All We Ever Look For... All They Ever Want For You...

I wonder if we are, collectively, letting our children down? The received idea is that you're supposed to give them (access to) things that you never had. In many ways, very generally speaking, that seems to have been achieved in most Western households. Many of the objects and gadgets that have become mainstream over the last ten years and are now mainstays to the majority of kids' routines today, would not even have been part of the farthest stretches of my imagination as a child -  just as Man's landing on the moon would have been utterly inconceivable to the generation just before mine... It probably goes without saying that most of these present-day staples in a 'normal' existence are based on electronic technology and usually present themselves in the form of one screen or another, ever enhanced with a myriad of network, apps and so on. Looking at the wide range of 'stuff' available to children and teenagers alike, I wonder what I would have thought of such things at that same age, and how amazed I would have been if I'd had a glimpse of what would be commonplace to my children...

Extract from the children's book - 'What Makes it Go?' - Joe Kaufman - Hamlyn Publishing Group - 1972

But for all this wealth of digitally-enhanced information, communication, education and entertainment, strangely enough, I envy this modern take on childhood and youth less and less as things progress. This array of fast, efficient devices that have streamlined lives and lifestyles to perfection does not seem to have actually delivered the perfect, dazzling life that it may suggest. The endless talk of opportunity and openings promised to the young by the digital era seems to gloss over what is being shut off in the process. The possibility to surf over those enticing, shiny, slippery surfaces of the internet provides so much, but has rendered so much else rough, dull and seemingly redundant in comparision. Little by little, a whole host of other, older objects and activities have come to seem clunky, shabby and senseless next to this mesmerizing modernity. But for all its magic, this modern wizardry isn't truly conjuring up anything enduring. It seems to leave many of its younger users spellbound by its illusory depths and wealth which are not, in fact, that enchanting. It seems to be blinkering off so much of children's vision, extinguishing so many sparks to their imagination and snuffing out chunks of their creativity and curiosity that children are born with.

'What Makes it Go?' -  Computers aren't even mentioned in it! 

Our days might be getting busier and ever richer with vast ranges of options, but our existence is getting weighed-down with light-weight noise and visuals that impoverish us in many ways. These endless choices have a tyrannical hold over us all and we are forever tempted to click ever beyond in the search of something that is ever elusive. These incessant processes dictate our moves. Why do we burn to check a message just received, and why would this urge to consult some screen be more compelling than the desire to maintain, uninterupted, the conversation or activity already taking place? Has the state of the remote and/or virtual gained more weight and 'reality' in our lives than what is actually real? There is surely a price to pay for this clicking and checking. When you can click on and off endlessly, there is little demand on your attention span. You move on freely, with or without reason, in an activity that never taxes patience or requires sustained effort. We want instant gratification and our devices promise the never-ending means to search other means for this. Here we have a game of mirrors to ensnare we skylarks and turn us into bird-brains. Perhaps part of the beauty, and most of the challenges, of Life itself are based on the now-devalued art of perseverance or the ability to tolerate plain tedium. What will our cultural, social and personal landscape be like, once vast numbers of public libraries have disappeared, handicrafts and manual skills have become quaint activities of the former generations, perceived as sadly lacking our glorious technology, and when all contact with the outdoors has become standardised and sanitised? All of this has simply provided a brilliant coating that can soon be scratched, just like the supposedly indestructable CDs that sneeringly replaced the laughably old-fashioned audio cassettes and vinyl records. Yet little is left once that sleek sophistication has been chipped or scraped - the illusion is broken and nothing can hide the fact that there's little left below the surface - like ultra-white veneers bonded onto neglected teeth beneath. An extensive, sustained powercut would leave us deprived of this technological tat  - revealing the true extent of our dependancy to it and the void it has actually created in our social and creative approach to our world and our very identity therein.

Extract from 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory' - Roald Dahl - Unwin Ltd - 1972

Furthermore, the ironic thing with the old clumsy 'stuff' we used to have - the sellotaped audio and VHS cassettes, battered and beaten books and scratched and warped records - still worked when no longer brand-new, Just try coaxing a bit of life out of a damaged DVD, CD or USB key. Have fun! In addition, the jolts, bangs, faults and short-comings of the now extinct species were part of their very charm and are woven into our memory of the experience of reading/listening/watching. And since, most of the time these were are hard to come by, due to limited finances and accessibility, they seemed special - objects of value. Today we really have become spoilt for choice, but we are spoiling our children's lives with this. We want the best for them, but why is this whole area so blurred that we cannot see what we're giving them? Is that all we ever wanted for them?

I have grown increasingly tired of 'teaching' (trying to teach) young adults who are continually drawn to and ever distracted by their 'smart' phone.... Dumb, damn phones. The dimmed down, device-drugged expressions as they are forced to respond to my intrusive physical presence whilst itching to get back to the latest message, selfie, link or whatever. It's not these young people who are the cause of my fatigue, it's just seeing how jaded a lot of them seem to be. They appear to get little enjoyment from things that aren't experienced through some form of device, or doesn't link back to that universe. Worse again, they don't actually seem to be getting any real happiness from this electronically-geared existence. But the worst thing? All of this is seen as 'normal'.

Roald Dahl's tirade against the television... What would he have thought of today's equivalent, I wonder?