Are you frigging kidding me? Yeah, I think I’d be finding a new therapist as soon as that happened.
I’ve seen the office phone beep to alert the therapist that the next client is here, or whatever, and I even wouldn’t mind too much if they told me at the beginning of a session that they had an emergency going on and may need to take a call (screened by the office first), but to just pick up the cell phone during a session? Completely offensive.
If they didn’t even ask what the other person wanted, and just hung up, that would be even better!
It’s all about safety, at least in my estimation. We live in a college town in the campus neighborhood, and most of the time, when a college student dashes out in front of our car to cross the street, hoping we’ll see them in time to stop (or worse, not looking both ways at all) they have a cell phone pasted to their ear.
Ditto the drivers who make right turns and almost take out pedestrians, pull out in front of other drivers, fail to use turn signals etc. etc. They almost always have a cell phone stuck to their head… OR WORSE - TEXTING while driving!! Once, we were driving behind a girl in a gigantic SUV who was driving about 8 miles per hour and swerving all over the place… from what we could see she was looking down the whole time… when we pulled up next to her, she was texting and had a chihuahua sitting on her lap!!
It’s almost like cell phones were designed to cause accidents - they are marketed to be a portable and convenient telephone, and some, very clueless people interpret that to mean that it should be used at all times and during any activity, even one which requires your 100% attention, like driving!
Oh yeah…the college age drivers. I’m a non-trad student who commutes to school. There are many other students who commute to my school.
I follow these drivers down the highway (I can tell who they are by the university stickers in their back windows), I meet them as we’re looking for parking spots around campus, and many are terrible drivers without phones! They are the people who tailgate you during a heavy snowstorm, they stay in the left lane doing 55 in a 65 zone and never move over**, they cut across the curb when making a right turn, and they park at a 45 degree angle to the curb with the rear of the car 2’ out into the lane…I’ve seen it all from college drivers. So many of them are on the phone and not paying attention to their driving. College students are the worst when it comes to phones. Most never put them away…between classes if they aren’t talking on them they are in hand, and even during class they are sitting out on desks & tables (thankfully shut off, but every so often one rings in class…grrr). I see some serious phone addicts at school.
**Which brings up another rant. My commute is along a 4 lane highway. As soon as it splits, I’d say 50% of the drivers I witness get over into the left lane and stay there along the entire 8 mile highway to the exit onto the interstate, which is a left exit. These are not the fastest drivers (usually the slowest), and they move over and claim their lane and don’t budge at all. I don’t get it. It’s like they’re afraid they’ll miss the left exit if they don’t move into the left lane 8 miles early. I suppose they might miss it if they’re talking on their phone and don’t see the end of the highway coming up.
Oh, that was when I was trying to huff the cell-to-tower microwave transmissions. They give you quite the high.
I think you hit the nail on the head right there. This might actually be the biggest social reason for cellphone use being perceived as “rude”: ultimately, it’s anti-social.
If someone walks into a room on a cellphone, even if you’re total strangers, you immediately know they do not wish to engage you. They do not wish to address anyone else around them. They are not actively engaging their environment. They are actively engrossed in the person on the other end of the phone, to the exclusion of everyone else and everything around them. Anything they do while on the phone (shopping, driving) is secondary and/or an afterthought.
It’s almost the same kind of rudeness as when you are in a group of people and two decide to speak privately by switching to another language to exclude the others.
I went on the college tour here and the guide mentioned how NH law says drivers must stop for pedestrians. That must be why students here just walk out anywhere without looking.
He falied to mention that the law states drivers must stop for pedestrains IN CROSSWALKS!! In other situations, the pedestrian must yield right of way.
I don’t think anybody mentioned this reason for being uncomfortable with cell phone talkers in public, namely that they force you to eavesdrop on a private conversation.
While the cell phone talker is “just having a conversation”, you are continously exposed as an eavesdropper, a person not only interested in what he/she is talking about, but also a person with bad manners.
For a person with mostly good manners, this situation is bound to make one extremely annoyed.
This isn’t a why it’s annoying answer, but it’s a how annoying is it answer.
