Phone Dangers -
Setting the Record Straight: A Dangerous New Web of Communication
by Mr. Owen Edwards
Writing at the early part of the last century, Owen Edwards penned these 'prophetic' words about the phone:
"A dangerous new universe of communications threatens to ensnare us, one so seductive and insidious that it must be recognized for what it is: a web!"
A web which, once we are trapped within it, will do nothing less than change the boundaries of human decency, decorum and behavior! Do nothing less than change the way we speak, think and, yes, act!
And what is the spider weaving this web, which mesmerizes and even enslaves its users? The spider which has crept unchallenged into offices and homes? The spider which, while promising extraordinary new avenues of discourse and delivery, has spun its web wider and wider and, yes world-wider?
It is Mr. Alexander Graham Bell's pernicious instrument, the telephone!
Merely one quarter-century -- an eye-blink in the annals of time -- has elapsed since Mr. Bell summoned his assistant Mr. Thomas Watson at his Boston laboratory. And with what did he summon him? Was it with anything like the noble rhetoric of Aristotle, a Caesar, an Aquinas, a Burke? No, it was with these blunt words: "Watson, come here, I want you," an augury -- even at that inaugural moment -- of deterioration into self-serving language and thought.
And in the lapse of that short span, we now find our skies darkened with a literal web of telephone wires, and ourselves accosted with offers of cheaper and cheaper telephones--beguiled by the very tools with which to carry out our own envelopment.
The truth is that this cold, impersonal new method of 'communication' has the potential--should we fail to recognize its threat--to change us from a nation of warm, gregarious souls, welcoming our friends across our thresholds, into a nation of lonely, house-bound hermits.
One need not tax one's imagination to envision the dire effects: front porches empty, as desperate families sit inside on balmy summer evenings waiting for the discordant clanging of Bell's hellish bells; streets and lanes deserted as former strollers find themselves tethered to the box on the wall; polite repartee replaced by the grunts of the cave-dweller, since face-to-face encounters will all but cease; young mothers hopelessly addicted to the diverting opiate of ceaseless prattle, and the relentless rise of gossip over thoughtfulness of conversation:
With all manner of rumor, innuendo and calumny spreading like wildfire over this copper web; sloth, disease and immoral behavior encouraged by idle sitting; strange new maladies and viruses transported into our homes by the telephones of strangers, and the ability of these same strangers to say whatever they like to our innocent children; loathsome legions of salesmen, ordinarily turned away at the door, breaching the sanctity of home and hearth whenever they wish to force their wares on those who have unsuspectingly responded to the bell; and a rash of family strife as parents and children contend for their precious moments of telephonistic ecstasy.
These are but a few of the calamities awaiting us if we succumb to this dangerous new invention, if we do not struggle to be the masters of this web, and not its prey. Impossible, you say? We once thought that no reputable lady would ever ride astraddle a bicycle, and now look at the shameless sight of billowing skirts on our public by-ways, if you dare.
What of the sacred act of writing? We know ourselves as Homo sapiens, but the designation should really be Homo scribens, for it is by the act of writing that we distinguish ourselves from the brutes of forest and plain. It is by writing that we convey the ore of our fleeting perceptions and idle commentary into the enduring gold of truth. Will not the telephone deal a death blow to our most elevating act? Since the companies that provide this 'service' charge a toll for each and every minute, the rhapsodic pluperfection of polysyllabic language will vanish, to be replaced by penny-saving grunts and snorts. Punctuation and spelling will wither, grammar and syntax will crumble, and will take with them--it is not extreme to suggest--the all-too-slender barriers to atavism.
