Connect, But Alone?

The TED talk "Connected, But Alone?" by Sherry Turkle, explains how in today's society, people rely on their technology more than they do people. Turkle showed that many kids these days do not understand the importance of real conversation and how kids would rather text than talk to someone in person. She also brought up how when people are online they change themselves. I personally agree with Sherry. I think that many people are constantly way too involved with their devices and do not get enough experience with real conversation. I will admit I can only go a maximum of  2-3 hours without my phone. My phone is the only way of communicating with a lot of my friends because they either don't go to my school or I have zero classes with them. When I hang out with friends outside of school, I am off my phone the major part of the time. When I'm not on my phone, I am usually with friends, sleeping, doing homework, or rehearsing. I honestly don't like living in the "digital age" because I hate how much I rely on my phone for a lot of my communication, although I am also glad that I live in this age because it gives me a lot of resources to talk to people.  Personally I would rather text than hold a conversation because in text you can easily end a conversation but while being physically present and conversing, I feel like I need to continue the conversation and it gets awkward at some point when I run out of things to talk about. When I'm online, I don't think I "edit" myself. I don't really believe in being fake to put it simply. I do feel that we are connected, but alone. I see many friend groups or families who are together but they are all on their phones, and I know of a few people who are very active online but in real life they are a totally different person and don't have real people who they talk to constantly.  My biggest take away from Sherry Turkle's TED talk was that many people rely too much on their phones, even if they think they don't, they probably do.