The Virtual Life We Live

There seems to be an underlying question throughout the article cyber ritual, can virtual interaction adequately replace 'real' interaction. I feel that to accurately access this question one must look no further than the omnipresent Facebook. Facebook is, in a way, a virtual world that allows people to create their profile to represent themselves as they chose, and 'interact' with others that are doing the same. With over 500 million users and growing it is clear that the demographic the site is after seems to be everyone, there seems to be no demographic the site has not reached. The site is used primarily for communication and more recently has become advertisement and business based. Communication on Facebook may be considered by some to be real, but, as mentioned in my research based argumentative paper, there is a substantial difference in the social skills we form as adults stem from much needed face to face interaction and conversation with others as adolescences. In the same way, I think a virtual church or temple seem to adequately supplement the action of church-going worshipers; however, in my eyes, it could never be considered a replacement of the other. Often we see that people are so entangled in the virtual world of Facebook that they seem to be unaware of what is going on in the 'real world'. I'm sure we all know someone that is always on Facebook, if it is not yourself.