I'm so old I remember when you'd get thrown out of restaurant if you used a cellphone

Abso-friggin-lutely. Shoot them twice to be sure.

It’s such an annoying, disrespectful thing to do in public. If you do it, you’re either a giant asshat or too dumb to keep around.

I was in the surgery waiting room for 12 hours while my mom had spinal surgery and some piece of shit Boomer kept watching political commentary videos on his phone and would very aggressively say to people "This isn't bothering you, is it?" And when we let him know it was, he'd just move a few seats away - not far enough to make any real difference. I wanted to beat the asshole to a bloody pulp, but I was equally as mad at the hospital who didn't put an end to it.

Same with fuckers in restaurants watching sports on their phones, or on speakerphone calls, or kids playing their fucking preschool games with their volume turned up. If we can't kill these motherfuckers then we should at least be allowed to smash their phones out of their hands.

If more people acted like Everett True, we'd live in a much nicer world. We've given assholes far too much free reign.

I was once on a Greyhound bus where a guy was loudly talking on his phone, but not on speaker. The issue was he was just repeatedly saying:

"Listen....... Listen..... Listen.... Listen... Lemme tell you.... Listen... Listen .... Listen lemme.... Lemme tell you .. listen"

For half an hour.

Finally a hero yelled out: "Listen! Lemme tell you to shut the fuck up!"

He said "lemme call you back later" hung up and shrunk down on his seat as the whole bus clapped.

This is why the removal of 3.5mm jacks is bullshit.

I can't just forcibly attach headphones to someone's phone and silence them anymore.

i love how cory doctorow is consistently right about literally everything

Seconded.

A lot of people blame this on people losing their social skills during COVID, but I remember people doing it when I was in high school in the mid-2010s.

I've been stuck on a train with a girl wearing headphones and singing along to Savage Garden. We all suffered.

She was even shutting her eyes tight and doing these ones...

If you've ever listened to just the vocals of a song without music, it was that, but also awfully off-key because she, of course, could not hear herself. Obnoxiously, I think she thought she was putting on a performance we were all impressed by. No one was impressed.

That's horrible. Think of all the blood someone else has to clean. For that reason I suggest strangle.

We old people were raised well, dammit! We had wired earphones! Then Apple cocked up and tried to make expensive wireless earphones fashionable. And look where that lead us. That's right, kids not knowing what earphones even are. Fuck you technobros, you can't do anything right.

(Posted from my HMD Global Nokia 5.4, which does have a headphone jack, thank you very much) (Sorry if abrasive, mildly drunk)

People around where we live mount Bluetooth speakers to their bicycle and ride around on nature trails sharing their music with everyone because who the hell goes out in nature to experience nature?

Shooting them is a kindness. They could be reported to the RIAA for violating public performance copyright.

I like to loudly say to my children: "Isn't it sad that some people can't afford headphones"

Meanwhile, Google's like, "We're removing the ability to silently check your notifications using your Pixel Buds. You have to use the voice command now. No, we don't care that you primarily use them in public spaces. And we really don't care that our voice recognition has a 15% success rate."

I don't think urinating on people in public transport is a good idea. But otherwise, spot on.

I don't get why anyone who rides public transportation doesn't wear headphones themselves. Big obvious ones are best so people don't talk to you.

I do find that the more righteous I feel about someone's actions the more annoying it becomes to me. Despite how rude it is, and you're absolutely right about that, try to not give a fuck. It really helps to consider their obliviousness as a disorder. They're pathetic.

If nothing else, hopefully it'll keep you from actually pulling the trigger one day.

I had to listen to someone blast Tiktok and parts of some yelling bro-y podcast in the dentist's office.

I am already on edge whenever I go there, but this put me on a different level, as I was ridiculously overstimulated by the time I was in the chair. They almost did not continue because my blood pressure was alarmingly high.

The problem with public transit isn't the transit, it's the public.

Can we have a special level for those who blast conspiracy theory videos? That was my last trip, and even with my headphones, I could still hear them droning on about some ignorant hot take divorced from any semblance of reality.

Let's not shoot them. I prefer public censure.