Recently, my husband shared a conversation he had with a co-worker. A 20-something woman working in the traditionally male dominated world of the railway.
While getting ready to leave work following his trip my husband noted that his wife had tweeted an item about the railway. His co-worker seemed surprised as she commented, "Your wife tweets?!". I was quite taken aback by this comment and the assumption that because my husband is over 50, he and his wife would automatically not be part of the twittersphere. It might have been easier to understand had it not come from a person who, by her chosen employment, does not appear to be restricted to the idea of the traditional social community.
Recent studies have shown that women aged 45-plus are greatly responsible for the recent growth in social media and that they are much more likely to stay in touch through social media than their male counterparts. This may be in part due to the fact that women tend to be the fabric of their families and communities. With this in mind, social media seems to be a natural progression from face to face conversations on the playground and most certainly acts to replace those dreaded annual Christmas letters many of us used to stay in touch with family members both near and far.
In the recent Alberta provincial election, women who's age can no longer be described as 20-something were prolific on social media, touting their party's platform, discussing the faults of the other side, and generally having the same conversation they would have had while dropping their children off at nursery school in the past.
For myself, I am much more connected to distant family members and friends through social media than I ever was when relying on hand-written notes and telephone calls. In fact it was a facebook conversation with my cousin that encouraged me to write this post.
Among my age group there is certainly a fear of going public with our thoughts, in part due to the fear that no-one is listening. Worse still is that others may be reading and think our writings silly, outlandish, or boring! We need to move past these fears and accept ourselves as we are.
Maybe we can't challenge the volume of young people and their texting/tweeting (nor may we want to) but we need to remember we do have something to add to the conversation.
misskimmy
