Today, I read an interesting article on texting, which referenced another interesting article. I was planning to write about differences in communication etiquette between countries based on my experiences in England, and the articles inspired me to write about it today. People here take really long to respond to text messages. Not just romantic interests but even friends or acquaintances. This can, of course, cause anxiety and confusion. In India, my experience has been that people respond to messages at least within a few hours unless they are pissed with you. Especially, if your last message is a question, in which case they say something along the lines of "will get back to you"if they can't reply. In England, I have had two instances where text proposals to meet went unanswered beyond the proposed meeting date. The first time it was a girl I had met on a dating app but who didn't really want to date, which I was fine with. We had met once before, and got along quite well. I thought maybe she had disappeared because she thought I was asking her out on a date. The second time it was a friend who didn't respond for 10 days. When she did, she apologized for not replying, saying she was indecisive about her weekend plans. To be honest, I would have preferred she had lied instead of being told that she didn't respond because she was waiting to see if something more fun came up that weekend.
Both the articles I referenced talk about how digital technology allows instant responses but doesn't oblige one to respond immediately, unlike face-to-face conversations. In fact, people enjoy having control over when to respond to whom. Which is fine. I am the kind of person who responds to texts pretty fast and doesn't have a single unread email in his inboxes. Many people are not like that. But, the line between carelessness and inconsideration is a thin one. When you don't respond to, for instance, a proposed plan to meet up for days, it just shows that you don't care much about that person.
I believe that life is difficult and people have complex inner lives. When someone ignores us, it is our tendency to assume that it was a deliberate act. There is a beautiful line in the first article I referenced: "There is a special, lonely kind of craziness in experiencing tensions with people who most certainly aren't experiencing them back". But, my point is can we, at least, try to be kinder to each other? And, I believe you are at least partly responsible for the tone of any relationship you are in. If you are, for instance, not okay with your texts being ignored repeatedly, you should either tell the other person that or break off that relationship if its not worth having that conversation. I feel we put some much effort in not coming across as needy that we let behaviour that we are not okay with slide, instead choosing to fume inwardly. I learned this lesson from a friend, but I must confess that I haven't followed it very faithfully. Hopefully, this blog will be a reminder.
Both the articles I referenced talk about how digital technology allows instant responses but doesn't oblige one to respond immediately, unlike face-to-face conversations. In fact, people enjoy having control over when to respond to whom. Which is fine. I am the kind of person who responds to texts pretty fast and doesn't have a single unread email in his inboxes. Many people are not like that. But, the line between carelessness and inconsideration is a thin one. When you don't respond to, for instance, a proposed plan to meet up for days, it just shows that you don't care much about that person.
I believe that life is difficult and people have complex inner lives. When someone ignores us, it is our tendency to assume that it was a deliberate act. There is a beautiful line in the first article I referenced: "There is a special, lonely kind of craziness in experiencing tensions with people who most certainly aren't experiencing them back". But, my point is can we, at least, try to be kinder to each other? And, I believe you are at least partly responsible for the tone of any relationship you are in. If you are, for instance, not okay with your texts being ignored repeatedly, you should either tell the other person that or break off that relationship if its not worth having that conversation. I feel we put some much effort in not coming across as needy that we let behaviour that we are not okay with slide, instead choosing to fume inwardly. I learned this lesson from a friend, but I must confess that I haven't followed it very faithfully. Hopefully, this blog will be a reminder.
No comments:
Post a Comment