Does social media cause illiteracy?

Woods’s evidence for the alleged brain damage caused by such social media seems to sift down to four points: Ralph Fiennes says it’s so; people don’t study Shakespeare anymore; social media encourages self-centeredness; and finally, causation may be inferred from a great pile of idiotic web comments somewhere.

By your leave, I will touch on these as regards the deleterious effects of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. (No, wait, does LinkedIn belong there — isn’t that the resumé site? Isn’t that about networking and getting a job? No matter: if you’re on LinkedIn, that’s definitely “all about you.” LinkedIn is in.)

Fiennes? Fine.

The Fiennes argument: OK, I like Fiennes as an actor, but as a commentator on actual writing, as distinct from social media scribbling, he doesn’t have much of a clue if Woods is accurately paraphrasing him. I’m focusing here on that business about “a sentence with more than one clause [being] a problem for us, as is a word of more than two syllables,” which is apparently the actor’s evidence for the damage social media has done. I can assure Mr. Fiennes that the observation about one-clause sentences does not reflect in the least my experience with somewhat advanced students. Indeed, quite ordinary high school and lower-level college students are all too capable of stringing together mechanically correct, four- to six-clause sentences, which, of course, are just as bad as sentences that belong in a Dick and Jane reader. Also, these students certainly know words of more than two syllables although, admittedly, what they sometimes think they mean is surprising.

Shakespeare is gathering dust, alas. Here’s what has always been true about the Bard — only a small percentage of those who have been forced to study him actually appreciate the brilliance of both his poetry and psychological observations. For most people, who left school to become parents, and neither English teachers nor editors, the language could not be appreciated because they didn’t understand it on first reading, and therefore, they resisted explication. And when Shakespeare (or Milton, or whoever is revered for the moment) fell out of their children’s curricula, well, they really didn’t care. This shallow reaction, related to that first reading “thing,” absolutely did not originate with those distracted by social media. Also, it should be obvious that few job interviewers ask which Shakespearean play includes the word “blood” (or forms of it) most often. (The answer is Macbeth; now you can win a point in a trivia contest.)

Not all shallowness relates to oneself — Woods’s next point, sort of.

Self-centeredness is somehow related to being dumbed down, which is bad since navel gazing is being embedded in academia: Woods’s argument here wanders a short distance away from social media into the woods, but we’ll allow it. However, this assertion is the essence of spitting into the wind in the United States. Start anywhere, anytime in our history: Charity, or even just looking outward without offering a helping hand, has always had a tough row to hoe. We admire Gordon Gekko’s remark about greed; we think Walt Whitman’s thinly veiled accounts of his sexual encounters are special; author Pat Conroy freely admits on NPR this month that he has made a career out of his lousy relationship with his father. We all have the right to “liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

Finally, having been dumbed down is self-evident in the stupid comments on the internet — except that such a claim just re-casts the old chicken-or-egg problem. It’s equally easy to claim that a website comment section is a henhouse in which you can’t determine what came first, Facebook or being dumb.

Exploring the world, 140 characters at a time

Like anything else, social media evolves, and of course, too much can be made of that: Twitter was involved in the Arab Spring! Twitter has had an IPO! (Twitter is currently ridiculously overvalued!) However, to stick with Twitter, the distillation machine for those one-clause dopes Fiennes seemingly worries about, that site isn’t about what you ate for breakfast anymore — if you select those you “follow” with even casual care. Indeed, since a huge number of tweets now link to articles and pictures, Twitter can serve as a kind of personal search engine that, like Google, Bing, or Facebook will — yep — also waste your time, but at least Twitter limits how much time you can waste writing for them.

And here are a couple of things I’ve learned from Twitter that, I’d submit, aren’t entirely inward-looking:

• The U.S. Navy operates a golf course inside an extinct volcano near Naples. It is one of nearly 200 courses operated for the relaxation of our forces and their families (but likely not too many Seaman Apprentices). MWR Golf Course is described by Naval Support as “best suited to leisure golfers, beginners and juniors,” but is, nonetheless, managed by an 18-year PGA professional.
• Alleged 2016 presidential contender Rand Paul, whose total Twitter-followers number I’ve been watching (375,277 as I type this), apparently intends to slash into the Democrats’ “internet advantage” by tweeting such as: “Happy birthday to @KYHoover! Thanks for your leadership in the KY House (and for sponsoring HB70).” It doesn’t even matter who “KYHoover” is, does it? I’m falling asleep oveeee thekeyborsd.
• And, high seriousness aside, how about a great Twitter pic from the BBC of President Obama looking just like a used car salesman and Angela Merkel looking like a really, really reluctant customer? It’s right here.

Hey, at least it isn’t a selfie.

For another response to David Woods's original piece, this one by Alaina Mabaso, click here.