The Antisocial Social Media
People can “meet” and befriend with someone they have never and may never meet in the physical world. we now spend more time than ever on our phones scrolling endlessly through our social feeds. The technology has reshaped our culture, conversation, and relationships with people.
When I realised how quick, easy, and cheap to drop and reply messages on internet that I could not relate who the person with real life but just based on some posts, it does make me reflect on what a true friend is? And I hope my social media friends can have a little thought about what friendship is to you, and perhaps it is worth to slow down and make meaningful connections.
The 3 kinds of friendships in Aristotelian Sense
The friendship of utility. It is what the two people involved can do for one another. The friendship of pleasure. The friendships based on enjoyment of a shared activity and the pursuit of fleeting pleasures and emotions. The friendship of virtue. The people you like for themselves, the people who push you to be a better person. The motivation is that you care for the person themselves.
In these days of social or business networking, it seems that more friends is seen being better, counts become more important than quality. Do you even know how many friends you have on social media? And what kind of friendship? The number of friends is limited by the size of the human brain, and it is hypothesised by the Dunbar’s number that 150 is our limit. And I probably have just have a handful of virtuous friendship.
In the era of social networking, it is easier to make friends of utility and pleasure. For example, people can connect with others for buy and sell, exchange of goods. It is easier to organise events such as party, or a movie club. In both of these friendships the other person is not being valued “in themselves” but as a means to an end.
Virtue-friendship occurs between good virtuous persons, not only in moral sense but intellectually. Such virtue contributes to the happiness and one need little external goods for happiness . Through the awareness and contemplation of the other, each becomes a better human being.
