Mr. Linnell on technology and silence

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,24531160-5001031,00.html

There is a good opinion piece by Mr. Garry Linnell in today’s Sydney Daily Telegraph on society’s enslavement to technology and aversion to silence. He writes that

[…] There are billions on this planet right now who would prefer to go home tonight and find [television celebrity chef Mr. Gordon] Ramsay in their kitchen, eyeballs popping, mouth spitting, ready to deliver a tirade about the state of their fridge rather than face a quiet evening alone.

[…] There is no silence and no escaping a world ablaze with white noise and the all-consuming grind of technology.

[…] who could ever have foreseen a future like this: People huddled in McDonald's, bowed before their laptop computers, slaves to technology, and doing anything to escape the one thing that strikes terror into Ramsay's heart.

That sound of silence.

As one observes the iPod zombies, the families switching the T.V. on as soon as they come home and leaving it on non-stop till bed-time, the blind drunk partygoers at the weekend, it is clear that there is an emptiness and insecurity at the core of present-day society that these distractions cannot conceal. Hence the aversion to and contempt for silence, contemplation and introspection.

And I liked this comment left by a reader at the on-line edition:

Most people don't like themselves--which is why being alone is scary----they would rather burden someone else with all their flaws and annoyances

Reginaldvs Cantvar
22.X.2008 A.D.