Did Technology Kill Romance?

Back in the day, a girl used to wait by the phone for a call from a special guy. This was before email, twitter, cell phones, and texts.  These things, you’d think make it easier to communicate with the opposite sex.  Lack of face to face communication can complicate matters. In other words, a clever email may fall flat due to lack of comic intonation.

Cell phones have changed the face of romance. Many men and women watch while their date reads texts, and even tweet about their date as opposed to talking.  How rude is this? The woman is not giggling about a text from the babysitter as she claims. Another example was a couple I observed at a pricey restaurant the man texted constantly while the woman just looked irritated.

Cell phones complicate relationships in so many ways. The smart phone allows you to check in at various locations, or your app does this automatically . While this seems to be an attention-getting device, it actually chases potential dates away because they don’t like where you went. There used to be times where certain aspects of your life remained private.

Technology allows you to fast forward through relationships. Needy gals or guys send numerous emails, voice mails, texts, even write on your wall after your first date. Text protocol is you should never send a second text until someone responds to the first one.  This allows the person to decide quickly this is not the person for them. Kinda killed the romance for the needy individual too.

If you are thinking about dating someone, the accepted practice is to Google him. By typing his name in quotes you’re able to pull up basic information, profiles, and even arrest records. Going more than three pages deep for the first date is excessive. Problem is often the information is old and wrong. A man who is divorced remains married on an old site. Who’s a girl to believe, the Internet or her date?

Cell phones tell a tale about the state of your relationship. If it is good, he actually wants to talk to you. He even tells you he loves you when you call. Not so good when he texts you, but still spells out I love you. The relationship is on the skids, when he texts, and abbreviates everything. People often use texting to break up because it so much easier than seeing someone’s heartache. They also don’t have to make excuses. As bad as that is, it’s not as bad as reading it on Facebook.

In England, one-third of recent divorces label Facebook as the cause. Facebook seems to be the ultimate snoop not only telling everyone where you’ve been when you automatically check in somewhere. It also alerts everyone who you are talking to also. A casual conversation you had with a high school mate didn’t go unnoticed. What could have been a meaningless conversation raises suspicions. Add to that a persistent ex who stalks you and makes provocative comments on your wall leading to the belief you’re back together. Sometimes you might be the culprit when you tried to search for old lovers late at night. Unfortunately, they chose the light of day to respond to your overtures.

Facebook allows rejected lovers to constantly monitor exes even to the point of knowing when they won’t be home to cause a little mischief at their former domicile. Rumors get started online that practically race around the world.  A woman can discover through her guy’s status change that she is old news. There is even a video of her replacement with a gushing commentary. This is so wrong, and heartless. Where has our sense of decency gone to? Not to Youtube, that’s for sure.

Sure, you’ve probably seen a few poorly filmed videos of someone bemoaning their fate because they were dumped. More popular is elaborate revenge videos where the wronged or possibly wronged woman enacts an elaborate scheme to get revenge on her guy, make that former guy. Everything from vandalizing his prized car to decapitating his vintage collection of Star Wars figurines seems to be fodder for these angry females. Are they filming this for the police?

We wonder why it is so hard to keep relationships together anymore. We hardly do any work to get them started. Electronic messages go awry…maybe it’s you or the weather. The text you sent never arrives, your cell phone is dead, out of service range, or worse yet the wrong person gets the message. Which brings up the subject of sexting? Is it ever a good idea to send a nude picture of yourself that could accidentally go to your mother or favorite uncle with the wrong push of a button? Even if you send it to the desired person doesn’t mean he won’t share it, or even put it online.

Technology has caused us to be less accountable in the romance department. People no longer worry overly much about breaking up. Instead, they block all calls and messages, and change their status on Facebook.  Has your man dropped you? Check his Twitter feed.

Any man or woman interested in a little action on the side has dozens of sites that cater to married people.  Twenty years ago, a man might contemplate cheating, but seldom found a willing partner. Now he has hundreds in his own locale. What does this say about us as people? If you want to know, type the topic in and thousands of blogs will come up on the subject.

It is odd that we have the ability to communicate with anyone in the world, and yet we seldom bother to talk to the people we are sitting right next to. I experienced this on a date with a gentleman who felt the need to respond to every text. He’d make a disclaimer that it wasn’t a girlfriend, when I could clearly see a woman’s photo and name. Needless to say, I didn’t see him again. Of course, if he really wanted to impress me, he would have turned off his phone.

It’s sad when turning off your phone is impressive. When your date looking into your eyes as opposed to staring at a phone screen is all it takes. It is a step in the right direction, maybe even be a romantic step.