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Show www.dailyutahchronicle.com 5 OPINION Friday, December 12,2008 a lesson in texting etiquette... bioiya WHILE I APPRECIATE THE TEXT... I DON'T THINK I'M INTERESTED IN SOME YEAH... UF6 15... UMM... 6000,,, YOU? 3) Do NOT text and talk 5) Text the RIGHT person 1) No texts at 3:00 am 4) No T.UL's 3) Do ttie Important stuff in person! PHIL C*NtiOH/Hit Doily Utah Oirortklt Texting a poor tool for communication n Sunday mornings, when there's no new snow to be had, I like to drink coffee, write to far-flung friends and read the newspaper, though occasionally I get drawn into the gossip and goings-on of my colleague/friend/ .roommate/landlord, and I usually come out of the far end of these rambling discussions and digressions enlightened, if not psychically exhausted. Among the heavier themes and threads of these conversations is the, ongoing debate about text messaging and intergender relations, . a topic that receives, sometimes unfairly, a tremendous gravitas of which it is undeserving. However, on other days, it is significant and deserves some attention. Headway is made and a feeling of understand,ing permeates the room. In brief, the debate involves ap- O propriate response-time, factors dictating interpretation of sometimes vague and oblique messages, which are lacking in non-textual data (body language, facial expres- JAMES sion, tone of voice, etc.), and the all- SEWELL too-familiar power games that boys and girls play with each other early in—and well into—a relationship. You get a text from your latest Can I send a racy picture text? (My love interest (or lust interest) and philosophy on racy picture texts: immediately the cognitive wheels good to receive, iffy to send.) start cranking as youfigureout To be sure, guys and girls have how to proceed. How soon do I text never been on the same wavelength back? Do I play it cool? How cool is in terms of communication. There too cool? What should I say? Should was never a golden age of beauty, I beflirty,uberflirty, nonchalant love and honest intersexual comor aloof? Are emoticons OK? (My munication. Humans are social philosophy on emoticons, briefly: creatures, and our communicative Just Say No.) Should I be sarcastic systems have been honed through and witty? Or will that translate as thousands of generations, each of weird false earnestness and doofiwhich managed to put aside their ness? How ironic can I be before gender disagreements and go forth even I forget if I'm being ironic? and procreate—which brings us to Work spaces too uncomfortable wenty-page papers, class-long PowerPoint presentations, final programming projects Ross -and more—nearly every U student has some sort of SOLOMON ;finalassignment that will put him or her at a desk or in front of a computer for ;hqurs on end. According to the Centers for : - While some students might Disease Control and Preven;6e able to do this work at tion, the simplest of these ;home, many must rely on U steps include making sure your ^resources. What could possibly elbows make a 90 degree angle Ibe wrong with free computers when writing or typing, sitting "and desks for everyone to use, upright, adjusting the monitor bright? Although these setups so it is level with your eyes and -might seem fine and dandy for using a trackball instead of a many students, a closer look mouse. Adjusting your sitting will show that most of these position or taking a break evworkstations are an ergonomic ery 30 minutes is also shown to nightmare, sometimes enreduce the onset of the injuries tirely unusable, and a potential mentioned above, as is using a health hazard for anyone who cushioned chair to reduce the uses them. pressure on your back. The U.S. Department of Which brings me back to Labor's Occupational Safety & the computers, chairs and Health Administration defines desks provided by the univercarpal tunnel syndrome as, sity. If you've ever had a class "The compression and entrapin either OSH or a physics ment of the median nerve auditorium, you've experience where it passes through the their archaic chair and desk wrist into the hand." This can setups—jammed hi a hard result in loss of feeling, mobilplastic chair that puts presity, strength and even the use sure on your back with tiny, of the affected hand. cramped tables that require you to hunch forward and do According to www^afecomputingtips.com, the main causes not allow the*elbow to form a proper 90 degree angle. for.CTS are repetition, direct pressure, prolonged constrained These are not the only classjoint position and awkward rooms at the U that have this posture. In addition to CTS, problem. In terms of computer prolonged exposure to these ac- work stations, try taking a trip tions can lead to other serious to the Union Computer Lab maladies, including tendonitis, Downstairs—monitors are pronator syndrome, Thoracic below eye level for most users, Outlet Syndrome, ulnar nerve keyboards are significantly entrapment and more. higher than they should be and . Although this might seem plastic chairs hard and unaddaunting to some, there are few justable. preventative measures one can Some students, myself in.take to avoid these problems. cluded, cannot even use these computers without dealing with severe pain in the arms, shoulder and back. Again, this is just a small example of a problem that plagues almost every campus work station. Donald S. Bloswick, a Mechanical Engineering professor who