In the article, “Public Display of Disaffection” by Anne Kingston with Alex Ballingall, the journalists portray Kevin Newman’s and Pamela Eyring’s thoughts of the usage of “electronic gadgetry” in public places. Firstly, we are losing our one-on-one people skills and the ability to engage in uninterrupted, focused conversation. For example, we “send a thank-you note via email,” which is one-on-one but is not face to face and is impolite. During emailing a person may get interrupted by other emails and distracted while sending the thank-you email. Even though a thank-you is a thank-you and is appreciated, saying thank-you to someone in person is polite and generous. Receiving the thank-you in person would mean a lot to the receiver and would make the person feel good about themselves. Doing a favor for someone and not getting a thank-you is disrespectful and rude. I agree that being able to communicate with someone face to face presents fresh social conundrums and is more appreciated. Furthermore, the usage of cell phones is distracting during a conversation with someone else, dinner, a conference, theaters, and etc. The glow of screens, loud cell phone conversations in elevators, narcissistic multi-taskers holding up line ups and dinner companions checking messages is “fostering self-importance.” These cell phone users do this “as if waiting perform an organ transplant” which they assume is so important that it can’t wait. People talking loud on their cell phones is like hearing and knowing one end of the conversation, its distracting because “we’re trying to predict what the [other] person is saying.” Also, talking into a cell phone while a cashier is trying to talk to you is not good manners and by doing this you are also holding up the lineup. Customers that are waiting behind get annoyed and tend to give the cell phone user “the stare” and other disgusting looks. I completely that using cell phones in public places mentioned above are rude, distracting and the person doing that is unaware of what they are doing is wrong “cell phone-related rudeness is so bad that it’s treated like a disease requiring awareness.” Lastly, the younger you are, the more tolerant you will be about electronic distraction. A recent survey says that “10 per cent of people under the age of 25 didn’t see anything wrong with texting during sex.” Sex isn’t supposed to be interrupted by text messages; in fact it should not even be interrupted in the first place. Sex is about making love not replying to text messages or phone calls. Many people would say that cell phones and other electronic devices are a distraction in general. I agree with the survey conducted by the consumer electronic site Retrevo that younger people are more tolerant about electronic distractions during sex and other activities. In conclusion, cell phones distractions are not appreciated by anyone and people are fed up of hearing cell phones go off in public.
I believe that cell phones are acceptable during emergencies no matter what the public location is, the emergency could be anything such as a family member being ill or someone fighting between life and death. Cell phones should also be acceptable if it has anything to do with a person’s safety. As long as the cell phone is on a low vibrate mode and is put away it should be acceptable. Cell phones are unacceptable when they are being used in restaurants, conferences, theatres, and meetings. No one wants to be interrupted in these places, it not only distracts you but, it also distracts other around you. I don’t think that school, movie theatres, and other public places should consider bans or cell phone jammers like Europe because cell phones are important to have nearby in case of any emergency. However, in schools the usage of cell phones during class should not be permitted “Students who have stopped using their cell phone in class reported, on average, a 10 per cent increase in their grade point average,” but should be allowed to use otherwise such as during breaks.
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