Romance and Technology in the Digital Age

A number of media stories have appeared recently dissecting the ways in which technology and social networks have transformed our culture of dating, romance, and breaking up.  For example, a few days ago NPR reported on “Digital Tears: Breakups and Social Networks,” the New Yorker online ran a short piece on “The Importance of Email to Romance,” and on Valentine’s Day, one writer’s personal story about Facebook heartache was published in the L.A. Times under the title, “Relationships in the Digital Age.”  Granted, the appearance of these stories has conveniently coincided with our national marketing of Valentine’s Day.  Nevertheless, they are interesting to consider for their articulation of concerns about the rapid and often uncomfortable ways in which technology seems to be influencing our ideas about romance and especially the end of romance.

Historically, of course, new technologies have always impacted our cultural construction of romance as well as our everyday experience of it.  The massive expansion of the U.S. postal system in the 19th century greatly facilitated the writing, sending, and receiving of romantic letters on a regular basis.  The automobile completely changed rituals of courtship and dating.  The telephone, electronic mail, and now social networks have similarly transformed how romantic partners communicate with one another (and how they expect to communicate).

What these recent stories suggest is that, while our latest online technologies can make romance feel more immediate, exciting, and accelerated, they have also made breaking up a rather drawn-out, tortuous experience.  The multiple connections that romantic partners establish via online technology become difficult to sever and the information provided by these connections often becomes difficult to stomach.  On remaining socially networked to exes, for instance, one interviewee in the NPR segment said, “It’s basically like stabbing yourself in the heart again every four hours or so.”  The L.A. Times writer used a similar metaphor when contemplating whether he should stay Facebook friends with his ex: “Seeing her updates and knowing I wasn’t in the inner circle anymore would be like another knife in the heart.”

I see two themes emerging from these stories.  The first is of access.  With the overwhelming access to information that the Internet has afforded us, we have lost a sense of propriety.  We have come to feel entitled to full access to information about our partner as well, no matter how early in the relationship—or no matter if the relationship has ended.  The second theme is of remorse.  There is a price we pay for making our private lives so incredibly public online.  Amidst our current debates over corporate and government invasions of privacy, be it the Patriot Act or Google Buzz or Facebook, we sometimes forget that we also willingly put ourselves out there, often too soon and too much in focus.