Phooey!

[Senator Jack]

I went to the theatre the other day. There was a Billy Wilder retrospective - 'Ball of Fire' and 'The Major and the Minor'. You would think the people who attend this sort of thing would be different. Nope. Cell phones ringing, people text messaging each other during the film, and then there are the fabulous who can't be bothered to shower before depositing themselves into a small, crowded theatre. I was really upset that of the few things I really should be able to enjoy, this one had to be ruined by the incivility of the 21st Century.

Well, we gripe enough about here, but I'm wondering who else has had it - I mean REALLY had it - with the 21st Century. I walk down the street and I can't stand to even look at people any more. They're starting to turn my stomach. Standing in line at the bank and market and riding the subway are torture because of the proximity. I'm unsure if I can eat at restaurants any more. I know I've always been at the precipice of madness, but now I fear that terra firma is about to shift.

So the question of the day is: Anyone else feel like they need some serious therapy at this point?

Regards,

Senator Jack

 

[LizzieMaine]

All the time, Senator, all the time.

For me, the final blow was being shouldered off the sidewalk by a phalanx of three teenage girls in the usual mall-trollop attire -- and all of them yapping away on cellphones, while wearing Ipod plugs in their free ears, and utterly unconscious of the possibility there might be people on the sidewalk other than themselves.

If this is how the 21st Century starts off, I'm really glad I wont live to see the 22nd.

 

[jake_fink]

Movie-going is as charmless an experience as a visit to the Ministry of Transportation (DMV). To make matters worse, here, movie theatres are closing and being torn down so fast that the dust doesn't have time to settle before some new condo project appears looming over the street like a great glass filing cabinet. We live in hideous, charmless times, and I fear therapy is not enough. BOMB THE UGLY!

I think of this malaise as a kind of furious ennui, and so I take the adivce of someone who new fury and spoke of ennui, D.H. Lawrence. He said that there are three cures for ennui: work, sex and travel, and by work he meant his own, meaningful work, his writing. Any one of them beats throwing yourself under a bus, and a little vacation, even up to the cottage, does me wonders.

 

[Fleur De Guerre]

In America, do you get those ads at the beginning telling you to turn your phone off? I mean, they do actually seem to work over here, I have only very very rarely heard someone's mobile phone go off during a film. Maybe us Brits are marginally politer! Though the B.O problem is still there. I had to move seats last time I went to the cinema because someone stunk a row behind me.

Mind you, the cinema is about the only time I'm not bothered by people's phones. Even on the underground (where they are talking about, but thankfully have not yet installed transmitters, so phones can't ring) everywhere I go is some youth with one of those mp3 speaker phones blasting out some tinny rubbish. Turned up ipods and walkmans are bad enough, but why why why do they think that just because they like it, we all want to be subjected to the latest Dizzee Rascal track?

 

[BellyTank]

Senator...

... you sound just like my Brother- he's a diagnosed Sociophobic.
But the condition can also be a HATRED:rage: of social scenarios and strangers in general, rather than a fear of.
My Bro' holds Joe Public in complete contempt.

I love him.
He's my Brother.

B
T- I'm a bit like that too...

 

[G. Fink-Nottle]

Senator, as a fellow NYC resident, I can tell you that it's not you that needs the therapy. Much of our city needs a shower, a healthier diet and lessons in manners.

On Saturday, my wife and I went to Les Halles on Park for a late lunch. There were only two other occupied tables in the restaurant. At one table was a foursome. Rather than having a quiet coversation, one man at this table performed a loud, one-hour monologue about his trip to Italy and hare-brain investment scheme for genome-mapping. My wife and I had a good laugh. If the restaurant was more crowded, I'm not sure everyone would have been as amused as we were.

This rude pig appeared to be about 50 which is certainly old enough to know better.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

Yes. It's why I love working from home.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

Well, wait...I don't feel like i need therapy, but I am annoyed by most modern folks so I enjoy not being around them on a regular basis.

 

[Absinthe_1900]

All the time, Senator, all the time.

For me, the final blow was being shouldered off the sidewalk by a phalanx of three teenage girls in the usual mall-trollop attire -- and all of them yapping away on cellphones, while wearing Ipod plugs in their free ears, and utterly unconscious of the possibility there might be people on the sidewalk other than themselves.

If this is how the 21st Century starts off, I'm really glad I wont live to see the 22nd.

Hang in there, you may still outlast them: Lightning Strikes Teenager Listening To iPod

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/9480106/detail.html

 

[Marc Chevalier]

I went to the theatre the other day.

I had a similar experience on Wednesday evening. Went to a showing of Rebel Without a Cause at downtown L.A.'s Los Angeles Theatre, a 1931 movie palace that is very rarely opened for screenings. The gargantuan theater was packed with people ... and what a motley crew they were. Gabbing all through the show while spreading the joy of their bodily functions. Pushing, shoving. Oy vey!

.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

I'm wondering who else has had it - I mean REALLY had it - with the 21st Century.

Jack and Lizzie, it's not the 21st century that's the problem. It's living in this part of the world.

Go to Santiago, Chile: you'll find all the courtesy there that you could wish for. (And lots of suits and ties on the streets, too.)

.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

In America, do you get those ads at the beginning telling you to turn your phone off?

Here in L.A., we have the ads. They're not 100% effective.

Sadly, it takes only one or two beeping cellphones to mess up a moviegoing/concertgoing/playgoing experience.

.

