Feeling of disconnect with modernity

[Antediluvian]

I always have this feeling of there being a large disconnect between myself and modernity. As a result, I feel as if I'm obsessed with it, and not simply technology, but the general culture and the depth of personality that can spring from it. I may be obsessed with modernity, but oddly enough I make a very concerted effort to keep myself separated from it due to anxiety. I don't socialize or experience much, and I seem to be missing out on vital experiences.

Can anyone else relate?

EDIT:

Meant 'from' modernity.

 

[ProxyAmenRa]

I do not relate.

 

[Antediluvian]

Good, just checking.

 

[ProxyAmenRa]

Good, just checking.

I did use to smoke so when ever I feel nervous I always end up mimicking putting a cig in my mount and lighting it. I don't do this in public but it is annoying, never the less.

 

[Antediluvian]

Is the point your non-point?

 

[ProxyAmenRa]

Is the point your non-point?

I tend to go off-topic really easily. It is a curse, I swear. I will run along now.

 

[Cognisant]

Modernism, the feel of brushed stainless steel, a feeling that offers no comfort but is soothing none the less, to those who appreciate the honesty.

 

[Kuu]

Surely you mean post-modernity?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modernity#Phases_of_modernity

Post-modern post-industrial societies are essentially alienating. Cultural vacuousness, historical amnesia and meaninglessness prevails.

Perhaps, I would venture to say, it is partly due to the apparent (or actual) powerlessness of the individual to influence the great natural/social/technological mechanisms, coupled with our increasing capacity to contemplate said mechanisms; the more we can see them and understand them, the more anxiety we perceive at our incapacity to engage them.

A sort of magical world where objects are just there to be consumed, and little do we know or care about where they come from, how they were made, by whom, and why (if there was even a specific motivation), and a world of meaningless production where objects are designed in X, manufactured in Y, and sold in Z, and the detached nature of homogenizing shops and services and archaic social institutions with seemingly arbitrary rules and structures...

(or maybe I need to start sleeping properly)

 

[Antediluvian]

of, relating to, or characteristic of the present or the immediate past

Or, not-too-distant past.

Is what I meant.

 

[TriflinThomas]

Modernism, the feel of brushed stainless steel, a feeling that offers no comfort but is soothing none the less, to those who appreciate the honesty.

Wow, this is quite poignant. Did you come up with this yourself? (no, I'm not being sarcastic)

 

[TriflinThomas]

No, I'm quite the opposite. I'm entertained by the cultural and technological advances we're making. All of it is very fun to observe.

 

[Hadoblado]

I do not relate, but I tend not to think sociologically. I am discontent with, and disconnected from, a lot of things, but whether or not this is characteristic of modernity or post-modernity I have no idea. Sociologists tend to write in a way which I find sapless, doing little to foster my interest.

 

[intpz]

I love modern shit. Gadgets, electronics, technology... Awesome stuff. You should try it.

 

[Architect]

I love modern shit. Gadgets, electronics, technology... Awesome stuff.

Likewise. I do have nostalgia for old things sometimes - old technology mainly, like vacuum tube electronics and such. Not so much for other stuff because it sucks so bad.

I used to own a 100 year old house. Charming as hell; wainscoting, a porch to die for, clawfoot tub, no plywood anywhere in the house.

It sucked; lead paint, no insulation, bad wiring, no heating, bad foundation, cracked floors.

Sold it at the peak of the housing bubble; best thing I ever did. Fuck pre-modernity.

 

[intpz]

Likewise. I do have nostalgia for old things sometimes - old technology mainly, like vacuum tube electronics and such. Not so much for other stuff because it sucks so bad.

I used to own a 100 year old house. Charming as hell; wainscoting, a porch to die for, clawfoot tub, no plywood anywhere in the house.

It sucked; lead paint, no insulation, bad wiring, no heating, bad foundation, cracked floors.

Sold it at the peak of the housing bubble; best thing I ever did. Fuck pre-modernity.

Oh yea, I can definitely relate to that. When watching a movie or seeing old stuff somewhere (phones, telegraph machines, computers, etc.), I feel interested, makes me think of how the humanity has advanced, sometimes even see the progress of various technological achievements throughout the years.

However when it comes to using it, fuck it, I want new, modern, advanced shit!

I live in an old house, 19th century build, was for a single family (now there's over 10 families). There is an old lamp, from the early 20th century hanging in the other room, the sealing is about 4 meters high, ornaments on the sealing, near the floor, wooden floor, huge windows, huge ornamented doors, walls almost a meter thick, a really nice piece of work for a furnace: riddled with ornaments, it's made from some kind of old and now costly material that I know how is called only in the "old," informal language, so I cannot translate it. The good stuff.

The bad stuff: most likely led paint, floor is rotten, sealing looks like it's about to fall down, mice, the furnace can only heat up the room to 15C or so during the winter, rotten windows in one room, mold in one room, one room was modernized about 15 years by adding another sealing and an extra wall with doors that can be locked. Shitty wiring, no insulation, hot during the summers, cold during the winters, shitty place for a house, a little cracked walls, for the top-floor inhabitants - leaking roof until some time ago, no shower, over 100 years old toilet, bath and a sink (the sink and the bath are in the same space, by the way), 20-year-old gas-based stove, room design based on family-house model (grandparents, parents, kids, grandchildren, wives, husbands live together very openly and together), other shit I didn't think of right now.