Smart Phones Are Destroying Families

Technology You Shouldn't Dare Use

By Charlie Melton

We baby-boomers are embracing new technologies. We've gone from a dumb old crank phone to a very smart phone. We gave up vinyl records for 8-tracks, then cassettes, then CDs. Our TVs are flat but hold hundreds of channels somehow. It’s hard to keep up. Even if we study new technologies we don’t really understand it. Let’s have a look into the seamy underbelly of one of the new gadgets.

Let’s start with the “smart phone”. It’s a computer. It’s a music player. It’s a camera, although frequently a fuzzy one. It is pretty good at just about everything, except functioning as a phone. If it was really a phone, wouldn't it look like one? Wouldn't it be ergonomic enough to actually hold to your ear? Using a smart phone feels like you’re holding a brick to the side of your head.

The ungainliness of using it as a telephone is a clue. I believe the unknown purpose of smart phones is to prevent communication instead a facilitating communication.

Smart phones are great to send text messages, but text is a method to communicate when you don’t want to commit to a real conversation. The messages are as obscure as semaphore on a foggy day. Typing a message requires use of a virtual keyboard with virtual keys the size of a grain of rice. You can barely see where you have to press. Being able to hit the correct spot 2 out of 10 times is about as efficient as it gets. The net result is that the recipient gets information totally unrelated to what the sender intended. Couple this with the devilish “autocorrect” and this can go very badly. An attempt to relay good cheer may result in getting beat up or fired from your job.

A smart phone is full of “apps”. That’s short for “Ain't Pertaining to People”. Many of them are games designed to make you obsess over something stupid, like crushing little candies.  Do you think I’m wrong? Try to talk to someone in a waiting room. Try talking to a teenager anywhere at all. You can’t do it. They’re totally engrossed in the game or whatever the distraction is.  Some apps show where your friends are in relation to your location, but I’m sure that is so you can avoid them so you can continue crushing candies.

Most smart phones come with “social media” programs on them. Social media is a means by which you lie about yourself so you can communicate with others that are lying about themselves. If everyone is lying is it really communication? Communication implies some sort of relationship. I would think that relationships require a genuine person on at least one side.

What is the point of making a phone that prevents communicating with others? It’s just like when you have a jealous spouse. It’s to isolate you so it’ll own you. If the phone thing consumes all of your attention it feels secure. More accurately, the company that makes the things feels secure. When a little plastic brick is your best and only friend, you’re a customer for life. That means you’ll continue to buy and upgrade and download forever.

We've learned what it means to embrace the technology associated with the smart phone. It gradually sucks you into a relationship that supersedes all normal human relationships. It will cut you off from the rest of humanity. It’ll make you a mind numbed drone. Beware the wiles of the smart phone.

Our next topic is Bluetooth: Evil speakers or colorful dental option? Just let me finish the next level on my game and then I’ll be ready.