Negative effects of a "text"

Text messaging is a part of our everyday culture and is affecting us in many different ways. According to McLuhan the “medium can be any technology that creates extension of the human body and senses.” This relates to text messaging because this can impact our culture positively or negatively. I decided to write about this topic because I have become addicted to text messaging along with many others including my friends. Even though text messaging is a very convenient way of communicating, there are many negative effects that are targeted on text messaging.

Text messaging is used affectively everyday and it is said to be one of the biggest forms of communication among youth today. It can affect us physically and creates an extension of our eyes and hands. It is also said to be dangerous to our brain this is due to the radiations waves that can be one of the causes of cancer. I am definitely a culprit of using my phone everyday and not being able to survive if it was not attached to my hip but this has impacted my life in some negative ways.

Ever since text messaging has been invented I realize that I do not communicate using my home telephone or I never talk to my friends on my cell phone. This has made communication on a phone obsolete. I do not necessarily believe that text messaging is always a quicker more efficient way to communicate than calling a friend because sometimes it will take them longer to answer or it causes trouble understanding what is being said. In a text message you cannot hear the levels or expressions in a person’s voice and the content of the message may be interpreted differently. This is another negative factor when dealing with text messaging that I have come across many of times. This affects our culture because our telephone calls or face to face conversations are becoming more and more obsolete due to the fact of text messaging.

I believe that text messaging should be banned when it comes to driving and texting. It has been proven that text messaging while driving can be equally as bad as to drinking and driving. All it takes is a split second to look down and start typing a text for something to happen right in front of your car. Many young teens have lost their lives due to texting and driving and this is something in our life that can help be prevented. Our society has been affected in so many ways when discussing text messaging, and driving and texting is just one example of a negative impact it has made.

Our culture will continue to expand with different forms of technology making communication easier or more exciting. The BlackBerry already has a different form of communication that other phones do not have. It is called BlackBerry message "BBM". This lets you have live conversations on your phone, very similar is msn messenger but this is pre set on every BlackBerry phone. Even though our culture will continue to be affected by technology and the cell phone, we have to realize how to use them safely, at the right times and for the right reasons.







http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/783729/the_negative_effects_of_text_messaging.html?cat=9

- Vanessa Johnstone