Has the mobile phone distracted the world or have people become ruder?
I parked outside a favorite coffee shop and before I had a chance to get out, a young man talking on his phone jumped into the back seat to be met with “This is the wrong car”. He then asked if this was an Uber although still chatting on his phone. When told “NO!” he then got out without an apology or even acknowledging his mistake.
Although a trivial example of rudeness it showed how a person on the phone can have little connection with the real world. What happened to asking of this car was the one for him before getting into a strange car? What happened to not getting into a stranger’s car? What happened to not talking on the phone while talking to another person? How do people treat others as non-entities to ignore?
Time to put down the phones, lift the eyes up to horizontal and meet the world and the people in it.
Dennis Fitzgerald,
Melbourne, Australia
