Can we restrain the urge to take out our phones?

Today as I lazily scrolled through a WhatsApp group discussion, one post stood out. A post that quoted the Late Aponye’s wife saying “While people were taking pictures of my dead husband at the accident scene and sharing them, a young girl – Barbra quickly got a katenge/kitenge and covered him. I will be forever indebted to her for that single act…” For a moment I pondered about how we have engendered a culture of sharing all manner of information without any regard. Have the algorithms hacked the human psyche? Have the algorithms hacked our sense of empathy? Have our brains been hacked?

As I contemplated these questions, I was reminded of the funeral service I attended. Having received news of my friend’s father’s death, I wanted to condole and offer my comfort – insignifcant as it may have been at the time. When I arrived at the church, I took my place at the back leaving all available front seats to the grief-stricken family. We stood, sat, bowed our heads at the direction of the church leader. Eventually she announced the speech session, hasting to add that members should keep it short. One by one the family and friends stood up reminiscing upon a remarkable man. A man who loved fervently, joked frequently and embraced his people. I was in awe. As the children stood in line to speak about their late father, I lifted my head to locate my friend. His eyes red, every now and then forcing a smile whenever his brother recounted another one of his late father’s jokes. I saw his pain, I felt his pain because seven years prior I stood at the same pulpit looking over at the casket that held my childhood friend. I knew the vulnerability because I had experienced it. The loss of a loved one. While I shared his grief, I wondered whether I had intruded upon this intimate moment. A moment where family and friends grieve and comfort one another. A moment where we are all at our most vulnerable. An event that tends to either strengthen or tear the tapestry that holds a family. This was a private event and I was a spectator – an intruder. I had not earned the right to sit at the back of that church and listen in as the family recounted their tales with nostalgia. But I could not leave. And so I stayed until the chief mourner led us in a prayer that reminded us of the evanescence of life. As I walked out, I knew I had to see my friend, make haste and allow the family to grieve privately. And so I did.

Many of us have shared this experience. I wonder if it has occurred to us that social media is inviting us into places that we should not be? That social media has enabled us to overly share intimate and private information. Like Barbara, can we restrain the urge to take out our phones? Can we summon the remnants of the empathy that still lies in our psyche? Can we locate the nearest pall and veil such moments wading off spectators? Can we resist the urge while we still can? Because every moment we take out these surveillance devices during such intimate moments, we are not the only spectators. We are inviting an avalanche of spectators that surreptitiously follow us everywhere with voyeuristic pleasure. To them we are no longer humans, we are subjects. Data Subjects. They have offered us their “genius” platforms for free and in return they demand our valuable personal data. The oil of the twenty first century – they say. But at what cost? At whose cost?