Offline
Or, why real spaces with real people can never be replaced by technology
When the pandemic first hit, I was privileged enough to have a job that was already remote so in a lot of ways not leaving the house wasn’t that much of a shock to my lifestyle. Of course, I had to adapt like everyone else - setting up the kids’ online learning desks in my work space complicated my own productivity levels; but we figured out a rhythm that worked (more or less).1 But, the truth is so much of our lives had already moved online that giving over a bit more seemed negligible. However, as the weeks turned into months and the months pushed into years, I noticed a new form of fatigue setting in around my online engagement. It became driven by anxiety and then eventually turned to apathy.
Now, this is where I need to make a confession: I’m a Twitter addict. I’m not really on other forms of social media, but I have been a serial Twitter user for over a decade now. It’s how I’ve stayed up to date on basically everything that goes on in the world. It’s the reason I got connected with this very group that I’m currently writing for. Twitter seemed, to me, to represent the best of what the internet could offer.2 It allowed people to communicate events in real time as they witnessed it. Then those communications could immediately be analyzed and commented on by journalists, scientists, and other experts who made sense of things as they unfolded. I’m certainly not naive to the negative aspects of Twitter such as abuse or misinformation (as we’ve seen) but it always seemed to hold the potential for learning and connecting around the issues I cared most about. For that reason it has been a tremendous asset in my life.
But - back to my growing anxiety and apathy.
As I felt increasingly cut off from people in real live spaces and as the weight of global events dominated my timeline I became overwhelmed with the futility of it all. Trying to carry it all in my head was having a negative impact on my mental health and accomplishing very little of value in the real world. By hiding behind the (justifiable) fear of being out in public, obsessing over these things online had become the only way I was engaging with the world around me. And it felt empty.
It’s funny, my background is in community building. I know the value of working with other people towards a common goal, of sharing stories with one another to inspire and challenge and grow, of how important empathy and care is in the midst of struggle. Yet, somehow I had replaced all of that in my own life for a really great Twitter feed. Something needed to change.
In the fall of 2021, my family and I moved into the Simcoe Region. We had a couple friends here, but for the most part we were entering into a community we didn’t really know. To try and understand it, I did what I always do: make a Twitter list. I started compiling local politicians, news outlets, school boards, not-for-profits, community groups, and other notable people who seemed like they had a pulse on things. A couple of the people I was following were working with a regionally focused environmental advocacy group and I got interested in what they were doing. So often it seems that sustainability efforts feel centred around urban centres only, it was refreshing to find a group that was working to connect these larger issues to a region that had a good mix of urban, suburban, and rural. Eventually, I reached out. This led to me joining a weekly zoom call with members of the group and then eventually, an in-person (outdoor) meetup.3 It was a real joy to meet people from different corners of the region who have been doing this sort of environmental advocacy for decades. Each of them shared with me their own stories of how they got involved in the work - usually stemming from a specific issue or cause that was relevant to where they lived. From there, I have now been out to two rallies, standing out in front of our MPP’s office (one of them in the pouring rain) to champion positive change. I’m looking forward to going to more. We’re also having conversations about other meetups and events to try and build upon this momentum and create stronger connections with other concerned and passionate people in Simcoe. It’s all very exciting.
I’m still on Twitter; but I admit I’ve lost a lot of my taste for it. Online has its uses for sure, I’m not about to become ‘Old Man Yells At Clouds’ over technology; but I am recognizing the more negative impacts of being online a lot more clearly. There’s a lot of doom to be scrolled through and it’s hard to not give in to despair when that’s all you expose yourself to. I heard something recently around the idea of togetherness being an antidote to despair. I think that’s true. It’s those offline spaces of connection with real people where we are able to share hope and joy and have fun with one another. Those spaces are what give us the energy to keep going when the odds seem stacked against us.4 They keep us grounded and can prevent us from losing ourselves in ideology. They’re spaces that hold a different kind of potential for connection and learning, particularly intergenerational friendship. They are also spaces where we can learn to disagree with one another while still working towards a common goal.
I know none of this is groundbreaking, but it’s something I’ve forgotten over the last few years and maybe we could all use this reminder. It’s also not lost on me that I’m using an online space to share it. But hopefully, like me, you can use something like this as a catalyst to reach out and take it offline.
Thanks for reading to the end,
Like everything in that first year, just getting through each day was the metric of success; so maybe saying the setup “worked” might be a bit of a stretch. I’m pretty sure our youngest, who was in JK at the time, did maybe 15 full minutes of online school a day before throwing in the towel.
It’s important to stress the past tense of this feeling. Much of what made Twitter great has been steadily declining over the last few years and has now basically been dragged out back and thrown onto a fire heap with you-know-who’s takeover.
As an introvert who has become even more socially withdrawn throughout the last few years, this was a big deal.
If you’ve never been out to a protest or rally, I encourage you to find one on an issue you care about. It’s an amazing energy.