Travel, that great broadener of human experience, will cease altogether, another victim of this web. Why would any of us endure the rigors of sea voyages and long train trips through often dangerous territory when we might simply talk into the telephone and ask those already there to describe the delights of Paris or Parma, of Cairo or Cannes? Imagining ourselves "connected" to the wonders of the world, we could substitute the lazy ease of telephonery for the vigorous exertion of climbing the Alps or boating up the Amazon. Exploration of the many undiscovered places on the planet will cone to an end. Just picture, not the legendary traveler encountering another at the very ends of the earth, but an effete Stanley shouting instead into a box on his library wall, "Ahoy, Dr. Livingstone, is that you?"
Perhaps we should be grateful that these telephones are held in one place by their wires, lest those who have been ensnared by the illusion of incessant "communication" carry these devices everywhere, speaking to unseen listeners like madmen haunted by disembodied spirits. If we solid Americans, guided by plain horse-sense, our traditional practicality and the unerring rules of good manners, rise up now against the spread of this insidious technology, such insanity will never engulf us.
HE WON'T GET OFF THE 'PHONE!
The dinner, succulent, sits waiting,
A rib roast, tender at the bone,
But no one yet is celebrating,
In fact their nerves are slowly grating,
Because he won't get off the 'phone!
The grass beneath the hammock pushes,
The yard is badly over-grown
With debris and disheveled bushes,
As tow'ring as the Hindu Kush is
Because he won't get off the 'phone!
The child, the pup are sore neglected,
The wife feels she exists alone,
Their countenances so dejected,
From Father they are dis-connected,
Because he won't get off the 'phone!
Outside a silvery moon is shining,
Where late the golden sun has shone,
But inside there is only pining,
In circumstances too confining,
Because he won't get off the 'phone!
*****
1 Timothy 5:8 "But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel."
We are to provide more than just material and monetary goods for our families. We must also be sure to provide our family members with love and attention.
And, most of all, we need to be providing good Godly wisdom and instruction - by both word as well as example.
Much damage is done in ignoring our loved ones and our parental duties while pursuing idle (idol!) pleasure and distraction.
So...please, get off the phone!! : )
In His Love
(NEXT PAGE - Bible Overview)
Setting the Record Straight: A Dangerous New Web of Communication
by Mr. Owen Edwards
Writing at the early part of the last century, Owen Edwards penned these 'prophetic' words about the phone:
"A dangerous new universe of communications threatens to ensnare us, one so seductive and insidious that it must be recognized for what it is: a web!"
A web which, once we are trapped within it, will do nothing less than change the boundaries of human decency, decorum and behavior! Do nothing less than change the way we speak, think and, yes, act!
And what is the spider weaving this web, which mesmerizes and even enslaves its users? The spider which has crept unchallenged into offices and homes? The spider which, while promising extraordinary new avenues of discourse and delivery, has spun its web wider and wider and, yes world-wider?
It is Mr. Alexander Graham Bell's pernicious instrument, the telephone!
Merely one quarter-century -- an eye-blink in the annals of time -- has elapsed since Mr. Bell summoned his assistant Mr. Thomas Watson at his Boston laboratory. And with what did he summon him? Was it with anything like the noble rhetoric of Aristotle, a Caesar, an Aquinas, a Burke? No, it was with these blunt words: "Watson, come here, I want you," an augury -- even at that inaugural moment -- of deterioration into self-serving language and thought.
And in the lapse of that short span, we now find our skies darkened with a literal web of telephone wires, and ourselves accosted with offers of cheaper and cheaper telephones--beguiled by the very tools with which to carry out our own envelopment.
The truth is that this cold, impersonal new method of 'communication' has the potential--should we fail to recognize its threat--to change us from a nation of warm, gregarious souls, welcoming our friends across our thresholds, into a nation of lonely, house-bound hermits.
