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I feel like these interactions go through phases of 1. Being ok and acceptable and even enjoyable at first; 2. People abuse it more and more; 3. Gradually turns
by godot 8y ago
I feel like these interactions go through phases of 1. Being ok and acceptable and even enjoyable at first; 2. People abuse it more and more; 3. Gradually turns into a negative experience in general; 4. The ordinary person will then avoid it and that becomes the norm.
Taking your example of meeting people online. I was on the internet in the late 90s as a teenager and it was incredibly easy and fun to meet people on IRC or ICQ and just chat. Some of those people I even eventually went on to meet in person. There was no motives, no romantic interests, whatever gender people were. Fast forward to now, these things seem unthinkable to do now both for adults and adolescents, safety concerns, predators, etc.
Take real life neighborhoods for example too. Growing up in the 80s and 90s in both Asia and America, when someone rings the door bell, you open the door and see who it is and talk to them. Nowadays this is almost not the norm anymore. In the past 2 years I have been assaulted and robbed as close as a block away from my house. I'm not opening the door to any stranger ringing my door bell, even if 99% of time they are harmless solicitors. There's far too many incidents of people abusing the trust and trying to cause harm when you let them in. I am not risking that.
I don't know what the answers might be to all of this. Is society actually getting more dangerous? Is it just that we're hearing more thanks to more news and internet? Is it overall income inequality in society that causes more crimes to occur? I have no answers to any of these.
- ryandrake 8y agoIsn’t violent crime (particularly from strangers) at historic lows, at least in the USA? “Stranger Danger” is blown way out of proportion. You’re less likely to be attacked by a rando walking on the street than by Uncle Phil, and far less likely than “back in the day.”
- digi_owl 8y agoIRC in particular was great for this, as it was rooms not P2P, and quite often one could find quite local rooms. ICQ and IM in general ruined that, IMO, as it was more invite based.
- StillBored 8y agoYou forget that IRC has person to person messaging too. It was pretty easy to start a side conversation with people on IRC that wasn't public.
- skookumchuck 8y ago> Nowadays this is almost not the norm anymore. A couple years back I knocked on the door of a stranger's house. A man answered it with "what the f*ck do you want?" I replied "the car in your driveway has its lights on." He softened up immediately and thanked me.