Don't Take Me Seriously - Book - Page 207
Featured commentary
Let’s turn off, tune out and drop in
S
o, I put on the TV news the
other morning, and the first
thing I saw was video clips
of brutes smacking women around
and stealing their smartphones.
And I learned that the FCC and
the major wireless carriers in the
U.S. have agreed to create a central
database of stolen cellphones in an
effort to reduce their resale value
and, therefore, cut down on the
appeal of phone theft.
Hey, that’s greeeat.
But, you see, I had the original
solution: Don’t own a smartphone.
I have seen numerous friends
of mine struggle mightily for
numerous hours, only to fail to
master their latest and increasingly
expensive cellular monstrosities
and the many “vital” functions
encumbering them (you know,
such as Team Tiddlywinks).
Just this past week, when I
visited San Francisco, it seemed
detaching themselves from the
Jim by
existing conventions of society.
I propose we do the
WALKER sameHerein,
thing again — only this
DON’T TAKE ME SERIOUSLY
everyone on the crowded sidewalks
and buses had such a phone
attached to his or her twitching
palm — and it occurred to me
that the “flower children” have
been replaced by automatons and
techno-nerds, sucking evermore
addictive and mind-rotting data
from the Matrix.
“Curmudgeon,” you say?
Maybe. But maybe it’s time to
get off the download, my friends.
If any of you remember or have
seen it on the History channel,
“turn on, tune in, drop out” was a
counterculture phrase popularized
by Timothy Leary in 1967. It urged
people to embrace cultural changes
through the use of psychedelics and
time with probiotics instead of
psychedelics. And this time we will
swim against the social current by
throwing our smartphones … well,
into the current.
Let’s all turn off, tune out and
drop in.
Turn off the phones, tune out the
noise and drop into something …
anything … meaningful.
If it isn’t printed on paper, don’t
read it.
If it doesn’t make you smarter or
healthier or make the world a better
place, don’t waste time doing it.
Let’s get our faces out of our
laps and look at the horizon. We
just might see something beautiful,
such as the huge parrot I saw riding
that guy’s shoulder on the bus in
San Fran. I mean, those with their
eyes on their phones weren’t even
aware of it until it squawked so
loud they heard it through their
earbuds.
I, on the other hand, saw it in
time to move out from under its
tail, if you know what I mean.
At the very least, we’ll all be
a lot safer if we are scanning our
surroundings instead of staring
stupidly at some little screen in our
hands — safer from trips and falls,
safer from collisions with cars, and
safer from those guys who want to
steal our phones.
Home is the place for watching
TV screens, people. There, as in the
good old days, we can “interact”
with family members while we
argue over which sitcom rerun to
watch, or who lost the remote.
There, we can learn the nuances
of popular culture by watching
such uplifting entertainment as
“Jersey Shore.” And there, we
can liquor-up and come to blows
because someone won’t shut up
during “Law & Order.”
Will going tech-less leave us
behind in the information age?
Of course, it will. Those who stay
plugged in will gain a tremendous
advantage over the rest of us and,
eventually, they will use us as a
food source.
But really, except for the ending,
would that life be so bad? We’d be
dumb and happy, chewing our cuds
and watching the scenery go by,
thinking deep thoughts, composing
romantic poetry and imagining
cloud characters — with absolutely
no worries or stress.
And no app is gonna give you
that.
Drop the phones and back away,
my friends.
Comment at jwalker@thesignal.com or at http://Twitter.com/
DontSeriously.
