mention the ease of accessibility to other addictive products, such as online gambling.
Sadly, your point about children spending endless hours in front of “World of Warcraft” (not to mention the TV) is raising a generation of children lacking social skills. Again, for me the problem is not the technology but the parents. Many parents selfishly use technology as “rearing aids” or “parent replacements” having worked out that sitting your child in front of the box means you don’t actually have to spend your time engagine with them yourself. Of course, I’m not saying that TV or computer games are bad, simply that parental regulation should take place ensuring that the child gets a balanced diet of entertainment.
In an earlier post, I mentioned that education was the key. I would like to add responsibility to that – primarily the responsibility of parents to regulate technology use and ensure healthy alternatives are provided.
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