Are social media driving us crazy?
From a few minutes to several hours a day, the time we spend on social networks is enough to question us. Scroll countless reels of a few seconds, discover with curiosity the feed of a lost acquaintance, learn a new recipe, learn about the news ... Networks have become an extension of our fingers while slowly but surely getting us totally hooked. The Christian of 2023, how does he manage his relationship with social networks? And for what issues?
Social networks are transforming our habitsA few months ago an influential pastor of a trendy mega-church in the United States confided that the first thing he did when he got up, even before brushing his teeth, having coffee or reading his Bible, was to check his Instagram notifications. And the statistics to know which of his publications had more or less worked. He added that the data had an impact on his mood.
Just recently, an article in the sports press mentioned these athletes who can no longer run without their phone or connected watch to record the race or training. They can no longer run because of the security that these electronic devices could provide (emergency contact, heart rate recording and missed threshold alert, for example). No, these athletes can no longer run without gadgets because otherwise they would have nothing to share on social networks. And if it's not shared on social media, it never happened. We ran, traveled, cooked for nothing.
These examples above are not so extreme because in many ways, many people - to varying degrees - are affected by the changes in habits and behaviors induced by social networks. And I recognize that I am part of the lot.
In ten, fifteen years, their development has changed our relationship with the world and our ways of interacting. They are so ubiquitous that they even fit into part of our conversations. A dozen years ago, I amused myself by noting in the conversations I heard on public transport the number of times the word Facebook was spoken. This number was staggering.
Today it would rather be WhatsApp, Insta (both from the Facebook group, now Meta), YouTube, Snap or Tiktok, depending on age or social group. Regardless, these social networks have accentuated our flaws, made us more narcissistic, more forgetful ... Crazier?
But they have also made it possible to unite people around the world and are an essential ground for the proclamation of the Gospel to the citizens of the 21st century. It is this paradox of social networks: addiction and opportunity; madness and creativity that we propose to address in this file. And it is also an opportunity to call for taking a step back and why not, from time to time, to disconnect.
Social networks are transforming our habitsA few months ago an influential pastor of a trendy mega-church in the United States confided that the first thing he did when he got up, even before brushing his teeth, having coffee or reading his Bible, was to check his Instagram notifications. And the statistics to know which of his publications had more or less worked. He added that the data had an impact on his mood.
Just recently, an article in the sports press mentioned these athletes who can no longer run without their phone or connected watch to record the race or training. They can no longer run because of the security that these electronic devices could provide (emergency contact, heart rate recording and missed threshold alert, for example). No, these athletes can no longer run without gadgets because otherwise they would have nothing to share on social networks. And if it's not shared on social media, it never happened. We ran, traveled, cooked for nothing.
These examples above are not so extreme because in many ways, many people - to varying degrees - are affected by the changes in habits and behaviors induced by social networks. And I recognize that I am part of the lot.
In ten, fifteen years, their development has changed our relationship with the world and our ways of interacting. They are so ubiquitous that they even fit into part of our conversations. A dozen years ago, I amused myself by noting in the conversations I heard on public transport the number of times the word Facebook was spoken. This number was staggering.
Today it would rather be WhatsApp, Insta (both from the Facebook group, now Meta), YouTube, Snap or Tiktok, depending on age or social group. Regardless, these social networks have accentuated our flaws, made us more narcissistic, more forgetful ... Crazier?
But they have also made it possible to unite people around the world and are an essential ground for the proclamation of the Gospel to the citizens of the 21st century. It is this paradox of social networks: addiction and opportunity; madness and creativity that we propose to address in this file. And it is also an opportunity to call for taking a step back and why not, from time to time, to disconnect.
