My family and I have a favorite Chinese restaurant that would always be crowded with customers and families, filled with boisterous sounds that emanated all the way across the street. However, during my most recent visit to the restaurant, I noticed a stark difference. That same loud, clamorous restaurant was silent. As I swept my eyes across the room, it was stunning to see how every family, couple, and kid, was naturally on his or here lectrical device, not talking to one another. I was completely stunned at the change that took place not only on the restaurant but also from people as a whole.

Ever since the rapid onset of technology in recent years, the world seems to have become a much less personally interactive place. Optimistic technology devotees never cease to rattle off onhow technology has changed for the better in our fickle and demanding world. iPhones give us unlimited access to information and communication on a global scale- not to mention limitless options for games and apps. The public seems to enjoy the entertainment aspects of technology more than anything else. Smartphones seem to have dominated conversations, social meetings, and even education “single-handedly.”

However, we as a society may not know how to when it is appropriate to turn off our devices and focus on what is present in front of us. Smartphone aficionados may be outraged at the proposed notion that smartphones may be controlling the way people behave. Yet, once we tear our eyes away from an electronic screen, the world seems to be a foreign place filled with humans who virtually could live with just the muscles in their thumbs. I myself, as an antsy teenager, am an owner of an iPhone with a bountiful amount of apps. I could easily go a week without any form of physical contact with my friends and feel perfectly fine. I used to guffaw at adults who gave the typical old generation lecture on why this generation is so disconnected with reality. However, I also began to notice subtle differences in familiar places as time progressed.

This article is not meant to be a didactic one in which the moral of the story is to never touch an iPhone ever again. Technology is a wonderful form of innovation that has helped thousands across the globe. However, it also serves to remind us that humans should live as humans, making eye contact, talking to one another, expressing emotions- all of these are privileges we have as human beings. It seems as though we are so involved in our electronical world that we often forget what is happening in the natural world. So today I hope you, dear reader, lift your head up, take a look at nature, the sky, other people, and remember once more how it feels to use more senses than a “touch screen”.

Hannah Kim
Santa Margarita Catholic High School
10th Grade