‘How Are You?’ Is Dead. We Killed It.

We know everything about everyone and speak to no one.

Photo by Ling App on Unsplash

I know an unreasonable amount about a friend I have not spoken to in two years.

I know she travelled recently. I know what she ate at the airport. I know she has started going to the gym, because the gym now appears on her status with the regularity of a news bulletin. I know her opinions on three separate trending topics.

We have not exchanged a single word in two years. Not one “hello”. Nothing. Yet, I could write her biography.

That is not friendship. That is surveillance with extra steps. And we all signed up for it voluntarily.

Nobody asks any more. We just broadcast.

“How are you?” used to be a question. Somebody had to care enough to ask it, and you had to decide how honest to be when you answered.

We removed the question. Now we post the answer before anyone asks. Breakfast, gym, traffic, heartbreak disguised as a motivational quote, all of it goes up like a daily press release from the Ministry of My Life.

And the people who used to ask have become viewers. That is the actual word the app uses. Viewers. Not friends. An audience.