Last year, when I returned from vacation in the United States, I told you about the horrible phenomenon of telephone conversations in speakerphone mode.1. In our southern neighbors, it is now a norm. We hold a conversation by holding the phone in front of us.
I said in this column that the thing was growing in Quebec and that we had to fight against it. A year later, I sincerely believe that we are losing the battle.
This practice is now well established and widespread among us. Everywhere in public spaces, in the supermarket, on the bus, in the subway, on the sidewalks or in parks, people are talking to a third person, generating an intrusive and unpleasant noise. We agree that the sound of a voice coming from the speaker of a telephone is absolutely unbearable.
These people hold conversations, most of the time useless, in the most complete carelessness and taking great care to stretch them out. The good old “I’ll call you back later” no longer exists. On the contrary, these people believe that it is essential to let the rest of humanity know that rain is forecast for the afternoon and that the invitation to the barbecue at Jacqueline and Jean-Pierre’s is slow in coming.
“Were you invited? The rest of us are still waiting for her to call us.”
And when it’s not conversations, we’re treated to soccer matches or TV series watched at full volume. I’m not making this up. I once found myself between a guy watching a BMX competition and a woman watching an episode of Seinfeld. Happiness, you thing!
I need someone to explain this to me. When was the phone earpiece that you normally stick to your ear removed from the device’s functions? Why this collective craze for this listening technique?
Some claim that fear of the effects of waves on the brain is at the origin of this new use. Rather weak as a defense… For me, the explanation is elsewhere. And it is rather found in pure selfishness.
People who talk on speakerphone do so with the unconscious (or perhaps not) goal of marking their territory in public space. I’m not the only one who sees it this way. Experts who study this phenomenon think so too.
And then there is this loss of privacy. Smartphones allow us to transport our home (and our office) into the public space. And to impose it on everyone, even those who do not want it.
And beware of anyone who tries to make someone understand that they need to put their headphones on. They will be met with a look of incomprehension or, worse, a derogatory comment.
I am a regular user of public transportation. I can tell you that one thing has changed in recent years. Before, we observed things and people. Today, we hear them.
On the bus, which the French psychologist and psychoanalyst Jacques Arènes calls “the observation post of the world’s rumor,” we are assailed from all sides by futile and immodest chatter.
One morning, on my regular line, a man was talking to a family member (he had the phone to his ear). Everyone could hear what he was saying very well, because we know that we tend to speak louder on our cell phones when we are in a public place.
The discussion was about the preparations for his mother’s funeral. The man was clearly keen to tighten his purse strings. In particular, he found the price of the urns exorbitant. That is entirely his right.
But there were several of us passengers looking at each other with an embarrassed look and wondering: “Is he going to offer to put his mother’s ashes in an old Yellow shoe box?” ? »
For this man, this conversation had the right to be accessible to everyone. Like a series on Netflix. Like a radio show.
This is one of the perverse effects of communication technologies. We end up no longer recognizing what is personal and confidential.
The smartphone is taking up a disproportionate place in our lives. We keep repeating it. Just as we keep discovering the repercussions it has on our mental health. Mobile addiction (nomophobia), which is the fear of being separated from your mobile phone or a communication network, is becoming more and more widespread. This phenomenon affects half of Internet users, according to several studies.
Based on “the fear of missing out,” mobile addiction makes us slaves and leads us to hold disturbing conversations without any concern for respect for others.
Have we reached the point of collective lessons in civics on the use of smartphones? I think so. Just as I believe that we must seriously consider regulating their use in public spaces.
It’s about our emotional health. Which is no small thing.
1. Read the column “I declare war on speakerphone calls”