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It’s about time I addressed something I’ve never really understood. Some people call it quirky; others call it refreshing–I just call it pretentious. Especially when the act I am about to describe is committed by someone under 30.
To all the people who refuse to own smartphones but belong to the generation that has reaped and revolutionized (bastardized?) their benefits: What are you thinking?
Allow me to provide a brief history of how I got to this contemplation point. While scrolling through the Thought Catalog today (via GoogleReader), I came across a post titled “Why I Don’t Own a Smart Phone.” The author explains he chooses not to own a smartphone–which is one word, as those of us who own one know (although really, you couldn’t have fact-checked that one?)–because he chooses to have an active real life rather than an active online life. He pities the smartphone owners of his generation, who have lost virtually all emotional intelligence and real-world social skills because of how much time they spend cultivating their Internet personas, keeping track of what their “friends” “like,” and “liking” things back on a daily basis. Allegedly, they have lost all freedom–instead of living life, they spend their time waiting desperately in line at an Apple store for the latest iPhone release. They allow their phones to control them instead of controlling their phones. Poor, misguided souls. WHEN WILL YOU STOP LETTING LIFE PASS YOU BY?!?!
Newsflash: smartphones may be a social crutch for some people, but for, I dare say, most of us, they are a supplement to real-word living. I’ll admit, disconnecting for a predetermined period of time (a day, a week, maybe even a month) sounds liberating–and based on the times that it’s happened to me unexpectedly, either because I forgot my phone at home or didn’t realize it had been on silent for several hours, I’ll say that it can be. And yes, maybe when my smartphone spontaneously died on me over the summer, I freaked out like nobody’s business. But that’s mostly because I couldn’t receive or send texts or even make phone calls. The email, Facebook, and Twitter capabilities were not the first thing that came to mind when my smartphone suddenly went to the big cell phone graveyard in the sky.
I kind of went on a tangent there, but here’s the point: smartphones have given us the ability, the choice, to connect to each other in multiple ways 24/7. Just because I own one doesn’t mean that I am socially inept in the real world. My online life is but a reflection of my real-world relationships. Yes, I have several hundred Facebook friends, and yes, I do have the Facebook application on my phone, which allows me to check up on any one of them at any given moment. But do I sit at my computer constantly hitting “refresh” on a Friday night because I have nothing better to do? No. Do I stand there as I’m having a conversation with a real person and continuously hit “refresh” on my Facebook mobile app? No. Do I actually have the phone numbers of those Facebook friends of mine who are close friends in real life? Yes. Do I use more personal ways of getting in touch with them when I just want to talk or hang out? Yes. I therefore don’t see the problem here.
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I’m sure the way I use my smartphone is the same way many twentysomethings use their smartphones: we’re constantly connected, yes, but our social lives happen largely offline, as they should. The smartphone and all its social media apps are merely tools we use to keep in touch with each other, to document our experiences, to plan real-world events that get us out of our apartments, and to put all the points of contact in one neat little package. Let’s face it, it’s convenient to have your email, social media, and traditional texts and phone calls accessible through one device. That you can then take with you wherever you go. Ah, modern life.
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So to my fellow twentysomethings who refuse to have a smartphone, I must say several things to you. On one level, I respect and admire you for sticking to your principles, conducting a realistic assessment of your needs, and acting accordingly. On another level, however, I can’t help but wonder if there isn’t some high horse you’re sitting on under all that I-just-wanna-live-real-life stuff you keep trying to sell to the rest of us. Is your not owning a smartphone supposed to be a marker of your individuality? Is it your way of shunning perhaps the only part of 21st-century life you may be able to shun without reducing your ability to function? Is it a way to cut the clutter out of your life? Is it a way to test your relationships, i.e. the people who really care will take the extra step to call or text? Or is it all just a strange ego boost?
Granted, the author of the aforementioned post blogs for a living, so maybe he has some justification for not wanting to be constantly connected. I felt the same way sometimes when I worked as a journalist. But let’s be real now: if you have a Facebook, a Twitter, a Tumblr or some other form of social media in your life, you ARE connected. And just because you don’t check it on your phone doesn’t mean that you don’t care as much about it as some of the people who do. So maybe you shouldn’t give yourself so much credit.
Choosing not to have a smartphone is fine–those of us who have one will look at you a little weird and wonder whether you belong in our parents’ generation, but we’ll respect your choice. As long as you don’t make us feel bad for ours. Shun the hell out of the smartphone and all it represents for all I care–just don’t act like you’re completely above the whole online, social media, over-sharing thing. Because chances are you’re not. Some social commentators have dubbed us the Facebook Generation, after all. They didn’t just pull that out of nowhere. So get off your high horse and come back to Earth–it IS possible to both “like” a friend’s status on Facebook and text that same friend at least once a day. One does not cancel out the other; they are not mutually exclusive. Balance, people. Balance.
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