I am increasingly convinced the only way to stay sane is to revert back to a flipphone, which I use. If I need to be connected, I do so when I get home. If someone wants to talk to me, they can call me. I have text disabled. Believe it or not I’ve never missed anything earth-shaking and I manage to live day to day without a smartphone. I’m in front of a keyboard and a monitor enough, when I’m with the kids, when I’m with people I care about I don’t want to constantly be distracted by a cell phone. Besides which, it’s rude and hurtful to the people you love when you are constantly breaking off to check your phone. Really, fark smartphones. They are terrible terrible things that enable terrible behaviour, mostly in people who are prone to be assholes anyway, but otherwise innocent people are also guilty.
People claim “oh I have to be connected, I need it for business or whatever, but I think they enjoy it. They enjoy checking texts and email and tweets. But I enjoy a lot of things that require my concentration and my main attention. I don’t attempt those things when I’m spending quality time with love ones. I don’t do them when I’m out enjoying dinner. I don’t do them when I’m in a movie theater. I damn sure don’t when I’m driving.
Sorry if it offends anyone, well no, I’m not really. But it’s self-indulgent and selfish to be constantly checking your phone, to stop a conversation to check your phone or worse yet WHILE you’re talking to someone.
There is a line that has been crossed, it was once a bad thing to take a phone call during a conversation or while you were doing something with other people, but at least people would say, however insincerely, “excuse me I have to take this”. Now they don’t even bother. While you are still talking they are looking at their phone and totally ignoring what you are saying. I see moms doing it to their kids. I see people doing it to the people they are sitting with at a table, eating. I see young kids today, all 4 of them, not talking, but each looking at her cell phone. Whoever is on that phone is more important than the people in their direct body space. Or a tweet that a friend or celeb made, or a meaningless text or perhaps an email or some bit of news.
It’s coarsening our already splintered society and I think it’s a bad think. You can do what you want. You have that freedom. But be aware that you are hurting people you profess to love when you do it and you are, in fact, a fucking asshole for doing that. Just so you know.