Overdependence on Technology Hurts Family Values

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Overdependence on Technology Hurts Family Values
The advanced technology plays a significant role in today’s community owing to its various applications towards making it easier for people to carry out their daily life activities. Daily chores such as cleaning of houses, laundry, as well as cleaning of utensils can be done using machines and other forms of advanced technology. The geographical barriers to communication are further reduced through advanced information and communication technology, which turns the world into a global village. The merits of advanced technology in society cannot be understated as they span across various aspects of human activities that are crucial to the enhancement of life as a whole. Ray Bradbury reiterates on the wide range of technology applications in his short story, The Veldt, which revolves around an automized house capable of clothing, feeding, and rocking its occupants to sleep CITATION Gal151 \l 1033 (Gale). However, the same technology accounts for a wide range of negative effects on the traditional principles and values of some of the primary elements of society CITATION Rei00 \l 1033 (Reid). Ray Bradbury’s, The Veldt, portrays some of the negative effects of overdependence on advanced technology on the institution of family, an integral part or element of society. Besides depending on the advanced technology to carry out daily house chores, parents are also relying on the same to monitor their children’s behavior and psychological development for an enhanced upbringing. The outlined reason is central to the deterioration of family relationships as a result of the loss of traditional family values and principles. Ray Bradbury’s short story highlights the manifestation of the negative effects of overdependence on advanced technology on family values and the subsequent adverse impacts on family relations.
Overdependence on technology breaks down the traditional forms and channels of communication in a family. Traditionally, families depended on verbal communication among its members as an effective means of strengthening family ties and solving emerging issues or problems within a household. George Hadley and his wife Lydia are facing a communication crisis as they seem to have lost the vital connection to their children, Peter and Wendy. Lydia is disturbed by the developments in their family and wonders whether they have lost touch with reality as she fears for their well-being. She is concerned that their dependency on the nursery to monitor both behavioral and psychological development of their children is changing all of them for the worst. She feels out of place and that they are losing control of their role as parents to the home automation technology they have installed in their home. Lydia Hadley admits after one of their visits to their children’s nursery, “I feel like I don’t belong here. The house is wife and mother now, and nursemaid. Can I compete with an African veldt? Can I give a bath and scrub the children as efficiently or quickly as the automatic scrub bath can? I cannot,” (Bradbury, pg. 4). She is aware of the adverse effects the technology is having on her family as a ...