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Love in the Digital Age: Big Hearts Beat Quiet

by Jamir Reddick

Love and LED screens are a recipe for mixed emotions, especially when real feelings are expressed online. I must have missed the part of the movie where Rapunzel’s locks turned into a follow back.

There is no place for a hopeless romantic like myself in this day and age. I wear my heart on my sleeve and what you see is what you get on or offline. In my world, I walk among heartless robots who need to be reprogrammed.

In other words, people need to put down their phones.

Whatever woman said chivalry is dead must have had her head in her phone while the door was being held for her. But that’s beside the point. It appears boy has met world, but boy doesn’t meet girl the way he did in the show.

This is the real world and time is going by fast, but finding love is a slow process. I have come to learn as times change, so do the rules in which we live. It is no different from this game of love.

But how does this work? A follow isn’t a commitment or maybe I missed that part, too. Which brings me to my next point: If it didn’t happen for the camera, then it didn’t happen, right? In this case, if people didn’t see that I followed you then what we have must not be real.

I get it though, we’re growing up and starting to get comfortable with the lives we created for ourselves from watching television. Emotions are fragile, making vulnerability the same as the fear you’d get walking over a bridge made of glass.

On the other hand, what if Apple created an algorithm that could match us with people we’re compatible with by making our phones vibrate when we see them?

Now, let’s be realistic. Love isn’t what we’ve seen in “Hotel Transylvania,” but our children might think it is. It is just another downfall of love in this digital age. Or even worse, they think a swipe is the equivalent of Cupid’s arrow.

It is a new kind of catfish. Only this time our true feelings and intentions are what we hide as we display the superficial. Usernames are how we see ourselves in hopes that others see us the same way or at least accept us and our flaws before we meet in person. It’s a gamble, but love is all about chances.

If I play it safe then I’m making sure this is the real thing, but in due time we’ll both see that these were just wasted years. The gold at the end of the rainbow is a friendship crafted from the storm. That is, assuming the glass bridge didn’t shatter, although more times than not it did. You rushed in too fast and what you thought would last didn’t. What happened to taking it slow?

Do we not play for keeps anymore? Not only is love a risky gamble, but a sport we stopped playing. Unfortunately, the digital age has made love a quick hobby to indulge in when we’re bored.

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