Use your INSIDE VOICE!!!!!
Use your INSIDE VOICE!!
I am a self-confessed gadget geek and fan of all things Apple, in fact I am writing this blog on a flight to Denver on my iPad and nifty little dock-able keyboard. I love my iPhone 4 with Facetalk. I love that when I finally get to my hotel tonight I will fall asleep (hopefully) to the AmbiSounds app on my iPad having set the alarm on my iPhone. When Steve Jobs determines, and I know he will, how to get the iPhone12 to make espresso, I’ll be first in line:)
BUT….there is one place where I part company with portable technology. It’s been bugging me for a while now but tonight it made me fall off my seat, literally, so I thought we might chat about it.
I was sitting at gate E4 at DFW airport wondering just how late our flight was going to be when a man in his 50′s sat down beside me. We smiled and said hello. He asked if Denver was my final destination and I said, no, I was heading on to Great Falls, Montana. All in all it was a routine pleasant exchange until he yelled at a volume that would have killed a large dog, “ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!!!” I fell off my seat.
When I had pulled myself together I realized that he was now talking on his bluetooth enabled phone. There was no, “Excuse me,” or “I need to take this,” just a vocal eruption to rival a Moose in heat!
What has happened to our sense of what might be appropriate to talk about LOUDLY in public on our cell phones?
I don’t want to know that you’re husband is a jerk.
I don’t need to know that your mother-in-law’s colonoscopy is next Tuesday.
And the next time I sit beside a guy on a flight that is about to take off and he calls his wife and says loudly, “Bad news honey, the flight was cancelled,” I’m going to grab his wee fancy microphone thingy out of his ear and say, “Great news, apparently he’ll make it after all!”
I very rarely get on a soapbox about anything but we seem to be losing awareness of our lives and how we might impact those around us. Perhaps one of the predatory culprits is reality television where we have become spectators at the three-ring circus our culture has become and are simply joining in without questioning the platform?
Well….I don’t know about you but I feel better:) So, tell me what you think but please……
use your inside voice x
Amen and amen! Thank you, Sheila, for saying what so many of us want to say!
amen! (using all lower case to whisper in print) on a city bus ride i learned way more than i ever wanted to about the size, shape, and prowess of two girls' assorted male "friends"' body parts. (they had a wide assortment to compare, apparently) eeuuuw. i've walked out of stores because another customer was shouting into their phone. boundaries, people!
WOW-yep, that would be TMI:)
GO GIRL! Oh, sorry. I just shouted that, didn't I?
We're "connected" via technology and disconnected to the life around us. Is there something wrong with this picture?
I think that technology gives us a \’safe\’ place to relate without really relating
I dont like hearing other people's private, one-sided conversations either. But what really upsets me is when a waitreess/waiter is standing there waiting to take your order while the customer has a phone conversation, or checking out at the store and carring on a phone conversation instead of the common courtesy of paying attention to the clerk who is checking you out. The big one is refusing to get off of the phone when checking into ER! Do you think the processing clerk can pull the needed information out of your head through osmossis???? Other people or waiting!
amen … and amen.
Hahaha!!
thank you thank you thank you. You just vented what I have been aching to say a long time. I am glad to find that I am not the only one who thinks this. [refrained from using capital letters and explanation points
]
Thanks Sharon!
The other day, Eric & I were standing next to a lady in the checkout lane talking to someone on her cell phone. She saw us both & then yelled to whomever she was talking too, "Are you really that mentally retarded?" I'm sure they could have heard her 8 aisles away. Now, being Eric is "retarded", that was like a knife cutting right thru me. Eric is very aware of his 'mental status' & I prayed that his hearing issue was in full gear then so he didn't hear her remark.
I not only don't appreciate people who 'share' to anyone within hearing distance, but another pet peeve I have is the way people throw around the word 'idiot' and 'moron'. Do they realize how hurtful it is to have a 'mentally challenged' child and hear people casually say to put down someone else or themselves– "You are an idiot." "I am such an idiot." or "Don't be an idiot (moron)."? Might as well just shoot me in the heart when I hear that. I could get on a real rant about that one–but I'll save that for another day.
So sorry Karen, people can be so thoughtlessly cruel sometimes
People do the same thing about mental illness.
I think I heard him from here!
If you want to have a private conversation, please don't do it in public!
AMEN!!
Ugh, YES. This makes me crazy.
Little anecdote of one of my less Christ-like moments… Was in the baking aisle at Kroger one day, patiently pushing my buggy behind a woman pushing HER buggy…slowly…right down the middle…while jabbering into her phone…and ignoring her flour-spilling, canned pumpkin-rolling toddlers. Completely oblivious to the multiple other shoppers on the aisle who were, due to her discourtesy and hands-off parenting, unable to get by. "But it said I need powdered sugar… but I thought that powdered sugar was different than confectioner's sugar…are you sure? I don't want to have to come back here!" she shouted. You know, I thought, If you weren't screaming and unaware of my presence, I might just tap you on the shoulder and help you in your moment of baking ignorance. But because you're ruining my evening, I shall leave you in your conundrum. When did conversations with those on the other end of the cell phone become more important than connecting with those right there in the same room??
