unPHILtered: The Way I See It (6 page)

Sadly, we don’t carry on conversations with our neighbors, our coworkers, or even our family members anymore. Instead
of actually talking to them, we send each other text messages, tweets, direct messages, and e-mails. What happened to actually hearing a loved one’s voice? The best days of my life were spent with my boys, brothers, and friends in a duck blind for hours, sharing stories and memories and laughing together as we waited for the ducks to come in. When was the last time you had a truly meaningful conversation with your spouse or children? When was the last time you walked next door to your neighbors’ house, sat on the front porch, and talked with them over a glass of tea? We spend so much time on Twitter, My Page, Your Page, MyTube, YouTube, LinkedIn, LinkedOut, Pinterest, and all of these other social media sites that we don’t have any worthwhile interaction with anyone. Instead of talking with our mouths, we’re letting our fingers do the talking. It isn’t healthy.

As someone who has never owned a cell phone or computer, I’ve wondered about the reasons behind the social media explosion in our country. The only answer I can come up with is that Americans are basically bored and nosy. Nowadays, minding your own business is extremely rare. I’m warning you, folks: if you don’t put down your cell phones and get off Facebook and Twitter, digital dementia is right around the corner. Digital dementia is capturing our souls, and we’re cultivating a generation of robotic nerds.

Social media and our desire to know everyone else’s business are consuming us more and more every day. The IDC study revealed that 70 percent of smartphone users are frequent Facebook
visitors, with more than half of them logging on every single day. On average, the study found, smartphone users visit the Facebook application 13.8 times per day, for two minutes and twenty-two seconds each time. And that’s only while using their smartphones! As soon as they get home, I’m sure they’re turning on their laptops and iPads. On average, Americans spend about twenty-three hours per week e-mailing, texting, and using social media. That’s 14 percent of the time in a week!

Imagine what you could do with the time you’re spending on your mobile devices and computers. You could actually talk to your spouse and kids, volunteer at a food bank or school, throw the football in the backyard, or take your kids hunting or fishing. Heck, some people spend so much time on Facebook that if they stopped they could actually get a job! But people rarely seem to put their cell phones down, no matter what they’re doing. They check Facebook while they’re shopping, while at the gym, and while cooking. People even use their cell phones while they’re at the movies! Let me get this straight: you’re going to get hosed for a ten-dollar ticket to the movies, and then you’re going to spend the entire two hours looking at your phone? Hey, how about actually watching the movie?

I can’t figure out why Americans are so preoccupied with what everyone else is up to. Evidently, people are starved for something they don’t have or couldn’t keep. They want to know what their friends are doing, where they’re going, and what they’re eating for dinner. It seems like we’re envious of each other
and dissatisfied with our own lives. Talk about putting yourself in a depression. Why would you want to know what your ex-girlfriend is doing in Texas or California? Or what kind of truck some guy you barely knew in high school bought? Do you know the worst part about social media? People don’t know when to be quiet. Do I really need to know how many times you’ve flossed your teeth today or that you’ve lost forty-two pounds with some miracle diet drug? People on social media can’t see you yawning from the boredom, so they keep yapping away.

According to researchers at the Pew Research Center, 73 percent of adults in the U.S. use some form of social media. Facebook alone has 1.19 billion users worldwide—more than three times the population of the United States! Think about that—one in every seven people in the world is using Facebook! I’m starting to think social media might be more addictive than cocaine and heroin. Americans can’t seem to get enough of it, and social media is making us narcissistic and envious of others.

I’ll never forget the time my son Jase told me he had millions of friends.

“Millions of friends, huh?” I asked him.

“Yeah, I’m up to two million friends on Facebook,” he said.

“How is that?” I asked him. “How do you talk to every last one of them? How do you do that?”

Jase then asked me: “Dad, how many friends do you have?”

I held up one hand and simply told him, “Not as many as you.”

When you log on to Facebook or some other social media site, how many of the people you’re communicating with are really your friends? How many do you have meaningful relationships with? How many of those people can you actually share your problems and struggles with? Miss Kay is my best friend and we talk about everything. Hey, the woman loves me! I couldn’t imagine jumping onto a computer and sharing my dirty laundry for the whole world to see. It doesn’t make any sense to me.

Much of the reason some people are so attracted to social media is gossip. Gossip is kind of like a second bowl of duck gumbo. We know we don’t need it and might even say we don’t want it, but when it’s within reach, most of us can’t resist it. Gossip is the same way. We’re humans and imperfect, and we can’t seem to get enough of it. Most people want to know everything about everyone, regardless of how hurtful it might be. Proverbs 18:8 says,
“The words of a gossip are like choice morsels; they go down to the inmost parts.”
Gossip is a sin, and it involves not only the person talking, but also the people listening and the ones who repeat what they heard. We have to remember that what comes from our mouths lets everyone know who we are and who we belong to. There are even gossip websites, and people hosting them have become millionaires, feasting on gossip and the intimate details of other people’s lives.

Here’s another thing: why do we now have to document every one of life’s precious moments with a photograph on Facebook and Instagram? I can understand a grandmother wanting to see photographs of her grandchildren if she lives across the country or a wife wanting to see photos of her husband if he’s stationed overseas in the military. Hey, even photos of birthday parties, weddings, and anniversaries are okay. But do we have to document every little moment of our lives? According to Facebook, more than 750 million photographs are uploaded to their site on a given weekend. Isn’t that what our memories are for? We’ve become narcissistic, wanting to share everything with our “friends.” We have to tell them what we’re doing, what we’re wearing, who we’re with, and where we’re going. Then we’ll sit in front of the computer for hours to see how many friends “liked” or shared the photos.

