You don't look cool looking at your phone
A solution that would change society. Plus sick jackets, suits, shoes, music & more
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But first —
For several years now, filmmakers, in the business of creating compelling images of people’s faces, have been acutely aware of an enormous problem that has not sufficiently dawned on the rest of us: We all look stupid as hell when we’re looking at our phones.
There’s been endless discourse about the negative effects of phones on our moods, sleep cycles, capacity for nuanced thought, and so on. But we have not grappled with the overwhelming negative aesthetic effect, which is that, when we are looking at them, no matter how cool and quick-witted we may be in other contexts, we can not help but look like dumbasses.
Case in point. You ever see people out walking their dogs? The dogs are all smiles… gazes mirthful… tongues lolling. They’ve been cooped up inside, they wanna scamper, they want nothing between them and the vibrant wonder of life. Contrast this energy with that of their owners, who have also been cooped up, and yet emerge only to plod around slack-jawed, pupils glassy, dimly aware of their surroundings as they continue to fixate on screens.
The dog savors the purples and pinks of a spectacular sunset, quizzically glancing up at Master, like, “My friend, f--k is wrong with you??”
There’s a tragedy tucked into this farce: Since the first iPhone came out in 2007, there are almost no dogs currently living who knew a time when their owners did not stare at their phones constantly during walks.
The dog’s the one with the collar, but you tell me who’s really “leashed,” friend.
For a while now, I (Jonah) have tried to remember how dumb I look when I’m looking at my phone, and to avoid it accordingly. If I show up early to meet someone, I try to keep my phone in my pocket while I wait. That way they are greeted by the anachronistic sight of me, say, reading a book or a magazine, or simply staring off in wise contemplation, as opposed to hunched over scrolling swaglessly.
If I’m in the corner of a party where the only people I know are in another room, I try not to take out my phone in an attempt to look “occupied” and less “lonely” and “herbish,” because this will in fact make me look more lonely and herbish, and get in the way of people watching and/or making new friends.
This is the real cure for “phone addiction” that no one has considered. Forget lightphones, forget apps that lock you out of other apps. Humans are a deeply image-conscious species. Just think about how dumb you look when you’re on your phone, and how you would never willingly look that dumb by any other means.
I know what you’re thinking. “Jonah, brilliant. But how will we know what time it is if we don’t look at our phones? We’ll have to at least glance at them, and risk getting sucked back in.”
I have the answer, and it’s not the one you’re expecting.
It’s not looking at wristwatches. It’s not looking up at clock towers. It’s not even checking the position in the sky of the sun. Because:
There is far too much visual clutter, and all those ways of telling time are visual.
There is too much isolation and loneliness, and all those ways of telling time occur on an individual level, as opposed to a collective one.
Whereas there is a centuries-honored method for knowing what time it is, and it’s both non-visual and communal.
We need to go back to telling time by the chimes of bells.
The bells might be in old church belfries. They might be in newly built nondenominational clock towers that go up as part of some massive, much-needed public infrastructural works.
Think about how much chiller life will become if we only know what time it is in 15-minute increments. Think about how this will force the pressure cooker of capitalism to de-pressurize. Think about how much more connected we’ll feel to our neighbors if we all bathe regularly in the same soothing, resonant chimes, looking not at our phones but at each other like, “Mmm — 11:45 — the day is young, almost time for lunch,” etc.
This will obviously require some work to achieve. But we can get there, life will reorganize itself for the better, we’ll be profoundly happier, and we won’t look like dumb losers anymore.
Wow —
Here’s a Special Spyplane Slapper Swarm of jackets, shoes, and pants that are new, sick, and…