No Likey Walkie Talkie

I'd seen the commercials on TV for a couple years now. Dennis Franz is buying produce or participating in some other meaningless transaction, but first he has to consult his wife. So he holds up what looks like a cell phone, but it turns out to be a cross between a cell phone on speaker and the old walkie talkies I played with as a kid, back when they were the size of bricks. It's bad enough listening to one side of people's cell phone conversations, but as soon as I saw those commercials for Nextel walkie talkies with Franz, I knew a phenomenon twice as annoying was on its way.

Then, yesterday, while out for brunch with Valarie, something interrupted my ham and eggs, something that got me hotter than the tabasco sauce I poured over everything. A woman at the table next to me starts talking back and forth with somebody on the other end of her walkie talkie to basically tell them she and her friend had finished breakfast and would be there, wherever there is, in fifteen minutes.

I didn't want to make a scene, and I didn't want to show Valarie how angry I was over what merely amounted to a mere 15-20 second disturbance. But make no mistake: I was appalled. It is beyond comprehension to me how someone could talk on one of these devices in the middle of a crowded restaurant and either not have it occur to them that this is extremely rude, or have the selfish sense of entitlement to interrupt forty people's breakfast and just not care.

So whoever might be reading this, I beg of you. I plead. I warn. If you choose to purchase one of these walkie talkies, that's your decision. Maybe there are times when a cell phone just won't do. For some reason maybe it's important that you be able to hold the device in question in front of your face instead of up to your ear. I'm not questioning whatever need that stems from. But for God's sake, don't use it in a restaurant. Or a movie theater. Or any other indoor public place. It's rude. It's inconsiderate. It's obscene. And if you do it in front of me, maybe you won't actually die or be the victim of physical violence. But you certainly will have earned my contempt.

Comments

[Sara]

If someone were talking to another person next to them, making the same amount of noise as the walkie-talkie was making, would you think anything of it? Of course not. It seems like you are absolutely furious over a noise just because it's coming from a device, rather than an actual person. Restaurants are loud, and people talk to each other, what does it matter if someone is instead talking over a phone?

[Brian]

I've grown up over the last 30 years conditioned to human voices to the degree that I can filter it out. But the walkie talkie makes a completely different sound, one that's often louder and at least to me more distracting. It's just like when a cop is nearby and you hear their CB going. You're right that it's just a voice, but to me it's more jarring and doesn't belong.

[Allan]

I have to agree with Brian on this one. Imagine if someone sat next to you in a restaurant and turned on a talk show on their transistor radio. Wouldn't you think that rude? Of course you would. Actually, if someone just talking was making as much noise as a walkie talkie, I might not think they were rude, but I bet I would think they were obnoxious.

[Sara]

I suppose unlike most people, none of the above would bother me. I just think it's unfair to demand that people in a public place meet your own, sometimes grossly unfair, expectations. Maybe a walkie talkie is excessive (although I personally don't care in the slightest), but if you're in a place that is noisy to begin with, I don't understand what it is about another, albeit different noise that makes you so irate.

[Brian]

It's all about how your brain is conditioned. Think of Pavlov's dog, who salivated instantly at the sound of a bell after Pavlov would always ring it just before feeding the dog. There are sounds people here they are familiar with, and other sounds that, even if they're no louder than what else they hear, register more. So while it may seem illogical for one to hear and be annoyed by walkie-talkie that's no louder than the usual din of people talking, my brain picks up and responds to (in a negative way) the artificial sound of a walkie talkie. When I argued that sound was inappropriate for introducing in restaurants, it was under the assumption, which Sara you've proven partially false, that most people would feel the same way. I think people of your generation are more conditioned to cell phones and walkie talkie phones than people my age or older may be. So I think what I'm saying may be generally an accurate gauge of public opinion but, as you've pointed out, certainly not an exclusively held feelign.