Why Texting is Damaging

I know I am told by many people that I am an old soul. However, be as it may I am for the most part up and about with the times. I got a cell phone when I was 16 and it was months before I learned how to text anyone. AT the time, not many people would text and I would only text one person (Kristin). Then my next phone had NO text. Then I had to get a cell phone for my college which HAD texting but limited minutes, then I got another cell phone, again no texting.

What I liked about not having text was that my friends were forced to actually call my phone in order to talk to me. Then I switched to Verizon a few years ago, which most of my family and friends had and calling Verizon to Verizon was free minutes. But I got unlimited texting. Ta Da! I was up with the times!

But I was the guy who would use proper punctuation and grammar rules when texting. I capitalized proper nouns, used commas and question marks, apostrophes, etc. I also knew the correct there, their, and they're to use, and I would type out I'm instead of im. But then I would get lazy with the rest and quick texts like ur, im, 4, w/o, btw, etc.

Do you know how many people actually write those things out in essays in school? They look so stupid! Now I am not saying I am smarter than anyone else, but even I remember my first through fifth grade teachers teaching me proper punctuation and such. But grammar usage is not the most damaging thing in texting. There are greater dangers that as I get older, I see more and more and it is absolutely ridiculous.

A few months ago, I had a conversation with Kristin. I was training her for her Black Belt test and I don't know how we got into the topic of texting. But we are both afraid to bring children into this world, because we know so many people who have absolutely NO social skills because of texting. It has become a point in this world that PEOPLE, not only kids, but PEOPLE don't know how to even talk to other people unless they can text or instant message their thoughts. They don't know how to express themselves either. And the ones who DO know how ot express themselves, still cannot speak verbally important things unless it is via text.

Isn't that sad? And it must be a great pet peeve of mine. I also think texting had made people become RUDE> I had a friend that when he was with me and my other friends, we could be watching a movie or eating dinner, he was having a full fledge conversation texting, not partaking with us. WHY BOTHER being with us then? When I am with someone, I want to be in YOUR company, and that's that. I found it rude to be texting.

Granted, there are times where it has it's uses, and God only knows I have also succumbed to then temptations of it. But I'd leave my phone in another room or something unless I had a feeling it was important. And if it is not, I don't answer right away. But some people take it as the highest insult if they don't get a response! As if you called them an obscene word or something. It's absolutely ridiculous!

I had a golden rule with all my friends that if I had something important or deep I wanted to talk them about, it would not be instant message or text, I would do it face to face, MAYBE even on the phone. But I did that because even as a young teenager, I understood how emotions get misinterpreted or people read the way THEY want to read it, and not in the way it was intended. When I see adults do this, I do ballistic! Where is the maturity we were once taught when we were younger? Is it becoming extinct? Because of texting?

Like I said, I text, I do it a lot. Sometimes it's my one way of talking to certain people. And it could be stupid stuff back and forth. But for the most part, if I am with someone else, it's away. Or I will check and unless it is urgent, will I respond. If it's important or urgent, or even deep, I save those conversations for a verbal conversation spoken in person or maybe the phone. And when someone texts ME something, I do my best to not to take it personal or serious. We read things the way we want to hear them usually, and though sometimes we may be right in the interpretation, or if we are wrong in the interpretation, if we don't know, get over it and have it verbally! It's the mature thing to do.

If we are to live in a world that cannot socialize with each other unless a computer screen of some kind is in front of us, or cannot properly write because we are pushed to being lazy, putting the most thought we have in a text quickly, or can only approach topics with other people by pressing buttons with our thumbs, then I don't know if I really want to be a part of it. Don't be lazy, don't be rude, don't take things personally. Time to grow up and be HUMAN.

Yours in service,
ANDREW TRENTO