By: Eman Kanza
Just about 20-30 years ago, people always wanted a device which could connect them with their families, business associates and loved ones all around the world at any given time possible. Today you find every next person in gym or in a bus has his headphones plugged in listening music; a teenager sitting in a restaurant with his parents seems busy playing games on his smart phone while waiting for their entree. A young man next to you is busy responding to text messages, while some are seen receiving notifications on twitter and facebook.
Mobile phones are looked upon as a modern invention and have become a basic need in our society.
Arguably, mobiles phones have become one of the best gifts that humanity has ever received in the twenty first century because of its numerous benefits.
We have become dependent on mobile phones. It has become an integral part of our lives. When you leave your home you will reach out for your purse and your mobile first.
It is the fastest medium of communication. When there is an emergency and we have to send a message or alert someone a mobile phone is very helpful, it lessens your boredom, example listening to your favorite music and as well as watching movies through downloading.
Also the mobile phone can be used to take wonderful pictures of both happy sad moments as well as aiding studies through the use of the internet’s features on the phone, it has other tools like calculator, currency converter, an inbuilt torch for emergency, navigation map to locate different locations, and you can even pay your bills through mobile phones. It saves time no doubt.
Every morning we wake up with checking the day’s schedule on the touch screen of our Smartphone and start working accordingly.
So, with smartphones connecting with our social surroundings all day is not a tough thing anymore. Moreover, phones are getting smarter day by day. Technology was supposed to set us free, to liberate us from time-consuming tasks so we could do great things, think great thoughts and utilise our energy to solve humanity’s most pressing problems.
But according to studies, these smarter phones are making our generation dumber and a dunce. When they face any situation they don’t try to solve it or think on it from different perspectives rather they just take out their phones and search out solutions to handle the problem.
Now there is no more conversation or chit chat on our dining tables. Not just kids but adults as well, all are busy leaning their heads down on their phones.
That’s how technology changed the dynamic at our dinner tables.
According to a survey the average I.Q seems to have dropped in new generations.
Kids don’t read and are poor in spellings. They spend all their time playing computer games and texting and hanging out with one another on Facebook. But the problem is much worse than you think, because they make no attempt to make their brains smarter.
Phones are getting advanced to save our time but as a matter of fact we waste a lot of valuable time by watching movies or playing games on phone.
Smartphone with their all-solution-at-palm apps and technologies have crept into our world. They have made our kids so helplessly dependent on themselves. They are no more interested or willing to listen bed time stories or the heroic tales or facts about history from their elders. Instead they search it on their phones, if they need any info.
Our kids don’t bother to visit and explore new places around them, because they prefer to remain idle and visit the places online.
Not only kids and teenagers but adults are also getting addicted to the curse of these smart phones. They socialize less and waste time on internet surfing and also neglect their precious relationships. According to a new study, the couples now spend more time on smartphones than with their partner. An average smart phone user tends to spend two hours (119 minutes) a day using their gadget. Yet, the amount of time we spend with our other halves per day is just 97 minutes - a third less - on average.
Smart phones are getting smarter all the time with huge leaps being made in technology.
However, that also meant we're now spending more time glued to the screen rather than gazing into our partners' eyes. Call me old-fashioned, but there was once a time when people used to meet in parks, parties or in gatherings for social interaction and sharing of thoughts and ideas with friends and families. Now they do everything with just a touch. Parents who are concerned about their kids' dependence on digital devices should first embrace the technology and not punish them with it.
The best way to deal with the issue of children addicted to cell phones is to not give them one in the first place. Secondly, there should be strict rules in every family, which must be enforced by head of the family, while family gathering or while dining together all phones should be on the table and no one is allowed to use it.
Mothers can also do "interval training" to their children where they spend an hour doing homework without any form of disruption from technology.
Talk to your kids and keep check on them, plus also do their character building.
Try to involve them in practical activities.
Indeed mobile phones has contributed immensely to our lives but the blessing and the curse of it turned out to be in the way it has enabled us to live in our own virtual community and the disciplinary measures lined for ourselves in the usage of it.
So, are our smart phones a blessing or a curse? The answer is . . . both. In God’s created order, we must strive to use what He has given us according to a godly purpose, and the enjoyment of anything He has provided must be balanced by discipline. If we fail to exercise discipline, then the good things God has given us can become idols or instruments of sin.