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Huh? I didn't say that my wife is on the phone any non healthy amount of time. She was on the phone for a short period of time for a very good reason and some

Huh? I didn't say that my wife is on the phone any non healthy amount of time. She was on the phone for a short period of time for a very good reason and someone lacked the mental health and self awareness to think "maybe me butting in and lecturing two strangers eating dinner IS more rude than someone being on their cell phone." Normally our usage is completely fine and not a problem, so during all of this, I never had a problem with our usage and only some old stranger did. This is a problem. The fact that you called my point a terrible point and projected that I must be "turning into a society that's spending significant time doing things that we don't want to do." when you don't know me at all is a pretty scary lack of self awareness. Your entire point is rock bottom terrible and you STILL start off by telling someone else that their point sucks. I don't even know why I bothered to respond because you don't seem even slightly interested in your argument connecting to the actual reality at hand and instead construct it to argue against a strawman version of our society you've built. "So sure, for the .1% time that you're texting your sick wife with cancer and she's able to vicariously experience things, you are probably feeling pretty good about what you're doing. Now how about the other 99.9% of the time?" Is the implication here that I must only be using my cell to waste time and drive myself into some sort of deep depression while being too stupid to realize it? Well finally the internet messiah came along to save me! Anyway, my call very certainly saves me time when I use it and I only use it when I need to. I'm not sure why I've become the example when I presume my habits must not be known to you?

DanielBMarkham 13y ago
"... I never had a problem with our usage and only some old stranger did. This is a problem..." This is a problem, sure. But it's not related to people themselves using their phones and being unhappy with their usage. The comment was bad because it took a discussion around whether we are ourselves with our tech use and turned it into some kind of reminiscence about annoying mentally unhealthy people. That's a great story, but it has nothing at all to do with what this article is about. If you and your wife are happy about your tech use, good for you. If there are rude people in the world, that's a shame. Okay. Got it. Now can we move on to the subject of the article, which is something along the lines of "are we really happy with our own tech use?" Or we could continue talking about how rude the guy at the restaurant was, how rude I am, how people are always nosing into other people's business -- and a dozen other things not related to that. As long as you realize you're changing the topic, works for me.
- nostrademons 13y ago
  There's going to be a very big adverse selection effect on the comments to this story anyway, because anyone who has a healthy relationship to technology is going to think "Eh, it's not worth my time to participate in the debate and get worked up over something generally inconsequential to my life." I thought about reading through the comments here and participating, but I'm going out for a walk with my family instead.
  - stevenleeg 13y ago
    OP here, that's a great idea :D
- ryguytilidie 13y ago
  "Your point, as I understand it, is that since there is one good use case for texting while eating, we should not discourage people from texting while eating in general. That is pretty clear from your post." I don't think you should discourage anyone from doing this because you don't know what you're talking about. "The comment was bad because it took a discussion around whether we are ourselves with our tech use and turned it into some kind of reminiscence about annoying mentally unhealthy people. That's a great story, but it has nothing at all to do with what this article is about." No actually the story pretty much reads like a "I'm sick of these damned kids doing this thing I don't like! I don't understand it and therefore it is evil!" story and assumes that every single time someone uses their phone at dinner they are terribly unhappy and socially unhealthy. My point was simply that he is wrong. There are many completely acceptable uses and sitting there watching someone do something productive or useful on their phone and thinking "this is upsetting! I need to stop this!" really reverses the role of who actually has the problem with unhappiness here. "If you and your wife are happy about your tech use, good for you. If there are rude people in the world, that's a shame. Okay. Got it. Now can we move on to the subject of the article, which is something along the lines of "are we really happy with our own tech use?"" Um, yeah, my answer was simply. We are happy with our tech use but multiple people want to push a belief on us that we are not happy for no reason. This again seems much less mentally healthy to me. "Or we could continue talking about how rude the guy at the restaurant was, how rude I am, how people are always nosing into other people's business -- and a dozen other things not related to that. As long as you realize you're changing the topic, works for me." Whereas you being rude while being 100% disconnected from the topic in any way while twisting my words to the point they couldn't be recognized. Finally the messiah has come to save us all from our own stupidity right?

DanielBMarkham 13y ago

"... I never had a problem with our usage and only some old stranger did. This is a problem..." This is a problem, sure. But it's not related to people themselves using their phones and being unhappy with their usage. The comment was bad because it took a discussion around whether we are ourselves with our tech use and turned it into some kind of reminiscence about annoying mentally unhealthy people. That's a great story, but it has nothing at all to do with what this article is about. If you and your wife are happy about your tech use, good for you. If there are rude people in the world, that's a shame. Okay. Got it. Now can we move on to the subject of the article, which is something along the lines of "are we really happy with our own tech use?" Or we could continue talking about how rude the guy at the restaurant was, how rude I am, how people are always nosing into other people's business -- and a dozen other things not related to that. As long as you realize you're changing the topic, works for me.

nostrademons 13y ago
There's going to be a very big adverse selection effect on the comments to this story anyway, because anyone who has a healthy relationship to technology is going to think "Eh, it's not worth my time to participate in the debate and get worked up over something generally inconsequential to my life." I thought about reading through the comments here and participating, but I'm going out for a walk with my family instead.
- stevenleeg 13y ago
  OP here, that's a great idea :D
ryguytilidie 13y ago
"Your point, as I understand it, is that since there is one good use case for texting while eating, we should not discourage people from texting while eating in general. That is pretty clear from your post." I don't think you should discourage anyone from doing this because you don't know what you're talking about. "The comment was bad because it took a discussion around whether we are ourselves with our tech use and turned it into some kind of reminiscence about annoying mentally unhealthy people. That's a great story, but it has nothing at all to do with what this article is about." No actually the story pretty much reads like a "I'm sick of these damned kids doing this thing I don't like! I don't understand it and therefore it is evil!" story and assumes that every single time someone uses their phone at dinner they are terribly unhappy and socially unhealthy. My point was simply that he is wrong. There are many completely acceptable uses and sitting there watching someone do something productive or useful on their phone and thinking "this is upsetting! I need to stop this!" really reverses the role of who actually has the problem with unhappiness here. "If you and your wife are happy about your tech use, good for you. If there are rude people in the world, that's a shame. Okay. Got it. Now can we move on to the subject of the article, which is something along the lines of "are we really happy with our own tech use?"" Um, yeah, my answer was simply. We are happy with our tech use but multiple people want to push a belief on us that we are not happy for no reason. This again seems much less mentally healthy to me. "Or we could continue talking about how rude the guy at the restaurant was, how rude I am, how people are always nosing into other people's business -- and a dozen other things not related to that. As long as you realize you're changing the topic, works for me." Whereas you being rude while being 100% disconnected from the topic in any way while twisting my words to the point they couldn't be recognized. Finally the messiah has come to save us all from our own stupidity right?