The Cancer of Key Words

Every internet user knows the value of key words when doing a search. They save time and aggravation and provide instant links to other 'discussions' of the same or similar topics. We agree then, that the necessity for, and use of key words is an internet wonder that deserves the highest praise. What a concept!
What a concept indeed.
However. There is a downside to the use of key words. Users who spend much of their free time on the computer and employ the use of key words on a regular basis - or just simply recognize them from site to site for what they are (they are often highlighted), eventually fall prey to the cancer of them.
The use of key words is nothing more than 'pinpoint editing' of our own thought processes. Ideas, even whole streams of conciousness, are reduced to a few words, entered in a search bar, and VOILA - masses of information spring to your fingertips! Wowza!
Have you ever thought about the ramifications of this? Of thinking in terms of single words or a few definitive ones, to pinpoint the location or meaning of the information you seek or are reading? Have you ever wondered what 'training your brain' to pick just the right words means to your thought process in the long run? Probably not. After all, it's just a tool to save time, right?
Wrong.
It's become evident that the affects of using this tool is also a kind of cancer on the net that is
spreading beyond the the net, right into the way we think, read, and communicate.
Any teen ager with a cell phone quickly becomes a master at the use of key words in conversation through text messaging. Though texting is not searching, the premise is the same, only reversed. Key words are used to convey entire paragraphs of information within a few well chosed words - which themselves are reduced to single letters! Texting itself is a whole other cancer which is shortcircuiting the brains of upcoming generations and changing the language in ways too awful to contemplate here.
On the net, the use of key words, the recognition of them, has only added to the difficulty of gaining the true meaning of what a user posts on various forums. Despite our modern western society and our so called advanced educational systems, it is evident that many people whose first language is English, are basically illiterate. Compound that with the loss of nuance heard in the spoken word: the written word or grouping of words must be very very clear in order for the meaning to come across to a reader they way it was intended by the writer. Dry or sardonic humour for example, loses it's punch when the face and body language of the humourist cannot be seen. Not everyone can write well. And obviously, not everyone can read properly. This comes down, basically, to the brain's picking out of key words, and taking the meaning of the 'piece' written, from those.
We all know how damaging it is to 'take things out of context'. Yet, we do this all the time on the net without even realizing it. Our brain's have been trained to recognize and interpret the meaning of key words, and as a result, entire meanings of posts are lost or interpreted as something different. The result is 'good intentions' turned into something negative. Users are jumped on and vilified. On some forums, the more a user defends themself, the worse it gets.
This has led to a growing number of people holding the opinion that we should 'just let it go and move on'. Why? Unless the original post was obviously intended to harm, hurt or inflame, why shouldn't the record be set straight? SOMEONE has to keep this cancer from growing.
Think about it. Reading has become a short circuited activity. Out of context has become a normal way of interpretation. How utterly sad and discouraging that fewer and fewer people take the time anymore to read ALL the words written in order to obtain the true meaning intended in the writing.
With so many 'poor writers' on the net, whose only form of communication is WRITING, and therefore often being misinterpreted, is it any wonder that so many forums are unhappy places to be? On some forums, responses/topics, entire discussions are being deleted because of a few people's inability to read properly and interpret correctly. I realize that some of these deletions are also to be put at the feet of people who simply disagree with what has been said, no matter how they have read it. This is simply another layer of the key word cancer. Of any internet cancer for that matter. However, the point remains that internet use has retrained our brains to think, read and communicate in short circuited ways which give rise to misunderstanding and the inability to comprehend entire meanings - not just the bits and pieces that generate instant reactions within us.
It is the 'bits and pieces' that we respond to, and in so doing, we spread the cancer with our written reaction.
So is there a cure? Of course there is. LEARN TO READ, every word. Take the time to read it twice if you have to. Remain as neutral as possible and take the time to fully understand. And if you still don't 'get it', ASK before you jump on the writer, or at least remain civil in your response. And read more books and less online 'bits and pieces'! Start with Joseph Conrad - there's a writer who will teach you rather quickly, the meaning of every word written in relation to the entire message of the story!

And We Call Ourselves Civilized! ROFL

It has been on my mind for some time lately that the nature of evil is showing it's face more boldly than at any other time in history. And we call ourselves civilized!
People of religion would put that down to the coming apocolypse touted in every Bible ever published.
People of science/technology, would put that down to progress - of any kind.
People of reason would put that down to - well, that's the point really. There are so few people of reason left in this world.
Humanity from the moment they could stand upright, has woven it's societies, religions, values and belief systems around the concept of Good and Evil, Good vs. Evil, Love and Hate, Love vs. Hate. Out of this obsession with balance; to simply make sense of the world; mankind has evolved out of superstition and ignorance directly into information creating progress, creating more information, and further and further away from the basics of Humanity itself.
We call ourselves a civilized global society. How arrogant we are to do so. Civilization does not denote progress. Civilization is not reflected in knowledge gained and passed on. Civilization is not the inventing and having of 'modern' conveniences and material goods or the knowledge and technology of the 'ages'. But I defy anyone to totally agree with those statements. It would seem - well, at best, an uneducated opinion to hold, and at worst, just down right uncivilized to think in such a manner!
In our arrogance at being at the top of the food chain, we have lost the true meaning and interpretation of Civilization. We have forgotten what truly set us apart from every other living organism on earth. After all, the study of many animals proves the existence within various diverse groups (lions and tigers and bears, oh my!) the formation of social orders, pecking orders and acceptable and non-acceptable behaviours. We, as PEOPLE, have forgotten, lost, destroyed and re-invented, the wheels of our own humanity which put us at the head of that food chain. And no - it is not the ability to think, to reason, to problem solve. In animals we call that instinct. That does not change the intelligence of it. And it is the re-emmergence of our own basic instincts so prevelent in today's conducting of 'society', that rather tarnishes those golden towers of reason and progress we so stupidly believe we are living in.
Fear not! We do still possess those 'wheels of humanity' that set us apart from the rest of the animal kingdom - though frankly, they seem to be only self-serving shadows of their former selves.
Can you guess what those"wheels" are called? There are four of them. And one through four, they progress naturally to form the basis of what makes the human heart and mind deserving of being called civilized.
I am not going to tell you what they are. I want YOU to tell ME. I want YOU to examine yourself, your view of the world, your experiences within your world and tell me what you think they are. I'll give you a hint however. In the overall view of life and society as we know it today, these qualities are rare in their abundance and vary in degress from person to person.
Sadly, one only has to pay attention to their leaders, their family members, their neighbours and their connections here, there and everywhere to see what's truly lacking.
The 'wheels' of humanity which keep civilization rolling. What are yours? And once identified, how would you then define civilization? It's certainly not the Webster definition!