 

[Caledonia]

Senator, you're saying it as I see it! I work from home too, so I can avoid most of it. I avoid cinemas like the plague, and have to grit my teeth hard to go into a theatre. Restaurants I can usually handle. I hate having to go to the city because of all the people, and they are so slooww. Get where you're going and stop clogging up my part of the universe! I think it is a general degradation of correct upbringing that causes it. Too little control over your children or your adult self, no respect for others, manners that stink, and a disregard for anything outside your own needs. Generally, I have a reclusive nature because I've learned over the years that there are very few people out there I actually want to meet, and even fewer that I want to spend more than 5 minutes talking to. But in fairness I don't think many people really crave my company either. I do wash though.

 

[colleency]

Went to a showing of Rebel Without a Cause at downtown L.A.'s Los Angeles Theatre, a 1931 movie palace that is very rarely opened for screenings.

.

Hasn't that been sold out for ages? And didn't it cost more than a standard movie ticket? The people that went there are rude? Oh, dear.

 

[Paisley]

This time isn't perfect, of course, but I can't think of another time I'd like to live in. One of the most important things to me is my independence. Even thirty years ago, it was tough for a woman to be independent. Working women were accused of taking jobs away from men who had families to support. Professional women weren't always taken seriously by their own employers or clients. One of the partners where I work said that in the 70s, they asked permission from the client--who was often a 50-year-old female bookkeeper--to have a female staffer working on their account. As for sexual harassment, "harass" was two words to a lot of men. Women were on their own to deal with it.

As a 37-year-old American woman, I haven't had to deal with much of that. I've worked in some unprofessional places, but nothing like the TV show "The Office." I own my own home and can afford to live there by myself. It's larger than what my parents had to raise a large family in. Nobody nags me about when I'm going to get married and have kids. Speaking of kids, cell phones don't bother me nearly as much as squalling, screaming or chattering kids in a restaurant or theater. Going to the downtown theater circumvents that.

To answer the original question: no, I don't need therapy. One reason I don't is because I swing dance. I love it, but I don't go to dances expecting too much: you're not going to have the time of your life every time you go out. People are occasionally going to be rude; that's to be expected. But I haven't found that rude SOBs are any more common now than they were 20 years ago. And respectfully, I just don't consider the problems mentioned on this thread to be nearly as big and important as other problems that I (and the rest of you, no doubt) have had to solve in life.

 

[Twitch]

The whole cinema experience from my perspective wil never be what it was when I was a kid in St. Louis in the 1950s. Why? Becaue back then you watched movies in REAL theaters that were either once used for live performances or were expressly constructed with acoustics in mind to be a movie theater.

There was a stretch of many years that I personally boycotted what passes for the theater today. Gone are the single theaters showing 2 movies. In their place is the ubiquitious Crapola 12 Cinema. Yeah, it's like taping a dozen shoe boxes together. Each viewing area is shaped the same. Being that they are smaller the screens are smaller than the old theaters but due to their relative size it's hard to find a good viewing position as you feel you are too close to the screen most of the time.

Acoustic are awful. During a quite moment in your film you can hear high points of audio from the adjacent cinemas sound track. And since the shoeboxes are completely dead acoustically the big time Dolby just blasts the hell outta everything and assaults your ears. Basically when some guy on screen farts it reverberates like a cannon shot. But when a muted conversation occurs the quality of sound is such that you can't hear it well.

Of course there's now every reason to pump up the volume of all sounds simply because they can. So you can go from straining to hear whispers to wincing from explosions, car motors, or just people laughing on screen.

Getting these movies on DVD presents the same deal. Every notice how you have to jack the sound up and down with your remote?

I'm not complaining about price of tickets or refreshments. It's just the atmosphere I cant' stand.
:rage:

 

[VintageJess]

I am with you, Mr. Senator.

Is it not a sad state of affairs when you can't even escape from it "all" in a movie theater, for all of the ringing and buzzing?!!

 

[herringbonekid]

well dressed misanthropists of the world unite and take over !

 

[Lady Day]

In America, do you get those ads at the beginning telling you to turn your phone off? I mean, they do actually seem to work over here, I have only very very rarely heard someone's mobile phone go off during a film. Maybe us Brits are marginally politer! Though the B.O problem is still there. I had to move seats last time I went to the cinema because someone stunk a row behind me.

Mind you, the cinema is about the only time I'm not bothered by people's phones. Even on the underground (where they are talking about, but thankfully have not yet installed transmitters, so phones can't ring) everywhere I go is some youth with one of those mp3 speaker phones blasting out some tinny rubbish. Turned up ipods and walkmans are bad enough, but why why why do they think that just because they like it, we all want to be subjected to the latest Dizzee Rascal track?

OH! I hate adds at the beginning of the movie PEROID! Let me get this straight, I just paid $12 to sit and have to watch comercials that I wouldnt at home? Wow.

I hate people in general. The 'mainstream' are sheep from everything from clothes, to politics, to chivarly, to acceptance. Its stomach turning, and sad all at the same time.

What happened to tact? Seriously. The golden rule? Come on!? Its if there is nothing you yourself can get out of it, it seems like it aint worth doin'.

Men dont hold the door for ladies, or even the elderly anymore, and its not that women are inferior, or PC crap, its just a polite thing to do! My heart brakes to think that it is gone forever.

LD

 

[Pilgrim]

With all due respect, I don't have any desire to give up on people or this century. When I look around, I see pretty much the same variations in people that I've seen for 50 years. Some good, some bad, and societal changes occur - but it's all part of the game. No better game in town.