Seems like the last couple of weeks, I’ve had occasion to do a fair amount of “texting.” I’ve also noticed that Claire seems to be texting more. Both faithful readers know that I’ve touched on this subject before and explained that “texting” isn’t new — it just goes by another name. If you dig back in the archives of this (or the previous) blog you’ll notice some entries discussing “Q” or “Z” signals. Those were used long before there was any such thing as the Internet or smart phones by the military and professional communicators.
But anyhow, back to texting — it started out as something only kids did, but now we are seeing senior citizens texting each other. I’m not opposed to texting, in fact I kind of prefer it — sometimes. But the problem is that it’s rapidly becoming the primary means of communication with some people, especially the younger generation.
So where does texting actually stand with me? I’m neutral, except of course, I have an opinion. The facts are (as I see them) that texting can be deadly. Texting is (probably) killing the English language. Texting is impersonal. Texting is a very useful form of communication — but, it’s not the only, or should it be the primary, method of communication. Texting is one of a number of ways now available to discourage face-to-face interaction. Just check out groups of teens (and pre-teens) at the mall. They’re not talking to each other, they’re texting. Texting has led people to shorten or abbreviate their words and thoughts so when it comes time to express themselves in a face-to-face situation, they don’t know what to say because they’re so used to staring at that little screen and using acronyms, they don’t know to speak those thoughts.
To be perfectly honest, a lot of texts make us sound a lot dumber than we are. What with all the abbreviations, we lose the ability to form and phrase coherent sentences in real life. When you talk to someone in person, your conversation is made up of many things including non-verbal cues, including posture, facial expressions, body position, eye contact, gestures, etc. When you communicate via text, these cues don’t exist.
I’ve heard that often times, guys are now asking girls out via text messaging — are you kidding me? Asking girls out? I’m guessing that sometimes (or maybe even often) it works. Just seems to me that some things are better done without the benefit of a cell phone. But that seems to be the way things are going. It’s probably fun to watch old people like me text. Usually takes about 20 minutes for a single text. And of course our texting acronyms turn out to be different — BFF to young people means best friend forever; to old people, it might mean best friend fell. TGIF usually means thank goodness it’s four (early bird specials, you know.) As age creeps up, we have to invent the appropriate abbreviations, like: HERN 8D — hearing aid, B4IMGON — before I’m gone, GR8 LWIO — great, Lawrence Welk is on. And then there’s BTW — before the war, ATD — at the doctors, FWIW — forgot where I was, IMHO — is my hearing aid on and WIWA — when I was your age.
So texting or talking, there is and always has been a generation gap and the generations will never fully understand each other. But that’s ok — I’m good with texting, but don’t get me started on Social Media….
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