From The New York Times
Trying to Find the Quiet Car on the Bus
By CLYDE HABERMAN, Published: July 13, 2004
BET you didn't know that this is Cell phone Courtesy
Month. We didn't, either, until the other day. How about a side
wager that some of you think cell phone courtesy can be found in the
dictionary under oxymoron?
It turns out this is the fourth year that July has
been set aside for reflecting on why some people feel obliged to sit
in a restaurant while screaming into a piece of plastic that they
will be leaving soon, and should they pick up Cocoa Puffs for the
kids?
Jacqueline Whitmore says the special month was her
idea. From her base in Palm Beach, Fla., she teaches courtesy to
business executives. (No Enron-inspired giggles, please.) Cell phone
etiquette, or more typically the lack of it, was a logical
extension. She hooked up with Sprint. In short order, a new month
was born.
Give it to us straight, Ms. Whitmore. Isn't the
pursuit of cell phone courtesy really a lost cause?
"Everybody asks me that," she said yesterday when reached by phone -
a land-line connection. "I don't look at it as a losing cause. As
technology evolves, rules change. As rules change, so does
etiquette. Education bears awareness, and awareness bears solutions.
It's a slow process, but we've made tremendous headway in getting
tips out to the public."
One wants to defer to experts. Maybe the battle for
cell phone decency can still be won. But riding the 86th Street
cross-town bus a few days ago, it was hard to shake the feeling that
New Yorkers desperate for a sliver of peace have come to accept they
are licked.
A young woman - you've encountered this
whisper-impaired type countless times, both the male and female
varieties - spent the entire ride demonstrating her lack of faith in
the phone as an instrument of voice amplification. At an implausibly
high decibel level, she made sure that everyone on the bus knew her
weekend plans.
The temptation was strong to show her how badly she
was behaving by talking just as loudly about anything that came to
mind. But the inner wimp prevailed. Other passengers were no braver.
Everyone sat there looking miserable, portraits in sullen surrender
as the young woman prattled on.
Once in a while, you find a hardy soul willing to
tell cell phone abusers to put a sock in it. Not often enough,
though. Let's face it, most of us have given up trying to stem the
tide of rudeness.
If anything, people in this city seem totally
clueless about their own behavior. In an online survey first
reported on Sunday by a sharp-eared Daily News reporter and her
colleague, Sprint found that 75 percent of New Yorkers feel that
people in general are less courteous on cell phones in public than
they were five years ago. Yet at the same time, 98 percent insist
that they themselves are polite on the phone.
Yeah, right. And Dick Cheney will take Michael Moore
duck hunting next season.
Even in a place where you might expect to enjoy a
modicum of privacy, the phone can be an unwelcome intruder. In the
Sprint survey, 73 percent of New Yorkers said they have had to put
up with cell phone chatter in public bathrooms.
It could always be worse. Not to be indelicate, but
on a visit to Paris earlier this month, a man was observed relieving
himself in a doorway. Not just any doorway, but one on the side of
the St.-Sulpice church. As if that were not enough, he gabbed on his
cell phone the whole time. At least that we haven't seen that in New
York. Give us time.
FEARS that the decency battle may be lost are not
eased by well-intentioned laws like the one in New York prohibiting
the use of hand-held cell phones while driving. You see it flouted
with impunity every day.
About the only place left to escape the abusers is
the subway tunnel, and who knows how long it will remain a refuge?
The technology exists to make wireless gizmos work underground.
For now, all that the subways have are cell phone
advertisements. One ad on the No. 1 train emphasizes a certain
company's dollar-saving potential. It talks about the things New
Yorkers do to save money. They buy unlimited MetroCards, for
instance, and then go everywhere to make the most of them.
"One time," it said, "you took the 1 train from 72nd
Street to 68th Street."
That's nice. The only problem is that there is no
68th Street stop on the No. 1 line.
How could the subway ad overseers have missed such a
glaring error? After spotting it, I wanted to call them the second I
got aboveground. But wouldn't you know it. I forgot that I don't own
a cell phone.
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