05.29.2008
Text messaging: break from the norm or the beginning of the end?
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I don’t want to scare anyone, but giving children the ability to text message could be the beginning of the end of the world.
These are not the paranoid rantings of a grass-smoking burnout nor is it some far-fetched conspiracy theory.
No, this is reality. Or should I say, “OMG, 911 ASAP.”
My generation, the grass-smoking burnouts in their 20s, missed the proverbial boat. It’s the young up-and-comers riding the wave of technology that we should fear.
It’s actually quite genius, what these kids have done. First, they picked simple technology — text messaging. It’s mindless to the point where phones are programmed so you don’t have to even finish typing the words — your phone can guess them for you.
The new generation has found a way to skate around the machine’s ultra intelligence so no one can decode their sensitive communications.
It comes in the form of “LOL” or “STFU” or “IDK” or “YTZEKLS.” (Yes, I made up the last one. I thought I’d give their code a try. I think it may have backfired.)
The medium — the telephone — is so obvious it’s obscene. Of course no one will question a sweet little girl playing with her phone — it’s so commonplace it’s camouflage.
Kids like text messaging because it’s the closest you can get to mimicking playing video games while nowhere near an Xbox. It’s the same motions that juice up your thumbs and leave the rest of your fingers puny.
(This directly plays a part into why I can never beat 11-year-olds at thumb wrestling.)
And thus begins their reign.
While all the details have yet to be unveiled, it is certain the thumb children will use their strengths against the rest of us with our feeble fingers. Animals are totally screwed.
Once we are eradicated in a genocide-type fashion, the thumb children will start producing hybrid offspring, born with their thumbs already attached to a Samsung.
It’s going to be like “Children of the Corn,” only not.
Still think it’s a conspiracy? Just ask history.
Prophets predicted all the monstrous biblical events, just like the reign of the thumb children has been forseen.
Why do you think people take “rule of thumb” so seriously? Why do you think thumbing your nose at someone is such an insult?
It’s like Moses unleashing the locusts on the Pharoah — it’s a sign of what’s to come.
Why do you think people are terrified of hitchhikers?
Why do thumbs up and down reflect good and evil?
Because the thumb will one day be the source of all that is and all that ever will be.
No one is safe as long as the thumb children run rampant.
They hate our freedom.
And now I’ve gone too far.
Put a stop to text messaging, or we’ll all be under their thumbs.
POINT goes to
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Text messaging is the gift that keeps on giving.
In high school, cool kids had pagers. When Kimmy got a page from Jason, “143,” the girls would flitter around excited over his proclamation of love.
I never had a pager, but I did help translate pages. I was awful at it, too. Why send numbers instead of letters?
Why didn’t I follow up on that thought?
But text messaging – now that’s a cool-kid trend I can jump on.
By nature I’m easily distracted. Phones force me to use only my mouth and one hand, yet require all the brainpower I can muster to focus on the noise flowing in my ear from someone I’ve probably heard too much noise from already. It is pure torture.
When the husband calls asking what’s for dinner, I’m distracted by e-mails, my latest doodle or what the cat got into in the kitchen. Marital strife is no good.
When the husband texts me, both hands and eyes are fixated on my phone. Question answered, strife avoided, e-mails answered, cats scolded.
Texting will surely erode all my social graces.
I no longer have to make up excuses to get off the phone. I no longer have to remember how to mail a letter. I no longer have to make eye contact with humans. I no longer have to wait until after work meetings to pass notes to colleagues.
Not that there aren’t certain etiquette rules.
“You smell like a monkey” isn’t nearly as well-received as “You make me want to barf :-)” or “Why are you so stupid? LOL.”
Notice the “don’t take me seriously” markers at the end. They are crucial.
Also, anyone can make up ridiculous acronyms. Once you start looking like granny from the cell phone commercial you lose cool points.
Last, it’s not cool to take dirty pictures with your cell phone. You will accidentally send that picture of your butt to your boss, and your little sister will find the cleavage shot you meant to delete but forgot.
I may have forgotten how to mail my bills. I may have sent a full moon to my boss and I may have told my husband he makes me want to barf.
But I am cool. My inbox says so.
COUNTERPOINT goes to