When I wrote the last post on Twittering I didn’t expect to be back covering social interaction issues so soon, but a recent item on NPR makes this follow-up seem quite appropriate and connected.
It seems young single people these days, both men and women, are into Hooking Up. Which is to say, rather than dating and looking for a long term commitment, they’re into rapid turn around sexual encounters, or what we used to call “one night stands”. Now don’t get me wrong, there has always been a class of guy who was into the wham, bam, thank you ma’am kind of relationship, or as they were fond of saying over the cold brew in the sports bar or the water cooler in the office, “why pay for the cow when you can get the milk for free”.
What is surprising, especially for an old traditionalist like me, is that women are now playing the game as well, with several factors appearing to have gone into this change of attitude. One, of course, is the ease and convenience of contraception devices, including both before and after the fact models. You’d have to be really inattentive to what’s going on in your life to get pregnant if you didn’t want to. And similarly, people are more aware of STDs and how to avoid them than they used to be. Then there’s the work factor. More people of both sexes are into their careers, looking to climb up the corporate ladder rather than into the family tree. With the average marriage age in this country standing at 29 for men and 28 for women, that’s an awful lot of post pubescent sexual tension that needs release prior to an official sanctioned “I Do”. However, it was one other reason discussed in that NPR feature that made me sit up and take notice.
Because of the constant interaction taking place between friends via tweeting and twittering and Facebook and who knows what else will be out there by the time I post this later today, young people are feeling that it is more invasive to let casual acquaintances into their thoughts, feelings, and emotions, than into their bodies! Screw me if you’d like, but don’t expect me to let you be my BFF. That’s the hard part, that’s the vulnerability, that’s the risk of getting hurt, opening my emotional self to someone I don’t really know. Take my body and let’s have some fun, that’s only something physical. Just don’t fuck with my inner being, the private, personal part of me that longs for connection but will defend to the death against being exposed. Believe it or not, Last Tango In Paris is alive and well and living in 21st century America.
Now those of you who have also read the last blog on Twittering might note some apparently conflicting thoughts regarding whether young people today put more importance on the inner or the outer worlds. Look again and you’ll see the common thread. The truth is that we live at arms length from the true being at our very core. And as long as we do, we shall remain apart, both from others and from ourselves. The loneliness will continue. The superficiality will remain. Bummer.
peace……………..ag
* * *