re: To those that experienced the 80s

The poster child for apologists and self imposed guilt. Hate on. And disrupt what was a civil discussion that was respectfully had.

quote:

---

Part of this generation's problem with being obsessed with everything "retro" is not appreciating just how good we have it right now.

---

If you think gadgets replacing real human interaction is better you are not in touch with reality enough to see what has been lost.

If we are headed to a world of non personal, non interactive, cyber sex then think of me as this guy wanting to have sex the old fashioned way.

quote:

---

If you think gadgets replacing real human interaction is better

---

Never intimated such. "Gadgets" can promote more human interaction than in the past, too. Case in point: I don't have to write my wife letters or wait by the phone to communicate with her while we're apart. I'm able to reconnect/coordinate reunions with college friends who would have been long lost to distance in the past.

And let's not pretend that the past was totally interactive, either:

quote:

---

If we are headed to a world of non personal, non interactive, cyber sex

---

Yeah, Tinder, Grindr, Craigslist and the like aren't going anywhere. Come on, now. If anything, people are using technology for nookie like never before.

quote:

---

Case in point: I don't have to write my wife letters or wait by the phone to communicate with her while we're apart.

---

Here is the disconnect. I have letters written between my great grandparents that are much better communication than anything I see today. They are also in a form that can be preserved and not lost when some cloud server craps out. I am not sure how to convey the difference in feel and content but it is real.

Internet may be more connective but much less real communication and more fluff. A handwritten letter between two people is not the same a a "social" site offering "free" service at the cost of data mining for big business and big government. This is no way to personal freedom.

quote:

---

And let's not pretend that the past was totally interactive, either:

---

I have spent the majority of my life in and old and established community built in the post Civil War era. As the lone minority household it was tougher but the interpersonal relationships were much more connected. I much preferred my neighborhood in the 80's when everybody in the neighborhood knew everybody else and the food, while admittedly less healthy, was way better tasting. Now folks have moved in and changed the dynamics (it has gotten gentrified) and the new folks are not engaged as being neighbors. They just want to live in their cyber cocoons and not be "interactive" with their darker next door neighbors.

My neighborhood may be an outlier but it certainly was better in the 60's, 70's, and 80's than it has been since. It seems the decline started in the Ronald Reagan administration and has fallen since. While the city may be happier with the higher property taxes it is a hollow replacement for the history and feel of the flesh and blood humans who once called it home.

quote:

---

Come on, now. If anything, people are using technology for nookie like never before.

---

I have lived through all the eras and the pill and lack of life altering STD's leads me to believe the 70's may have been the peak of good nookie. Real live 70's funk may have been the greatest sex inducing technology ever invented.

quote:

---

That's because, to you, "real" communication must be written down.

That's highly subjective.

---

Incorrect on both counts. Real communication must not be written down but it must be real. 97% of human communication is non verbal via live human interaction. A letter can be more descriptive than a text and may require 2x to 4x the words - indicating higher brain capacity - but both will not give hearing clues. A phone call is better than both as the human brain can pick up infections at the subconscious level via hearing skills.

As almost all real communication is based on things that are not conveyed in texts or emoticons.

Look at this list and how many are easily expressed by the vast majority of the human race with modern communications. Hitting the LIKE button on FaceClone or texting via TWITter does not undo the communication skills adopted and rewarded over the entire human experience.

They include:

Body Movements (Kinesics), for example, hand gestures or nodding or shaking the head

Posture, or how you stand or sit, whether your arms are crossed, and so on

Eye Contact, where the amount of eye contact often determines the level of trust and trustworthiness

Para-language, or aspects of the voice apart from speech, such as pitch, tone, and speed of speaking

Closeness or Personal Space (Proxemics), which determines the level of intimacy

Facial Expressions, including smiling, frowning and even blinking

Physiological Changes, for example, sweating or blinking more when nervous.

Add in scent and touch which certainly can not be conveyed electronically. As a younger man I could always pick up the scent of a woman she could not control. Not sure if it was a pheromone or some other scent but when you dance cheek to cheek you can pick it up like an alarm bell. You just can't unwire all that in a single generation.

I'm quite aware of the nuances of nonverbal communication

I only went there because you seemed to value letter writing over electronic communication.

This is a whole 'nother tangent, now

that florida fan pic is from the early 2000's

Cum on feel the noise was a Slade cover that was originally released in 1973.

This fricker came out around '82...I wanted one so bad that I couldn't stand it. I wound up getting a freaking Emerson that sucked.

quote:

---

To those that experienced the 80s

---

Summer of 1985, before my sophmore year, I made a little over 10K shrimping and spent it all on two vehicles I bought from burnt out shrimp boat captains; a 1969 SS/RS 396/350 camaro convertible for $7500 and a 1983 CJ7 with the rest and I still own both today. The 80's were great.