One need not tax one's imagination to envision the dire effects: front porches empty, as desperate families sit inside on balmy summer evenings waiting for the discordant clanging of Bell's hellish bells; streets and lanes deserted as former strollers find themselves tethered to the box on the wall; polite repartee replaced by the grunts of the cave-dweller, since face-to-face encounters will all but cease; young mothers hopelessly addicted to the diverting opiate of ceaseless prattle, and the relentless rise of gossip over thoughtfulness of conversation:
With all manner of rumor, innuendo and calumny spreading like wildfire over this copper web; sloth, disease and immoral behavior encouraged by idle sitting; strange new maladies and viruses transported into our homes by the telephones of strangers, and the ability of these same strangers to say whatever they like to our innocent children; loathsome legions of salesmen, ordinarily turned away at the door, breaching the sanctity of home and hearth whenever they wish to force their wares on those who have unsuspectingly responded to the bell; and a rash of family strife as parents and children contend for their precious moments of telephonistic ecstasy.
These are but a few of the calamities awaiting us if we succumb to this dangerous new invention, if we do not struggle to be the masters of this web, and not its prey. Impossible, you say? We once thought that no reputable lady would ever ride astraddle a bicycle, and now look at the shameless sight of billowing skirts on our public by-ways, if you dare.
What of the sacred act of writing? We know ourselves as Homo sapiens, but the designation should really be Homo scribens, for it is by the act of writing that we distinguish ourselves from the brutes of forest and plain. It is by writing that we convey the ore of our fleeting perceptions and idle commentary into the enduring gold of truth. Will not the telephone deal a death blow to our most elevating act? Since the companies that provide this 'service' charge a toll for each and every minute, the rhapsodic pluperfection of polysyllabic language will vanish, to be replaced by penny-saving grunts and snorts. Punctuation and spelling will wither, grammar and syntax will crumble, and will take with them--it is not extreme to suggest--the all-too-slender barriers to atavism.
Travel, that great broadener of human experience, will cease altogether, another victim of this web. Why would any of us endure the rigors of sea voyages and long train trips through often dangerous territory when we might simply talk into the telephone and ask those already there to describe the delights of Paris or Parma, of Cairo or Cannes? Imagining ourselves "connected" to the wonders of the world, we could substitute the lazy ease of telephonery for the vigorous exertion of climbing the Alps or boating up the Amazon. Exploration of the many undiscovered places on the planet will cone to an end. Just picture, not the legendary traveler encountering another at the very ends of the earth, but an effete Stanley shouting instead into a box on his library wall, "Ahoy, Dr. Livingstone, is that you?"
Perhaps we should be grateful that these telephones are held in one place by their wires, lest those who have been ensnared by the illusion of incessant "communication" carry these devices everywhere, speaking to unseen listeners like madmen haunted by disembodied spirits. If we solid Americans, guided by plain horse-sense, our traditional practicality and the unerring rules of good manners, rise up now against the spread of this insidious technology, such insanity will never engulf us.
HE WON'T GET OFF THE 'PHONE!
The dinner, succulent, sits waiting,
A rib roast, tender at the bone,
But no one yet is celebrating,
In fact their nerves are slowly grating,
Because he won't get off the 'phone!
The grass beneath the hammock pushes,
The yard is badly over-grown
With debris and disheveled bushes,
As tow'ring as the Hindu Kush is
Because he won't get off the 'phone!
The child, the pup are sore neglected,
The wife feels she exists alone,
Their countenances so dejected,
From Father they are dis-connected,
Because he won't get off the 'phone!
Outside a silvery moon is shining,
Where late the golden sun has shone,
But inside there is only pining,
In circumstances too confining,
Because he won't get off the 'phone!
*****
1 Timothy 5:8 "But if any provide not for his own, and specially for those of his own house, he hath denied the faith, and is worse than an infidel."
We are to provide more than just material and monetary goods for our families. We must also be sure to provide our family members with love and attention.
And, most of all, we need to be providing good Godly wisdom and instruction - by both word as well as example.
Much damage is done in ignoring our loved ones and our parental duties while pursuing idle (idol!) pleasure and distraction.
So...please, get off the phone!! : )
In His Love
(NEXT PAGE - Bible Overview)