We live in an age when people would rather pay attention to their screens and devices than the person next to them. This is not shocking. We have known this for a while. There are tons of images of people at dinner staring at their phones and not each other, and there are tons of articles about it, too. We have all read them and seen them… while staring at our phones at dinner, ignoring the people next to us.

Yet Pokemon GO brings this social societal breakdown to a whole new level. Since it’s release on July 6, there have been multiple reports of robberies, car accidents and injuries-- all caused by inattention to surroundings by GO users. Not to mention people getting caught having affairs and the discovery of a dead body!

What kind of world do we live in that people care more about their fake realities than the actual reality around them? When did it become okay to be so consumed with a game that your obliviousness is causing physical harm to other people? Yes, actual reality is hard, especially this week. As I write this, Turkey is being overtaken by it’s military, reports are coming out about the 84 people murdered last night in an act of terror in France, and the ongoing debate about the unfair treatment and persecution of black Americans’ is playing out across the United States. Our reality is a depressing one to live in, but it is not going to change by escaping into a virtual world. And even from within that virtual world, people are still causing harm to one another in the real world!

Of course I do not think every GO user is a terrible person, so consumed with catching Pokemon that they are adding to the destruction of humanity. It is great to be able to have fun with a game! It’s wonderful that people are becoming more active and venturing to new areas. And realistically, this game will be a thing of the past in a matter of weeks as our collective diminishing attention span kicks in.

What is concerning is the growing want of people to become more insular. Our world is a beautiful and wonderful place. It is a little broken right now, but if we all put our attention on what is happening in actual reality and work together to fix that, this world can become even better than you imagined.