My Simple Community

May 26, 2010

Here’s to Josh, my local barber (not the guy in this picture).

This is what social networking used to look like.  There are places in your community where people come to do something functional while they experience neighborliness – if that’s a word.  In a lot of cases, like a haircut, it doesn’t take any more time to be neighborly. And it takes so little extra thought to choose the neighborly option over other less connected approaches to getting things done.

Can you think of other “social networks” in your community that offer this kind of two-for-one? Accomplish a task and strengthen a bond at the same time.

February 6, 2010

Time we spend with family, friends & neighbors can be very unconscious. Let’ do something about that.

Think back over the last week. How many times did you get together with someone primarily for the enjoyment of their company – not to accomplish a task?

Maybe you are asking yourself what kinds of activities count. That’s up to you, but here are some things to consider:

• A meal with someone (other than a meal at home with your family)
• Getting together for a drink (coffee, beer, whatever)
• Just stopping over at a neighbor’s house
• Going to a social gathering (party, etc.)
• Going to a social event (concert, play, movie, etc.)

But please do not count these:

• Phone calls
• Emails
• Facebook or other social media exchanges
• Just saying “Hi.” in passing… not quite enough, is it?

Face-to-face is key, and doing even the smallest thing to make it happen matters – there needs to be some investment.

So how did you do last week? When you thought about it, did you do more or less than you predicted?

When you think about it, I hope it seems easier to do than you imagined.

Having thought about it, I hope you now have it in your mind to do even one more thing this week than you did last week.

That’s simple community.

Maybe the easiest way to make the social distinction between being technologically connected – known as social networking – and being right there with a person face-to-face is face time.  This is the first post in a group called “Face Time” because it is key to true community.

There are many who say social networking is as good as face time, some say it’s even better because we are in contact more often.  I can support that in my own teaching. For more than ten years now, when I teach undergraduate college courses, I always have a day when I ask about personal communication.  It’s usually far enough into the semester that I have a rapport with the students and they are generally candid with me.  

I ask them two questions.  First, how many have sent or received a message during this class period.  I’d say the number has been over 50% for more than the last five years.  No surprise there.  Second, how many communicated with a parent during the class period? There is always at least one and sometimes as many as a half dozen.  No doubt, cell phones alone have kept college kids and young adults in more frequent contact with their parents. And that’s a great thing.

But while I certainly agree the technology enabling social networking has led to more frequent communication, there are very important things missing, still, that only face time can provide. Over several blog posts I will share a bunch of them.  Here is the first.

Among the most important is vulnerability.  I am amazed at how easy it is for me to ask or say something through technology that I would be too afraid or embarrassed to say in person. This concept is not new. Long before personal computers romantic relationships were ended with “Dear John,” letters.  Writing a letter was seen as the easy way out of the relationship because you didn’t have to confront the impact of your decision on poor John.

That’s exactly the point.  Social networking provides a buffer against personal responsibility for our communication acts. Is that a good thing?

We are bold to comment, suggest, ask for things online and in texts that we would never consider saying face-to-face with a person.  An entire generation is being raised with a social suit of social armor protecting them from the impact of their personal communication.

Face time, and only face time, reminds us of the full and direct impact – good and bad – of what we communicate with others. We need more of those reminders if we are going to build civility. Civilization, the civilized world, community – there is a connection here.