Has goodbye been diminished over these last few centuries, and particularly this last decade?
It used to be that when you were leaving a person for a long journey, and would probably not see them again, that was it. There was a true last moment with that person that you'd perhaps always remember. I can't speak to it from personal experience, but I imagine before the phone was invented it was effectively "the end."
Now, you are leaving for good, and there is that goodbye moment with an old friend. But regardless of your farewells, you will still be on facebook with them, or have their email address. Instead of an abrupt, "this is it" moment to remember fondly and perhaps bittersweetly, your relationship will instead be doomed to a slow decline. Kind of the difference between musicians that died young (Morrison, Elvis, Hendrix, Cobain, etc...) and musicians that just kind of puttered away into obscurity over a long life.
Does this make sense?
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SIGNATURE
Yes, but there still are goodbyes, with the people that you don't quite know well enough to have on facebook/exchange emails with, yet know well enough to have generally positive feelings towards.
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I thought I saw upon the stair a little man who wasn't there.
He wasn't there again today. Oh how I wish he'd go away.
If you're saying that as a society we're saying goodbye to goodbyes...well, doesn't it then become an endless loop of goodbyes thus never really getting rid of the goodbyes to begin with causing some kind of crazy space and time paradox???
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Smithy/Freepizza/Heydude/Monty/Shadowspy
Oh man the crazy things I come up with when I'm tired. It's time for me to go to sleep. Goodnight...or rather...Goodbye...temporarily...while I sleep. And goodbye to that goodbye...and goodbye to that goodbye...and.....
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Smithy/Freepizza/Heydude/Monty/Shadowspy
I've had "I'm never going to see you again, and we're both actually sad about that" breakups.
It was pretty moving.
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Set signature in options page.
I'd say goodbye has diminished a little bit in the last few years, if only because the various means that you can use to contact someone (especially online) has increased explosively, and also text messages have become more popular. That being said, there are plenty of people that I've met over the last couple of years that, even though I may contact them via Facebook or text message relatively often, there truly isn't anything like actually seeing them in person.
I've got a couple friends who go to school about two hours north of where I live, so I don't see them very often. I met them at a conference last year. I facebook them every once in awhile but the rare occasions where we see each other face to face, those times are fantastic.
I've got a cousin who I've talked to on AIM nearly every day since meeting him for the first time two or so years ago. I've only seen him in person three times. Those three times we've seen each other are worth their weight in gold compared to our daily AIM interactions, and saying goodbye those times was difficult, too.
Seeing my friends from college has become more difficult and less frequent since I graduated. The greater majority of my friends in college are younger than me / haven't graduated yet, so I still make it out to some of their get togethers when I can. Maybe it's because I just graduated myself, but it's really hard for me to say goodbye because it feels like I hardly ever see them. And these are people I regularly text and facebook, too.
I think that technology has allowed us to keep in touch more regularly with people, but at the same time, I don't think that goodbye has lost its effects. Maybe it's diminished a bit, but at the same time, I think that social media, even things like Skype, can't make up for real life, person to person contact.
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I'd say it's diminished, yeah... I think the whole concept of friendship is changing... it used to be limited by geography. Now you can have your pick of who to talk to at any old time, so why have lots of local friends, like a small-town atmosphere kind of thing, when you can have a few really close friends? It's good and bad... awfully nice to be able to talk to your best friend whenever you want, but kinda lame too because you can be in a cyber-clique and ignore people who are physically present.