http://www.thestar.com/news/science...mail-s-ease-appeals-to-the-cowards-in-us?bn=1
By Rosie DiManno Columnist
"There is nothing more pleasant than receiving a beautiful letter. It can inform, console, thank, express love, indignation. It can persuade, dissuade, congratulate, chide, cajole, inspire or say very effectively 'I'm sorry.' There is nothing within the range of human emotions that cannot be expressed by the reflective written word. It is sad that the world of instant communications has made us so lazy that we are losing the ability to communicate our real selves to each other on paper. It is easy to communicate information via computers, but the computer cannot convey the emotions of the heart.''
That observation comes from my well-thumbed copy of The Amy Vanderbilt Complete Book of Etiquette: A Guide to Contemporary Living, revised and expanded by Letitia Baldridge, social secretary to the White House during the John F. Kennedy administration.
While I've no everyday need for, say, the chapter on "Household Management in a Servantless Society" or "Riding and Fox Hunting," the book has taught me all I needed to know about setting a formal dinner table and how to dress for an audience with the Pope.
Alas, contemporary living has changed a great deal – to the point of being unrecognizable – since Miss Baldridge first revisited Miss Vanderbilt's compendium of advice and proscriptions. Who writes or receives letters any more except of the pro-forma or business variety? Who even uses stationery, with paper itself a vanishing medium?
This is a shame because putting pen to paper – always preferable for personal correspondence over a typed or word-processed letter – forces a certain amount of reflection upon the writer. There's a ritual to it, a dedication of time and effort so at odds with the slapdash yip culture of email, texting, tweeting and other social networking rot.
Anybody struck these days by a passing thought – excuse me, opinion – feels the need to thumb-pound it out and press Send. Those who take particular and malevolent delight in ambush via email, to the extent that they engage in user group assaults, are known as ninjas and trolls – a fitting description.
Most email, in my experience, is evil and, because of its easy anonymity, cowardly.
I am not of the texting generation. I am not of the sexting generation, which strikes me as particularly vacant and creepy, an unfortunate mutation of the otherwise pleasant phone-sex experience.
But I've just received – via email, of course – a how-to on the suggested protocol for brexting, from an American-based mobile company piggybacking on the travails of Tiger Woods and Jesse James (Sandra Bullock's loutish and now estranged husband, currently doing the sex addiction rehab thing).
Is Brexting the New Break-Up? the release asks.
I don't know, is it?
Seems to me brexting is just techno-lingo for what was once known as a Dear John letter. I've sent a couple of those in my time, because I was too chicken to do it in person (pretending that awkwardness could be more deftly handled by writing it out, a face-saving kindness to both parties).
In truth, it's about ducking confrontation and interrogation and denying the other person an immediate reaction.
I've also been kissed off by email, which makes rejection no less hurtful; indeed, more so, because of the implied insignificance: not worth the phone call, not worth a letter, not worth any more time than it took to tap-tap these few sentences. Such shallowness may reflect hideously on the sender's character but, still, I'd rather have a face (and a drink) in front of me on such occasions.
Texting – or brexting – is about bad manners now roughly codified, an exculpation of etiquette turned on its head. As the aforementioned release explains the "revolution" of texting:
* It's a great way to mask any emotions, whether good or bad. (God forbid we should allow emotions to break out.)
* Texting can be practised while doing numerous tasks. (This is me shattering somebody's heart while doing the laundry.)
* It prevents controversy because one need not respond if one doesn't feel like arguing (see emotions, above).
* Texts can be saved and reread (otherwise known as obsessing).
* If you change your mind about saying something, you have the ability to delete the message before it's sent. (Unfortunately, the technology does not allow you to retrieve the message after it's been sent but before it's read.)
* "When it comes to cheating, you have the ability to delete all evidence that anything ever happened over text." (As if erasing the words erases the conscience, just like that. If Tiger had only pressed delete he'd still be, you know, a happily married philanderer.)
By Rosie DiManno Columnist
"There is nothing more pleasant than receiving a beautiful letter. It can inform, console, thank, express love, indignation. It can persuade, dissuade, congratulate, chide, cajole, inspire or say very effectively 'I'm sorry.' There is nothing within the range of human emotions that cannot be expressed by the reflective written word. It is sad that the world of instant communications has made us so lazy that we are losing the ability to communicate our real selves to each other on paper. It is easy to communicate information via computers, but the computer cannot convey the emotions of the heart.''
That observation comes from my well-thumbed copy of The Amy Vanderbilt Complete Book of Etiquette: A Guide to Contemporary Living, revised and expanded by Letitia Baldridge, social secretary to the White House during the John F. Kennedy administration.
While I've no everyday need for, say, the chapter on "Household Management in a Servantless Society" or "Riding and Fox Hunting," the book has taught me all I needed to know about setting a formal dinner table and how to dress for an audience with the Pope.
Alas, contemporary living has changed a great deal – to the point of being unrecognizable – since Miss Baldridge first revisited Miss Vanderbilt's compendium of advice and proscriptions. Who writes or receives letters any more except of the pro-forma or business variety? Who even uses stationery, with paper itself a vanishing medium?
This is a shame because putting pen to paper – always preferable for personal correspondence over a typed or word-processed letter – forces a certain amount of reflection upon the writer. There's a ritual to it, a dedication of time and effort so at odds with the slapdash yip culture of email, texting, tweeting and other social networking rot.
Anybody struck these days by a passing thought – excuse me, opinion – feels the need to thumb-pound it out and press Send. Those who take particular and malevolent delight in ambush via email, to the extent that they engage in user group assaults, are known as ninjas and trolls – a fitting description.
Most email, in my experience, is evil and, because of its easy anonymity, cowardly.
I am not of the texting generation. I am not of the sexting generation, which strikes me as particularly vacant and creepy, an unfortunate mutation of the otherwise pleasant phone-sex experience.
But I've just received – via email, of course – a how-to on the suggested protocol for brexting, from an American-based mobile company piggybacking on the travails of Tiger Woods and Jesse James (Sandra Bullock's loutish and now estranged husband, currently doing the sex addiction rehab thing).
Is Brexting the New Break-Up? the release asks.
I don't know, is it?
Seems to me brexting is just techno-lingo for what was once known as a Dear John letter. I've sent a couple of those in my time, because I was too chicken to do it in person (pretending that awkwardness could be more deftly handled by writing it out, a face-saving kindness to both parties).
In truth, it's about ducking confrontation and interrogation and denying the other person an immediate reaction.
I've also been kissed off by email, which makes rejection no less hurtful; indeed, more so, because of the implied insignificance: not worth the phone call, not worth a letter, not worth any more time than it took to tap-tap these few sentences. Such shallowness may reflect hideously on the sender's character but, still, I'd rather have a face (and a drink) in front of me on such occasions.
Texting – or brexting – is about bad manners now roughly codified, an exculpation of etiquette turned on its head. As the aforementioned release explains the "revolution" of texting:
* It's a great way to mask any emotions, whether good or bad. (God forbid we should allow emotions to break out.)
* Texting can be practised while doing numerous tasks. (This is me shattering somebody's heart while doing the laundry.)
* It prevents controversy because one need not respond if one doesn't feel like arguing (see emotions, above).
* Texts can be saved and reread (otherwise known as obsessing).
* If you change your mind about saying something, you have the ability to delete the message before it's sent. (Unfortunately, the technology does not allow you to retrieve the message after it's been sent but before it's read.)
* "When it comes to cheating, you have the ability to delete all evidence that anything ever happened over text." (As if erasing the words erases the conscience, just like that. If Tiger had only pressed delete he'd still be, you know, a happily married philanderer.)
