
Set frequency to 'swine'
I probably lean to side B. But I seem to be in the minority. Apparently, by now most Americans can’t imagine a world without the freedom to conduct loud and insipid conversations any place they happen to be. Suggest that maybe there are some venues where people should be quiet, and they always invoke the specter of “an emergency.” Like, what if they get stabbed by some enraged bystander who has become sick of the endless prattling? And as a result they really need to get in touch with 911? OK, I take that point.
Personally, my first reaction to this was, “Hey, where can I get one of those things?” I never really think about hypothetical medical emergencies; I just think of the idiots compelled to answer their phones right in the middle of the movie or concert. I think of all those business travelers at the airport, babbling away into their Bluetooth headsets while they stride back and forth in front of long-suffering introverts. I think of the woman on the train who opened her phone in Philly and loudly discussed her boyfriend all the way to New York, ignoring repeated requests by the conductor to tone it down. I should mention that this was a local, not the express.
There are many wonderful people in this world. But they are far outnumbered by clueless swine. Nearly all of the swine now have phones, and, unaccountably, someone who will listen. If I could shut them up at the touch of a button — or a portable rocket launcher — well, that would be wrong. But a man can dream.
Cell phone jamming is (sad to say) illegal in the USA. If it were not so, there would be an enormous market for jammers at churches and concerts.
Silencers are illegal too, but people manage to obtain them. I wouldn’t be surprised to see these things generating fistfights across the land.
If you find out where to get one of those jammers, please share the information. I want to buy stock in that company. Never mind the jerks in movies, concerts, and public transportation. I teach at the college level. It’s mind-boggling the number of students who feel free to answer their phones and text their friends during the classes for which they (or, more likely, their parents wave paid good money!
I was stunned to witness that in the college classes I recently attended. It made me feel even more like a stodgy dork.