Modernizing our technology and advancing into the future is happening day in and day out with our public furniture and appliances. The Jetsons meeting the Flintstones sums up just how far we can go from primitive to futuristic in the blink of an eye and how we become so attached we are unable to break free from the hypnotic effect that en-capsules us, or being under the control of appliances. Cowan’s article, More Work for Mother, brings up the point in the very beginning that sparked my view of the modern stone age family, being: each generation lived in homes that were just a bit “more modern” than the generation immediately before it, and the working lives of the members of each adjacent generation were not so profoundly different as to leave unbridgeable communication gaps between them. This made me think of how the Flintstones live very primitive lives in using dinosaurs for menial tasks that we in the present day able to easily accomplish based on our technologic advances. That’s where the Jetsons step in.
The Jetsons live the lives we expect to live in the distant future, where robots do our tasks, machines make us food, and we do not even have to walk our own dog and instead, do so on a treadmill. Is this really the life we want to move onward to? A future in which technology does all of our tasks for us and we just lay back and do nothing. I feel that in the end looking back on the shows, that the Flintstones are actually us disguised as cavemen and that the Jetsons are the lives we hope to live eventually.
Some advances in a technological scale being beneficiary such as repair to broken limbs or skin tissue and other life saving devices, are just a very slim acceptable factor in the main issue being faced. Meghan Kenny writes in her article, Technology is Getting Out of Hand, saying: When teens invite their friends over, it seems like all they do is go on their phones. Having a friend over should mean spending quality time with them, not gluing your face to your computer screen. Digital conversations and social media are a more expedient way to socialize, but at the expense of human interaction. It’s truly disgusting to say that we live in a generation in which we are unable to properly function with one another in a room for more than five minutes without texting. The article continues to go on and states how these advances in technology are also promoting others to stay hidden and be anonymous or public and bully others.
This brings back my point from earlier and raises a question, are we the Flintstones? Or are we slowly becoming the Jetsons? We can live in a world that has few if any technological advances and instead feed off information from others. Or we can live in a world where all we do is feed off of information from a screen.
Sources
Cowan. More Work For Mother. An Introduction of Housework and its Tools.
Kenny, Meghan. (2014). The Lancer Link. Technology is Getting Out Of Hand.
caa5200 says
I really enjoyed this post. The comparison of the early 1960s programs ‘The Flintstones’ juxtaposed with ‘The Jetsons’ worked perfectly in proving your point and analysis of the article this week. Since these are both shows I watched when I was younger, I definitely like the appeal of using these two to compare our modern culture and where it is headed. I agree with you that the Flintstones are us as cavemen, at least how we would’ve like it, and the Jetsons are where our 1960s brethren saw our generation heading towards. Are we close to using personal flying saucers to get to work? I don’t really think so. Do we have robots running everyday tasks for us? Absolutely. Our phones are the biggest unnoticed machine we all have and abuse on a daily basis, and that’s not including all the appliances we have at home. The dishwashers and clothes dryers, and the computer towers connected via wifi with the 52″ TV in the living room are all things happening now. At the same time, our personal devices are killing our interpersonal skills, and our ability to rely on one another instead of a mechanical device.
Brittany T Rizzo says
I think that the use of the Flinstones and the Jetsons made this post very interesting because it gives the reader another way to look at the topic. It is true that when people watch the Flinstones today, they think some of the things they do are ridiculous and it is sometimes hard to believe that maybe one day that was actually how things were done. The thing that strikes me as being the most interesting about the Jetsons is how similar things are to the lives we live today. My mom always says that when she was younger and would watch shows like the Jetsons, the objects they had really did seem futuristic, but today, viewers can look at it and think about how they either have their technology or they have faith that they will one day very soon.
I think it is a great thing that we have all of these technological advancements. While they do come at a cost like the author menitioned (people not being able to communicate without the use of their devices) I think that is something that can be worked on. I know that in my family it is against the rules to use our phones at the dinner table or when on a family outing. Things like that being enforced by different families could eliminate the lack of communication leading people to only see the positives that these technologies give us.