specializes in ergonomics, safety, occupational biomechanics and rehabilitation engineering said that a big reason why older desks found in most classrooms do not need to be replaced is because many students only spend about 50 minutes sitting in each of these chairs. About adjustable computer workstations he said that an education program for students would be the most important course of action at this point. "It would be less costly than spending a lot of money on equipment that people might not know how to use," Bloswick said. Some progress is being made in terms of chairs and desks. For example, the newly redesigned Warnock Engineering Building provides padded chairs and ample desk space. Unfortunately, much more needs to be tfone to ensure the ongoing good health of the students. The cramped chairs from past decades must be replaced with similar environments to those found in the Warnock Engineering Building. Every computer on campus should be paired with an ergonomic keyboard, a lowered area for the keyboard and adjustable monitors and chairs. To provide any less is a disservice to every student on campus, and an insult to those who have already been injured. letters@chronicle.utah.edu i: today. But what's happened with texting seems like a pyrrhic victory: To avoid the hard work of one-on-one relationships, we've harnessed a technology, supposed to make com. municating easier, that itself entails even harder work. Sure, Ozzie Osbourne makes a great, humorous corporate commercial shill for the efficiency of text, but other than Ozzie, who really mumbles that incoherently (besides Alan Greenspan and Bob Dylan)? And how does Ozzie get the phone numbers of the coffee jerk and the cab driver, anyway? The shrink's number I would guess is on speed dial, but that doesn't mean it makes sense. Our Sunday salon adjourned with some progress in understanding that the disagreements that develop into hours-long intertextual spats could easily be resolved with some- thing as simple as a five-minute phone call, which, if you recall, was what we did in the old days when we wanted to talk with someone who wasn't near. As always, more research is needed. Technology is not in and of itself good or bad, but the application of it within society has consequences, which can be judged. Texting is here to stay, until it too is replaced by whatever's coming next. Guys and girls will continue to misunderstand and miscommunicate, and the whole wide world's gonna keep on spinning. But to make things a little bit easier—because, after all, life is hard—the next time you want to talk to your partner (of the week or of your life)* pick up the phone. Can you hear me now? letters@ chronicle.utah.edu LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Rodriguez-Vargas needs better research Editor: Emily Rodriguez-Vargas complained that "we all have our own views" about firearm use ("Guns shouldn't be recreational," Dec. 11). True, but we don't have a right to our own facts. Rodriguez-Vargas wrote that "the likelihood is 40 times greater that a gun will be used against a member of one's own family than to prevent a crime if it is kept in the home." The report to which she referred is likely the infamous one that was written in 1986 by Arthur L. Kellerman, who admitted that his study did "not include cases in which burglars or intruders are wounded or frightened away by the use or display of afirearm."He also admitted his study did not look at situations in which intruders "purposely avoided a home known to be armed." This is a classic case of a "study" conducted to achieve a desired result. In his critique of this report, Gary Kleck noted in 1991 that the estimation of gunownership rates was "inaccurate," and that the total population came from a nonrandom selection of only two cities. Firearms stop more than 1.5 million (Clinton administration) to 2.5 million (Kleck) crimes a year in the United States—14 times as many as they start, according to the FBI and U.S. Department of Justice. Rodriguez-Vargas should look into it. David Nelson, U Alumnus Practicing with guns is necessary Editor: Emily Rodriguez-Vargas' first point is about curious, naive children ("Guns shouldn't be recreational," Dec. n). Children, as they grow, need to learn about all the dangers they might face. This includes guns, knives, hammers, ammonia, ovens, strangers, traffic, heights and water, just to name a few. The standard procedure is to keep them away from your child's reach until they can be taught, then teach them why they are dangerous and how to use them safely. Then they won't be naive as to what these items do. Rodriguez-Vargas said guns should only be thought of as a necessity to provide food and self-protection. The purpose of target shooting and clay pigeon shooting is practice. Practice is necessary for both hunting and defensive shooting because in order to be able to provide food for your family or defend yourself in a violent encounter, you must be able to hit what you are shooting at. The challenge of being able to control where the bullets land is where the fun comes in, just like the fun of golf is getting the ball in the hole. What is wrong with learning how to be aggressive with a weapon? If the legitimate purpose of a gun is to be able to defend yourself, when you are assaulted you are going to need to tap into some major aggression in order to kill the other guy before they kill you. Dave Sohm, Senior, Mass Communication |
