More Virtual Identity Scurz

My mind refused to yeild in preparation for my final project of my college career. It was to be persuasive speech on any topic of my choosing. It was the most difficult choice I may have ever had to make. All my training in communications and marketing, with the explosion of media outlets and smart phones, I knew my topic had to address the issue itself - how have our personal identities been affected by such drastic communication shifts? And how have these machines which we rely so heavily on been used to persuade our identities to shift as such? I knew the topic could apply to all. Cyberized selves stare at most every student in the face most of the day, most every day - but not everyone wants to admit that facebook and text messaging platforms have taken over as the primary means of self-expression and social development. And for the lucky ones who were able to grow up making friends the old fashioned way (using verbal communication), well, they may not consider how much the youth may be missing as they click and type away their personalities. As they are granted the ability to tweak and polish every statement they post, pick and choose who to associate with, and scroll and click the things which they "like", the security of being behind the monitor is exactly that - on the other side of the screen. We are becoming parasocial beings, with parapersonalities. That is, everything which makes us, us, is beginning to exist outside our bodies. Without your keyboard, you cannot speak. Without your facebook profile, you have no personality or friends. And if you dont have spellchecker, you are an idiot. However, you do have google to lookup what an idiot is, if you forgot. In addition, you can always build a cyber-self, but you can never actually take anything down. It shall forever be a struggle of dependence, for adults like me. Building a life outside the box can be frightening, and it can be easy to text your friends about it instead of participating in it. However, for children, who may learn how to type before they know how to even speak, who get a facebook profile before they are born, whose primary form of socialization plays out on a smart-phone... I fear for thier capability to thrive and communicate in a world unplugged. Even for a second. As we are forgetting who we used to be and what it was like before all this technological nonsense, the kids aren't even learning what it means to be or learninig how to be anything without their screens, in the first place. It seems the new ve
Lets consider that could never happen. Why would they even need to speak? Why would a child need to learn how to spell? And what would be the point of having to remember anything at all, except for a few colors, like green for "send", and a few shapes, like triangle for "play"? Yes, these are all extreme examples and they are all unlikely. However, consider this: what about penmanship? Why would a tech-savvy, cyber-child ever need a pen or pencil? They already tossed cursive out of the lesson plans at elementary schools and replaced it with extra computer classes. Don't worry, they will still be able to sign thier names - it'll be a fingerprint or voice command. But reading one's name or reading outloud does not constitute verbal behavior.
What about forming a question? Why would one ever have to lower themselves in such an inferior position of asking someone a question when they know the answer may be just a few moments away through the internet? Currently, we spit youtube video references out of our mouths, but
but the transition between one-to-many and one-to-one communication