I’m telling you: social media isn’t for me. My code of life can be summed up in a few short statements. 1 Thessalonians 4:11–12 tells us:
“Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.”
That’s what Paul the Apostle told the Thessalonians as he was writing on behalf of the Father of the cosmos. Paul did not tell the Thessalonians to live
noisy, chaotic lives. Instead, he told them to love each other and to make it their ambition to lead quiet lives. He told them to concentrate on their own lives, take care of their own jobs and responsibilities, and not meddle in the affairs of others. In other words, he told them not to be nosy.

I’ve made it my ambition to live a quiet life. Once the
Duck Dynasty
cameras are turned off for the final time, Miss Kay and I are still going to be living in the same place we were before, in the same house on the banks of the Ouachita River. I’m going to wake up every morning, spend most of my day in the woods or on the river, and then enjoy a quiet evening. There won’t be a cell phone attached to my hip. I’m going to be doing the same things when I’m old and gray. Here is one of the few bits of advice I’m ever going to give the news media: Write anything you want about me, good or bad, on your websites and blogs. I don’t own a cell phone or computer, so I’m not privy to that information. I’m not hearing you—ever! You might as well not say it.

I can promise you one thing: you’ll never find me logging on to Facebook or Twitter or e-mailing or texting someone. If someone needs to talk to me, they know where I live. They can come talk to me face-to-face, instead of sending me a tweet of 140 characters or less. Seriously, what can you really say in less than 140 characters? We’ve become shallow and uninformed. If my friends and associates can’t get to my house, then they can call me on the phone—the kind that’s attached to the wall. Good luck getting me to answer it.

You have to understand that I’ve never e-mailed anybody in my life and have rarely written anyone a letter. One day, as I was walking through the warehouse of Duck Commander, I saw six women sitting in front of computers.

“What are y’all doing?” I asked them.

“We’re answering your e-mails, Mr. Robertson,” one of them told me.

“You’re doing what?” I asked her.

“We’re answering your mail, sir,” she said.

“All of you?” I asked.

“Yes, all of us,” she said.

Apparently, I was receiving thousands of e-mails every day. Miss Kay, Uncle Si, and each of my sons were getting nearly as many. I had no idea we had so many long-lost cousins in Nigeria or some other faraway land who were in desperate need of money. I had no idea I’d ever entered the Irish lottery. I could only shake my head and say, “Well, good grief.”

One of the craziest things to me is the fact that
Duck Dynasty
has become a social media phenomenon. We love each and every one of our fans, and fortunately they love our show and family. But the show’s popularity has turned our quiet lives into not-so-quiet lives. Hey, it’s one of the hazards of reality TV. The irony of it to me is that millions of fans—and a lot of them are the people who are on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media—were probably attracted to the Robertson family because they saw us as people who minded our own business, worked hard, built
duck calls, and loved God and each other. Maybe they thought we were interesting or maybe they thought we were weird. I like to think they were attracted to the fact that we live godly and productive lives. I’ve chosen to live my life kind of like Americans did fifty or sixty years ago. I think a lot of Americans would like to live the way their grandparents and great-grandparents did, when times were much more simple and a lot less stressful. But most Americans have been caught up in the rat race, and they’re afraid to give up the conveniences of the twenty-first century. I think simpler lives are what a lot of people in America really want, but they’ve been consumed by the modern-day American culture. They’re living wide open and romping and stomping to make money and climb their way to the top. It doesn’t have to be that way.

We really need to decide what’s important in our lives. Life doesn’t have to be so complicated. We need to figure out the people we want to spend our time with and what we want to accomplish. We need to examine our commitments and declutter our lives. If we have stress coming out of our pores, we need to commit to doing less each day. Hey, it’s okay to even do nothing every once in a while. Every one of us needs a vacation now and then. We need to slow down, eat slowly, and enjoy the moments we have with our families and friends—the ones who are physically with us! When you come home from work, turn off your cell phone, computer, and TV. Spend some quality time with your spouse and kids. Talk about your day and spend time with
them outdoors. Learn to decompress and to not worry about the things that really don’t matter. As it says in Proverbs 15:16,
“Better a little with the fear of the Lord than great wealth with turmoil.”

You can’t imagine how many people across the country have told my family that their favorite part of
Duck Dynasty
is the end of the episodes, when the Robertson family is gathered around the long table in Miss Kay’s dining room, sharing a meal together. After thanking the Lord for our food and blessings, we share stories and tales and laugh together as we enjoy our meal. It was always that way, even long before Hollywood decided it wanted to put a family of rednecks from Louisiana on national TV. If you look closely, you’ll notice there’s never a cell phone or iPad in sight. Not at my table, Jack!

I
have been on both sides of the fence when it comes to parenting. During my first twenty-eight years on earth, I was not a God-fearing man and lived a lifestyle of romping, stomping, and ripping. I was not a very good father and was more concerned about my own sinful desires than I was about my family. My son Alan was ten years old before I repented, so some damage was probably done. He was not reared in a godly family environment during the first part of his life, and I think that experience probably led to some problems later in his life.