By Temple Maduoma
The internet has become an indispensable part of human life. It has amazingly revolutionized everything, from the most pressing aspects of our lives such as intellectual and emotional experiences to some of the most casual and everyday aspects of our existence. The impact and to what extent the internet has impacted the way we interact with others has always raised an obvious concern as to whether the internet has been able to bridge social capital; that element that traverses socioeconomic, geographic, and racial lines.
Throughout our evolution, we lived in small groups, tribes, or clans. We used to have to figure out how to interact and get along with our fellow tribe members because our mutual survival depends on it. We naturally tend to gravitate towards people who are similar to us because it has some survival value. These living conditions laid the foundation of our social behaviour and interactions with one another.
Around the 5th century, people relied on pigeons, smoke signals, and Morse code flag to carry messages to nearby towns and communities. Then, towards the 15th century, hydraulic and maritime semaphores were a popular method of communication, especially at seas. Sadly, all these means of communication were not enough to satisfy our deep desire as humans to communicate and to communicate over distance. Well, necessity, they say, is a mother of innovation. This deep desire led to the birth of one of the world’s greatest inventions, the largest connected construction on the planet and beyond – the internet.
Unlike pigeons, smoke signals, Morse code flag, hydraulic and maritime semaphores which could aid communication within small groups, tribes, clans, nearby towns and communities. The internet wields its way across planets, continents, countries, and under oceans in a massive encircling web of fibres, cables, satellites, and wireless connections. These connections carry our profound thought, our wildest fantasies, our fear, our financial transactions, news, music, and just about anything we can express in words, writing, or spoken language. The internet has been able to satisfy our deep desire to the extent that we could only dream of centuries ago.
Globally, the internet has made a huge difference in the way the global community connects and communicates. It allows for the sharing of ideas, experiences, cultures, and backgrounds in a way that nothing else can. It has helped people from around the world to understand one another and has been able to pull the global community together. Therefore, making the world a small place and significantly bringing us together. Looking specifically at a more local level, the internet is enabling people to connect with friends and family and in that way bringing the community closer. People can connect with friends in different cities, countries, and continents. People can get in touch with family members. It has removed the obligation to make friends based on geography or lack of options.
On the internet, people can make new friends, stay in touch, and connect with old friends. people choose to talk to people that they share similar interests with, which in turn grows many international sub-communities.
Although, many have argued that the internet despite its effort to connect the world, is tearing us apart as much as it brings us together. Deception, gossip, cyberbullying, spammers, people with fake identities, and miscommunication are spreading which is consequently hindering communication and making people anti-social. While there may be a trace of truth in this notion, it is also paramount to understand that deception, gossip, bullying, miscommunication, etc. have been, even before the adoption of the internet, and will always exist. The internet just provided another means of spreading such information as much as it is spreading relevant information too.
Take a moment and think about the negative and positive impacts of the internet on our world today. In the end, when everything is carefully examined, you will be forced to agree with me that the internet is bringing more people together on a bigger scale. People can live beyond their small groups, tribes, or clans. Share their thought and are aware of their environment.
Nevertheless, when we talk about social capital and whether the internet is separating or bringing people together, there is not a white or black answer. Certainly, the internet is an overwhelming and positive invention and has created both positive and negative impacts in the world as much as every technological invention has. But For every one negative attribute, the internet boasts two positive ones. We can now interact, socialize, and collaborate with others in a way we could only dream of decades ago, thanks to the internet.
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