And the big question: what can be done here?? Is this one of those awful things we'll have to come to accept about our unmannered society?
Great question Katie-I really don\’t know
Thank you so much Sheila for posting this. I couldn't have said it better. I could write a thesis on how I feel about this but I think you covered it. Thanks again
Thanks Vivian
Well said! I was guilty of this the other day. Not because I was being mean, but because I was concerned about my friends heath and should of taken it to a more private place. It has made me think.
I had a chat with a friend of mine who is 93. He said he sat in the doctor's office one day for an hour and a kid sat beside him on his 1pod and never looked up once to say hi. He ask me when we talked, what has gone wrong. It is sad but through technology our elderly are forgotten. They feel the disconnect.
Great Post!
Great observation Mary but how sad
Oh amen sister. Reporting this link ASAP!
Thanks girl!
the whole bluetooth thing BUGS me! i can't tell you how many times i've responded with an "excuse me?" only to discover someone began talking to the earpiece hidden behind their hair. and then *i'm* the one left feeling stupid?! mer. so annoying.
and people who use outside voices inappropriately inside bug me too. although i have to admit, in a moment of candid honesty, that i am sometimes one of those people. maybe i'm even *often* one of those people. my entire life my mom has told me i'm loud. i think that just meant i am louder than my brothers, but… i dunno. maybe i really am just plain loud. i blame it on being italian. so i talk with my hands, and with more volume than is probably necessary.
so all's i can say is… i'm workin on it. can we still be friends?
Alece-I am your long lost sister! If you look up \’loud\’ in Webster…there I am. But loud is different to me than unaware or unconcerned about those around you
hope we get to be appropriately loud with each other someday, long lost sister!
What are we saying to the person standing in front of us when we take a call from someone who is unseen? It just seems rude to me to imply (by taking the call) that the person on the phone is more important than the one standing with me. Maybe I’m just old fashioned…
I don\’t think that\’s old fashioned Steve-I think it\’s courtesy. Part of it too is that I think we are waiting for the next \’big thing\’ and it might be that call:(
A worthwhile article on the effects of the screen and technology on our relationships: http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/hiding...
That’s about as rude as teenagers texting at the dinner table. My teenager tried that once….and only once!
Double and triple amen!! …….Thanks for sharing Sheila!
Sheila, I totally agree with you. Unfortunately, it seems to me that people have become slaves to their phones–heaven forbid that they not answer their cell phone. I have never forgotten being in Walmart about 5 years ago, and a mother was yakking away on her cell phone, while her little boy (maybe 2 years old or so) was sitting in the front of the shopping cart doing everything he could to try and get his mother's attention. I felt sorry for the poor little guy and felt that maybe she should have been giving him her undivided attention. Why couldn't she just ask whoever she was speaking to if she could call her back later?
I have to admit that my pet peeve is people talking on their cell phones while driving, or even texting while they are driving. I will not answer calls or make calls while I am driving–not even hands free. Personally, I am afraid that having a conversation on the phone with someone will distract me from my driving and what is going on around me. Believe it or not, I've ridden in cabs where the driver was keeping his eye on the road with one hand on the wheel and texting on his cell phone with the other!
Spence….you are asking me to rant more?:) Well-alright then
But you're right -it is so rude to be more connected to your bluetooth than the blue eyes across from you
The more gadgets like this, the deeper lonlinesss in the crowd, I think.
Two words for you – I concur!
Also my biggest pet peeve. I also think that when you are IN a restaurant, the phone should be OFF. Period. Leave it on vibrate if you HAVE to have it on and then GO OUTSIDE to talk on it. I rarely get to go out to eat and when I do, the last thing I want to hear is some schmuck talking loudly on their cell. Seriously. And if you are out with me, do NOT answer your phone unless it is an emergency. Trust your spouse enough with your children that you can be gone for an hour or two and IF there is some big emergency, he can handle it! Mine can, I am certain yours can too. Also, don't text constantly when you are with someone else. When you are saying, "Uh huh" while texting with someone else, it makes others feel like dog doodoo. Thanks for writing about this. I wish more folks would "get" this.
Blessings,
Mel
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Hi. I wanted to drop you a fast note to precise my thanks. I have been following your blog Use your INSIDE VOICE!!!!! | Sheila Walsh for a month or therefore and have picked up plenty of fine information as well as enjoyed the approach you’ve got structured http://www.sheilawalshblog.com/2010/11/18/use-your-inside-voice/. I’m attempting to run my very own blog but I assume its too general and I need to focus a lot of on smaller topics.