So what is it about the use of cell phones that seems to bother some people?
First, there was a campaign to ban the use of cell phones while driving. While I agree that safe driving requires two hands on the steering wheel—at least, most of the time, I see no reason to designate the cell phone as the root of all evil.
Why not campaign to ban CD players in cars? Fiddling with CDs is at least as dangerous as using a cell phone! And what about eating? Doesn't munching a burger while driving qualify as dangerous behavior? Apparently not. In the eyes of the zealots, only the cell phone qualifies as a distraction while driving.
So legislation was passed and we all bought Bluetooth devices, but did that satisfy the zealots? Not on your life! They then pointed to studies that indicate it isn't the use of cell phones that creates the distraction, but the conversation itself. According to the zealots, only conversations conducted on cell phones, whether hands-free or not, are dangerous. Conversations with real, live people sitting in the car create no distraction. Go figure. And so we were encouraged not to use even our hands-free devises while driving.
An aside to the zealots: As a cell phone user and mother of two, I can assure you that no distraction can compare to a couple of pre-schoolers yammering in the back seat. Now go ahead and campaign to outlaw that!
Now that the zealots have made their point and have relentlessly hammered into the general public the notion that cell phone use while driving is a cardinal sin, they'll go away and leave us alone, right?
Of course not, you fool! Now they've begun a campaign to convince us that the mere use of a cell phone anywhere, even outside a motor vehicle, will result in brain tumors. They want us to believe we will all suffer gruesome deaths at a young age because we have embraced modern technology.
The story of the cell phone-brain tumor connection is slowly catching on, having been reported, re-reported and re-re-reported by a number of news outlets. After it takes off, what will the zealots attack next?
Our computer keyboards, of course! During the course of the past several weeks, I have heard no less than a half-dozen news reports detailing how many germs have set up residence on my keyboard, waiting to strike me down with some dire illness. Why, according to the zealots, the keyboard I'm now using contains more bacteria than my toilet! If we don't stop using our computers immediately, a contagion will arise that may wipe humanity off the face of the earth!
I'm waiting with bated breath for the reports that are sure to follow which prove that video gaming causes cancer.
Don't you get tired of all these half-baked so-called "studies"? And don't you wonder who funds them? And to what purpose?
Perhaps the folks who keep warning us of the dire consequences of using modern technology are in cahoots with the global warming nuts who want us to revert to our pioneer past.
I have a word of advice for them: Get a life!
© 2008 by Libbi Adams. All rights reserved.
