Been wondering about this for quite some time now. I’m a walker, have been since I was a kid, 5 miles a day/7 days a week/52 weeks a year. Of course that doesn’t include regular walking, the kind everyone does day to day to live life. By my calculations since graduating high school in 1984 I’ve walked approximately 63,000+ ‘extra’ miles. Granted, half of those are done at the crack of dawn when generally no one is around but me, but the rest are done most often at lunch time when I pass by an awful lot of people.
I’ve observed a marked change over the years in eye contact between people. Many years ago nearly everyone I passed by on the street made eye contact, most even said hi. Now, most go to great lengths to avoid eye contact, seems some would rather stare directly into the sun than look at another person.
I’d say maybe it’s because I’m just a lot uglier than I was 30 years ago, but while that’s no doubt true I watch the same people not look at anyone. Just hoards of humanity walking along in their own little world ignoring each other. Sometimes the reason is obvious, they have their head buried in a cell phone, but more troubling to me are the ones that are just blankly staring into the oblivion, to me they appear very awkward, it’s like they see you coming, get uncomfortable then struggle to pretend to not notice you so they don’t have to look at you or worse, say something.
The exceptions to this are older people, by and large they still look at others and say hi. I’m one of them, I look at people just waiting to see if they’re one of the few that will look back & when they do I say hello, even say it often when they don’t look over…
Has anyone else noticed this? Is this another byproduct of technology? Are younger people so detached from actual interaction with others that they can’t look you in the eye? Is there some other explanation or have I officially turned into a cranky old man that just thinks this is happening?
Get off my lawn.
I’ve observed a marked change over the years in eye contact between people. Many years ago nearly everyone I passed by on the street made eye contact, most even said hi. Now, most go to great lengths to avoid eye contact, seems some would rather stare directly into the sun than look at another person.
I’d say maybe it’s because I’m just a lot uglier than I was 30 years ago, but while that’s no doubt true I watch the same people not look at anyone. Just hoards of humanity walking along in their own little world ignoring each other. Sometimes the reason is obvious, they have their head buried in a cell phone, but more troubling to me are the ones that are just blankly staring into the oblivion, to me they appear very awkward, it’s like they see you coming, get uncomfortable then struggle to pretend to not notice you so they don’t have to look at you or worse, say something.
The exceptions to this are older people, by and large they still look at others and say hi. I’m one of them, I look at people just waiting to see if they’re one of the few that will look back & when they do I say hello, even say it often when they don’t look over…
Has anyone else noticed this? Is this another byproduct of technology? Are younger people so detached from actual interaction with others that they can’t look you in the eye? Is there some other explanation or have I officially turned into a cranky old man that just thinks this is happening?
Get off my lawn.
