Begining with personal ads in the Saturday morning paper, and evolving to include the online realm, people have often sought help in dating and the relentless pursuit of that “special someone.” Studies have shown humans require some level of intimacy to stay emotionally healthy. It comes down to a basic, primal urge. If you’ve been unlucky in the game of love and seem to strike out more often than not, technology can now provide you with an easy way to hit a “home run.”
Enter the V-boy and V-girl, artificial intelligence at it’s most sociologically bizarre. Like the Tamagotchi craze that took the world by storm in the mid ’90s, these virtual fantasies laugh, flirt, talk and respond to your every whim via cell phone. The point of the “game” is to build a relationship with a virtual entity that you can never touch, but you can watch all you want. As the creator Artificial Life claims, “who knows what might end up happening?!”
The “digitization” of the human experience in the last 10 years has occurred at an alarming pace. We’ve witnessed the bacterial like growth of cell phone use, the ICQ craze, MSN, the Blackberry and countless other communication “innovations” designed to make our lives easier. It might be simpler to get in contact with your friends, but instead of going out with them on a Friday night, time melts away in front of a four way MSN conversation. The result of all this new technology is complete social retardation.
We’re turning to virtual relationships because we’ve lost basic social conventions and don’t know how to behave around members of the opposite sex. Individualization, independence and self centered existence are the norm. In a society where we’re only looking out for ourselves and spend more and more time in front of our computers, it’s no wonder we can’t find a date. Who wants to spend time with someone with zero social skills and be part of a conversation filled with regurgitated mindless drivel about the other person?
Human emotion is being streamlined; forget the bad, only experience the good. If you’re involved in a virtual “relationship” with that special digital girl or guy you can forget the nasty aspects of real relationships, you’re in complete control. You’re guaranteed unconditional acceptance. No emotional pain, no commitment; so in other words, a whole lot of nothing.
If desperation is pushing you towards exploring the world of virtual relationships, explore every other possible dating avenue first. Turn off your MSN, your PDA and leave your lap top at home. If the bar isn’t cutting it, join a club, volunteer, or head to your local church, mosque or synagogue. Who knows, these outings might do more for you than just increase your number of potential mates. As for the cell phone, turn it off, unless it is specifically being used to arrange a coffee date with the guy or girl you met at the Conservative Club.
Social misfits, workaholics and engineers might think they’ve stumbled upon the answer to their lonely Friday night prayers, but the rest of us need to take a step back and really think about the implications of virtual dating. Connecting emotionally to an inanimate object is more than a little unsettling to begin with, but doing so with the knowledge that it will never progress past words and the odd moving image is completely insane. It’s time we focus more on bettering ourselves and communities; getting out there and meeting new people. In the end, “who knows what might end up happening?!”