"'Your arm gets tired, your ear gets sweaty," said Ivanna, who also doesn't like the awkward silences.'"
Sure she's lazy, and really, who likes sweaty ears? But it's the apprehension towards awkward silences that really gets me.
I don't much like texting. I don't have a nice keyboard phone to do it really well or anything, and I'm fucking terrible at T9. I usually use it for simple questions like "do we have eggs at home?" or "did you barf?" Other than that, I don't use it much. In fact, I have a very harsh loathing for "text conversations." Should an exchange via text go more than two times around, I usually either stop and call the person, or just stop altogether.
This is my phone. Hot shit, isn't it?
It seems to me that Ivanna loves text conversations. Ivanna gets to avoid any awkward silences she might have with her friends while she texts. You know how else you avoid awkward silences? By not being socially inept. That's the catch. As kids younger and younger stop talking to each other face-to-face and start interacting more on a digital level, they won't have to learn how to act when around each other on a normal social level.
Now, is this really going to happen? Are we going to wake up one day and find ourselves awash in a school yard full of Michael Ceras? Probably not. I mean, digital conversation has been around since the age of the Internet. AOL Instant Messaging probably led to thousands of teenage sexual escapades and helped kids looking to avoid the awkward silence that actually comes from talking on the phone. I've been through that; that's essentially my generation. What's the difference between my generation and Ivanna's? Portability.
Goodness, I hope not.What does it matter that digital communication is portable? It's unlimited, unrestricted access. You use to have to go to a computer to IM someone. Now you don't. Why does this matter? In your pocket ALWAYS, then, is a way to contact everyone you know. That sounds all fine and cool until you realize SO DOES EVERYONE ELSE. EVERYONE. Who likes everyone they've ever given their number to? Not me. But what's the difference between repeated texting and someone repeatedly calling someone over and over and over again? What's the difference between texting and IMming someone over and over and over again?
Well the difference between IMs and texts are that you can block someone on Instant Messaging programs. You can do it on phones, but I've yet to occur anyone who does that. Why?
Going back to Neil Postman's idea of "the medium is the message," text messages mean inherently less than actual phone conversations. By which I mean, it weighs less in emotional/personal substance. Because it means less, it's less of a commitment to send a text message rather than calling someone. Because it's less of a commitment, it's more likely for someone to text someone because it's overall less bothersome. People are also more likely to receive and ignore a text because it does mean less. So texts are generally seen as less invasive than both phone calls and IMs because they're just little bits of whatevers. People I know just tend to receive texts and just keep on rolling. Following me?
Picture text message as little balls of paper with small messages written on them and then thrown to the receiver. Everyone has the ability to throw one of these paper balls to anyone whose number they have. But like I said, there isn't much meaning to these messages. So imagine entire torrents of paper balls filled with bullshit being thrown all over the world, none of them meaning much. Because they're so easy to catch, you end up catching all the ones thrown at you. Eventually, you're so caught up in being pelted in the face with balls of paper that all because you don't like awkward silences. It seems like a lot. I wonder how Ivanna deals with it.
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