The editorial by Simone Marchetti: human reconnection

This entry is posted on the number 20 of Vanity Fair on newsstands until 13 May 2025

A man sits at the mother of the mother: the woman is dying and he, while watching over her, finds time to respond to a work WhatsApp. This story, which highlights our dependence on social, smartphones and hyperconnection, is only the beginning of the piece edited by the writer Giacomo Papi, on page 66 of the number from today to newsstands. It is one of the many articles, reports and interviews that we wanted to develop in this number dedicated precisely to the desire for disconnection, to the urgency that we have to take away from social networks, hearts, company emails and messages to all the hours that come without respite from friends, colleagues, relatives and even (and above all) from strangers.

There are many spheres of our life that are literally overwhelmed by hyperconnection. Family, friendly, emotional and sexual relationships. The work, then: in our uses we live in a constant performance anxiety that knows no times, breaks or rests. And finally, the experience: to remain perpetually in front of a screen prevents them from facing really human emotions and comparisons, events that involve us firsthand, live and without the mediation of a support like a phone.

As you will discover in the next pages, this trend does not concern above all the youngest, indeed, perhaps they were the first to warn the extreme consequences of the phenomenon. The urgency of a disconnection has to do above all with adults, often returning teenagers, if not even children unable to manage a new toy, the technology, which has dominated them.

But is it really possible to completely disconnect, do without social networks, unplug from email, messages and chats? Yes, especially when the problem becomes an obsession, a disease, a danger to health.

But this is not the answer. The solution, in fact, is another: the reconnection, or a more conscious, healthy and human choice with a digital revolution that is now part of our life like many other cultural revolutions have done before.

I hope that the reports, the cover interview, the specials and stories that you will find in this number help you better understand the outlines and drifts of this digital era, an era of great information and great conquests but also a moment of enormous doubts, dark sides and immense solitudes.

Reconnecting not only with technology but also with one’s humanity is one of the most necessary and complicated tasks of this historical moment. A milestone to be faced to better use digital progress instead of being praised by its immense power.

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