I can’t wear earbuds. My ears aren’t shaped right. I try to carry over the head earphones but they are bulky and often a pain to bring along. When I use them, I get laughed at by assholes who can’t conceive of a person who can’t wear earbuds. But I do it anyway because polite. I do hope karma kicks some opportunities for empathy their way.
All this talk about ear buds or headphones is a distraction. Hold the phone to your ear like a normal person. If the phone somehow doesn’t work like that, get a phone that works like a phone. All of my iPhones have been fine talking holding it to my ear. All of my old Nokias and Motorolas were also fine holding to my ear. If the phone’s mic isn’t picking up your voice properly, there’s a good chance you aren’t holding the phone properly, eg. you are covering the mic with your hand.
That’s how I define dogmatic. You know: people who are always barking at anything they don’t like. 
It’s rude.
People do this quite a bit in the break room at my job and I’ve been trying to figure out why. It’s a large room with a high ceiling and hard surfaces (kind of like a warehouse) and that tinny talking just echoes everywhere. Can they not afford earbuds? Is there something wrong with their phone? I don’t get it.
I’d like to have some peace 
and quiet for a few minutes during my break. Am I unreasonable? It has caused me to put my best sound blocking earbuds in my lunch bag so I can block out The Tinnies when they happen.
There should be earbuds that let you listen to whatever’s on your phone and still hear some of the environment around you. Besides, you’re not gonna get run over by a car in the break room.
There are. My Jabra Elite 75t do this, and also have active noise cancelling if you want to go the opposite direction. I’m sure lots of others offer this as well.
Hmm. A technical solution for Luddite problems…
Anyone who uses a phone on speaker within earshot must want me to join the conversation.
It is amazing how fast people remember how to use a phone like a functioning adult if you do that.
Or just use one earpiece. Indeed many headphones designed for phone use have only one.
I have a number of single speaker headphones just from recycling old headphones that started to fail in one ear.
And, as mentioned, I always have earplugs with me, so I can plug the other ear for very noisy environments.
Just yesterday I was in a crowded hospital waiting room, and a woman was watching tv on her phone, very loudly. I wanted to rip it out of her hands.
See, now, I think that that’s rude. Because you are an indoor space defined for a specific purpose, shared with other people. (The OP was describing an unbounded outdoor space where anybody can come or go without any particular reason for being there, like a park.)
I’m the dipshit who installed the screen protector on their phone upside down. So I can’t hear my callers unless I put it in speaker phone. And it always take a second to find the phone screen where the speaker button is, so I’m telling the caller hold on I can’t hear you gotta put you on speaker. It’s a pita. Sorry in advance
It was a park-like place, but directly adjacent to the hospital and on its property. An outside rest and waiting area.
I don’t actually see the difference to be honest. You noted that you thought those people were also waiting on someone, so they decided to not make too much noise inside, but rather go outside where most people don’t mind others making calls on speakerphone… you know like when they are walking in the street.
The difference for me is that the street is busy and loud anyway, so I don’t mind people speaking on speakerphone there, but a rest area of a hospital is another matter.
Take the screen protector off, it doesn’t do much anyway.
Yeah, I don’t use a screen protector. Never had a problem. But then I use and Otter case that I hang on my belt. Might be different if you put it in a pocket with change or your keys or whatever.
It was a Motorola that didn’t work except in speaker mode.
But I’m not going to get a new phone over that. You know why? I don’t pick the gadget for its phone capabilities. 98% of the time I’m using it for its screen and keyboard. I’m writing email. I’m posting on the dope (right now, using my phone, from the privacy of my bed), I’m shopping on line. I’m texting. Hell, it’s a lot more than 98% of the time. I hate cell phones as phones. There’s a weird lag, the sound is poor quality, and the ergonomics suck, especially if you awkwardly hold it to your ear, trying both to get the speaker close to your ear and the mike close to your mouth. I only use them when i really really need to, which is typically only a couple times a year.
If I want to use it for something long and noisy, like watch TV on my commuter train or an air plane, I’ll lug my headphones along. But if i just want to make a quick phone call, maybe from the hospital, to tell my mother’s sister that my mother is okay, I’m just going to use it. And if it only works in speaker phone, sorry, I’m calling anyway.
That would be awkward, so don’t do that. If you hold it to your ear the mic will pick up what you’re saying just fine.
I have a lot of issues with people on the other end asking me to please say that again, and to speak up. Maybe every cell phone I’ve had is crappy. Maybe I have bad cell phone technique. It is partly because I rarely use the cell phone as a phone. It’s my portable internet device, that happens to support voice calls.
(In contrast, I’ve had consistently good luck with pretty much every video conferencing software in use, on my laptops. I am comfortable with Zoom, Teams, Meet, Discord, and a few others.)
You may be covering the mic with your hand when you hold it to your ear. Or maybe it’s just a crappy phone, I don’t know.
Anyway, I suspect that at least some of the people you run into in a hospital, making phone calls, are people like me who almost never use their phone as a PHONE, don’t like using it as a phone, aren’t very good at using it as phone, but there they are, in the hospital with a critically ill relative, and information that other family members are anxiously waiting to hear.