In a confined area a cell phone conversation falls between an uninteresting conversation between strangers and a person talking to themselves. Annoyance-wise.
One cell usage that particularly bothers me: conversations in the library. Don’t do it. Just step through the turnstile and do your talking in the lobby.
*All *intrusive conversation is annoying. If you have a bunch of rowdies at a restaurant or bar talking too loudly, they are as annoying as the guy on the cel phone speaking too loudly.
However, the guy on the cel phone that I can’t hear? He isn’t bothering me.
Girls that send texts or check their cell phones every time they receive texts when out for dinner is my BIGGEST PET PEEVE OF ALL TIME. Sure, if I was boring the shit out of you, go for it (not bloody likely). But we could be having a great time, engaged in a meaningful conversation, and they still have the nerve to do it.
It’s strange; I started dating a girl that I’ve been in love with since sixth grade, and although it didn’t work out (and we started dining out as just friends), the first thing she would do is TURN OFF her cell phone at the dinner table. That’s why I know I’ll always love this girl.
Speaking of distracted drivers and cellphones, Here’s an interested little test. Not only did I fail the test (with 25 or so years of driving experience), but I was irritated throughout at too much going on and feeling overwhelmed. I also noticed that I got some of the questions, but I didn’t notice the road around me AT ALL.
Whenever you are with other people assembled for a specific purpose, cell phone use is impolite. Talking to someone about which peanut butter to get while in the grocery aisle? Okay. Talking to someone while standing on line to check out the groceries? No.
We occasionally have teenagers come in to help out in the office. One young woman was literally on her cell phone the entire four hours she was here. Everything I talked to her, she would ask whoever it was on the other end to “hold on a sec.” When she left, I told her not to come back because I could not deal with such rudeness.
For me, it’s as simple as the fact that I can’t stand how inane most people’s conversations are, period. When riding the train, I can’t stand to be near two people having a stupid conversation, but being near one half of that conversation is somehow even more annoying. As someone else mentioned, it’s mostly the sheer inanity of the conversations that really galls - for a misanthrope that’s trying to reform into someone who gives others the benefit of the doubt, getting that confirmation that most people are walking around with the equivalent of a busy signal ringing in their heads at all times is extremely disheartening.
I once overheard a young woman talking about the sex she had the night before. It sounded like she was temping or a lower level employee at some form and she had sex with an older, higher-up. She was sharing everything.
She had gorgeous breasts but sounded a bit of an airhead. I felt like saying “excuse me, you’re turning me on”.
Although in reality I was thinking "so this is how women criticise guys the next day. I’m never having sex with a woman again. "
I use my cell phone and other’s reactions to it don’t really come into the equations for it. If I’m talking to someone when the phone rings, I look at the Caller ID and put it away. I’ll call them back later. If I’m walking through the grocery store, then I’ll answer it… if I’m at checkout, then I won’t.
If somebody thinks that I’m rude while talking on a cell phone sitting on a bench, so be it… I really couldn’t care less.
And if someone doesn’t like me talking on the phone in a movie theater…
…you’ll go to the Very Special Hell?
This is it right here;
“I really couldn’t care less.”
A complete disregard for those around you.
It’s a generational thing for sure.
If you have a problem with someone talking on a cellphone on a park bench, the problem’s yours, not the talkers.
Yes, talking on a phone when it interupts some social interaction like a checkout line, or a date or whatever is rude, but talking on a phone in a public space is normal behavior that is the intended use for cell phones.
As a corollary though, if you do get a lot of calls on your cell phone, take the damn thing with you!
My boss constantly leaves his phone on his desk, where it inevitably starts ringing while he’s wandering around somewhere. His initial solution? Use a ringtone loud enough that he could hear it from anywhere in the office.
He’s taken enough shit about it that he seems to have finally gotten the message. He still leaves the phone on his desk, but at least now he uses a much quieter and less obtrusive ringtone.
My favorite trick for some jerk yelling into his/her phone is simply to join the conversation. Act like he/she is talking to you, and provide suitable responses each time he/she pauses. It gets real fun real quick. Make sure to do it in a voice as loud as theirs.
The only social pressure that jerks react to is embarassment. So that’s the one I try to apply.