Who are they always texting?

There is a line from a scene in Community (my favourite TV show) that seems to live rent-free in my head:

And who the hell are you always texting? Everyone you know is here.

I am reminded of this scene almost every day when I look at cars passing by my kitchen window and see that the majority of drivers, slowly cruising down the street, look at their phone while doing so. Who the hell are they always texting? What are they doing on their phone that couldn’t seemingly wait, or be done a few moments before, i.e. before taking the wheel?

The exact same observation can be made at red lights: most drivers, once their car is stopped, will immediately grab their phone, making sure, in a way, that these few seconds waiting for the green light are not wasted.

If I am proudly consistent in never looking at my phone while driving, I am definitely guilty of staring at it every time I am in a queue or in a waiting room. Only recently did I motivate myself to stop doing that at the restaurant, after realising that it was kinda gross to do while waiting to be served. I realised that I was just like people sitting at the other tables, silent, with the screen’s white light shining on their bland faces from below, like ghosts.

Just like most smokers can’t help themselves littering their cigarette butts, even though it is illegal, disgusting, and dangerous, phone users can’t seem to avoid looking at their shiny screens every chance they get.

Here, I won’t focus on the dangers of looking at a screen instead of the road while operating a two-tonne machine, but instead, I will try to understand the reasons that may be driving this unconscious and obsessive behaviour.

The reasons are obvious: a genuine addiction, an educated FOMO, the assumption that doing two things at once — driving and catching up on messages for instance — can save a lot of time (to have even more time to look at things on our phones).

These reasons should be enough to explain this ubiquitous behaviour, but I also think that most people don’t know how to properly use their phones despite using the same technology every day for the past fifteen years. Fine-tuned notifications, scheduled reminders, Apple CarPlay/Android Auto, send later options, hands-free commands… Some of these features are completely unknown to most users who rely on the default settings, without ever taking the time to adjust anything besides the homescreen wallpaper. Default settings are great for many things, but they are simply not built with the goal of keeping us out of the shiny screen vacuum; quite the opposite, I’d say.

How many times have I seen people type their passcode instead of using Face ID (and Touch ID before that)? How often do you hear the default and annoying WhatsApp notification sound?¹

How many people have you encountered listening to voice messages through the bottom speaker of their phone, while having it placed awkwardly at a ninety-degree angle against their ear?²

It’s not just “our parents” who are completely clueless with tech. It’s not just old taxi drivers using Google Maps directly via their phone screen rather than their car’s infotainment, it’s not just European Commission politicians who would rather force Apple to change how iOS works than switch to Android, it’s also people my age and the younger generations.

This poor use of technology, coupled with decade-old bad habits, ageing mobile operating systems, and a variety of addictions, I believe contributes to this behaviour.

I am not immune to this either. How many times have I been distracted by new messages, emails, or even app updates when I just wanted to check the weather? Sometimes, I would not even get to the weather app: I would just forget why I unlocked my phone in the first place. I wonder how much worse this would be if I were still on social media.³ I can only imagine the amount of noise, distraction, and temptation most people experience on every phone session.

But this phone addiction is not really the main issue. Would I be so bothered by it if people were reading Marcel Proust instead of watching TikTok videos? Would people in the restaurant sadden me as much if they were using their phones to show photographs to each other, to illustrate a conversation? Of course not.

The problem is not using the phone, it’s not looking at a screen all the time. It’s not that people don’t know how to master the technology; the problem is what’s displayed on those screens, what people actually do with their phones. Not all screen time is equal.

When I see people using their phones while they drive by my apartment building, I’m not even mad about the lack of safety, I’m not even wondering why this interaction couldn’t wait or “who the hell they are texting.” I’m just sad because it all feels rather joyless. I’m pretty sure that 90% of these moments are either wasted on low-value entertainment or triggered by message notifications and interruptions that could have been easily avoided with a slightly smarter use and understanding of all the features available.

Even better than setting up your phone to avoid noise, sometimes it’s nice to simply put the phone down and look out of the window. You can look at the clouds, look at the birds, and watch cars go by. You can then see the drivers texting, wonder how these texts can be such an emergency all the time that they can’t wait, and find the inspiration for a new rant.