4 ms·

I'm really curious what you mean by "privileged" for a person to be able to say "just shut your phone off". I recently broke my phone and it took ~10 days to g

I'm really curious what you mean by "privileged" for a person to be able to say "just shut your phone off". I recently broke my phone and it took ~10 days to get a replacement. During this time, I had my wife text my family that I had no phone and wouldn't be responding to anything for a while. I felt no urgency, nobody got upset that they couldn't reach me, and thankfully there were no emergencies. What level of privilege do you consider me having (or lack thereof that you apparently have) that doesn't let you do this? Genuine question btw, not trying to be facetious. I found the use of "privilege" here to be an interesting word choice and was hoping you could expand a bit.

Lammy 6y ago
It's a pretty big deal to ask somebody to shut off what might be their only form of social connection. It sounds like you have the privilege (not pejorative) of having a decent social network irl if you have a wife and family, as do I now that I'm later in life, but I can remember being an only-child teenager in the middle of nowhere with no social outlet other than online.
- bussierem 6y ago
  I know you're not the OP, but this is a very fair point. I would imagine though that if you're in such a situation you don't see your online time or phone as much of a detriment; You would see it as a lifeline and most likely be quite happy to have it. The GP does not seem happy with the idea of phones in this case.
pessimizer 6y ago
My read is that it's specific to the case of being a programmer/sysadmin. Even if you're not on call, it's usually pretty unimaginable to be completely uncontactable if something breaks. So privileged might literally mean "not having the most common job held by the people reading this."
- bussierem 6y ago
  I think that needs to be specified even further, because although this seems to surprise many people on this site, the vast majority of programming jobs do not require you to be "constantly contactable if something breaks". I have been a dev for almost 10 years now and never had a job that required anything to this level of "ability to be contacted", and neither have none of the people in my social circles. I genuinely feel bad for the people who end up stuck in jobs where this is the case, and in that way perhaps I would be more privileged than the GP
  - dkdk8283 6y ago
    Every job I’ve had came with reachability expectations
    - brewdad 6y ago
      Hopefully not 24/7/365. I think that's what OP was getting at. At the very least, weekend coverage should be passed around various co-workers.

Lammy 6y ago

It's a pretty big deal to ask somebody to shut off what might be their only form of social connection. It sounds like you have the privilege (not pejorative) of having a decent social network irl if you have a wife and family, as do I now that I'm later in life, but I can remember being an only-child teenager in the middle of nowhere with no social outlet other than online.

bussierem 6y ago
I know you're not the OP, but this is a very fair point. I would imagine though that if you're in such a situation you don't see your online time or phone as much of a detriment; You would see it as a lifeline and most likely be quite happy to have it. The GP does not seem happy with the idea of phones in this case.

pessimizer 6y ago

My read is that it's specific to the case of being a programmer/sysadmin. Even if you're not on call, it's usually pretty unimaginable to be completely uncontactable if something breaks. So privileged might literally mean "not having the most common job held by the people reading this."

bussierem 6y ago
I think that needs to be specified even further, because although this seems to surprise many people on this site, the vast majority of programming jobs do not require you to be "constantly contactable if something breaks". I have been a dev for almost 10 years now and never had a job that required anything to this level of "ability to be contacted", and neither have none of the people in my social circles. I genuinely feel bad for the people who end up stuck in jobs where this is the case, and in that way perhaps I would be more privileged than the GP
- dkdk8283 6y ago
  Every job I’ve had came with reachability expectations
  - brewdad 6y ago
    Hopefully not 24/7/365. I think that's what OP was getting at. At the very least, weekend coverage should be passed around various co-workers.