Lindsey asks about getting rid of a smart phone:
Please tell me more about the smartphone. How did you get rid of it? It seems like a silly question I suppose but did you replace it with a dumb phone? Where did you find a dumb phone and a cellphone plan to go with it?
I am interested in the logistics of making it work when you walk into restaurants that no longer carry paper menus. The trendy ones all want you to scan a QR code these days. Or more importantly, communicating with necessary service providers when they all want you to have their app. Looking at banks and daycare at the moment… I suppose daycare isn’t too much a concern for you, but banks?
I guess this all boils down to: do you have any tips for someone considering a similar thing (as I type this on the smartphone)?
At the beginning of 2022, I pulled the SIM card from my Android smartphone and said goodbye.
I took that SIM card and put it into a Light Phone II. All that phone really does is text and call, though it also has a simple map app which provides simple written directions from location to location.
This was a very good decision and I do not regret it.
Our phones are spy devices that track us and record our lives. They also constantly irradiate you. And yes, the Light Phone also allows the user to be tracked, but most of the time I leave it off or at home.
Once you’re not checking notifications and emails and reading the news, etc., you stop caring about your phone.
As for restaurants, etc., I don’t care. If they can’t tell me what they serve without me having to carry a government tracking device smartphone, heck with them.
And no, we don’t do daycare. And I don’t care to install banking apps. I reject all that. You can still function without a phone, and life is much better without it.
Don’t you remember what it was like to not carry that stupid thing? To not constantly have your eyes and attention drawn to a little screen that begs for your attention? To live life unencumbered by digital noise?
I remembered, and wished I had those days back.
So I reclaimed them by ditching my phone.
The benefits of living without a digital chain greatly outweigh the difficulties. I’ve gotten to read many more books since I cut the leash – just look at the reading lists I’ve posted for the last two years!
My wife still has a smart phone, which she uses sometimes. We take photos on it, and occasionally I’ll take it in the car when driving someplace unfamiliar.
But personally, I’m done. And if her phone was gone too, it’d be fine.
I read paper books.
I garden with hand tools.
I can sit by the pond and watch my cows without Zuckerberg dinging away in my pocket.
I play with my children without taking a phone from my pocket.
I carry on conversations face to face.
I go to sleep without the blue glow of a screen.
I don’t have a TV.
I don’t have a computer in my house.
I reject Modernity.
13 comments
Now you’ve got me thinking about things. It was better, wasn’t it? I keep thinking I’ll put this stupid thing in its place, and 10 minutes later, there I am picking it up again to just check on this one thing. Hmmm.
Yes. It took me a couple of weeks to break the addiction. I also keep my computer in my office, which is an outdoor shed.
Leave me alone, world – I want time with my family!
Also, losing the damned thing makes you smarter.
I never got one to begin with. So much easier than getting rid of it later ;) Seriously: old enough that cell phones were not really a thing until I was an adult, and I was too poor to be an early adopter of the technology. So I got to watch what happened to various friends and acquaintances when they acquired their first… iphone, galaxy, whatever. It was ugly and I wanted no part of it. Still drives me bonkers when I’m hanging out, in person, with actual people… and their attention is constantly zapped away by blips and boops. Like trying to have a conversation at the end of a busy airport runway.
I have a very antagonistic relationship even with my dumb flip phone. I frequently “forget” it in the car for 2-3 days. When I find it again, it’s like “Oh! THAT’s why the house was so peaceful!
Yes! Never had one, don’t ever plan to. No social media for me, either. If you know me, you know where I live and how to get a hold of me. The usual response to, “I don’t have a mobile phone,” is “Oh, you must get so much done every day.” Well, yeah, it’s called Life, which is not found on a screen for me.
Gonna go check on the okra, then practice the musical instrument I’ve played for 40 years. ‘Bye!
Before I moved I kept my phone at home. I rarely go out to eat but I did 2 years ago and there was some crazy looking dot on the table and the waitress told me to scan it for a menu. I ask her if she had a scanner. She was confused, she told me about phones and scanning and I told her I was from the 1970’s and this stuff seems crazy to me. I do carry a phone now because my computer is not set up and I like to use the phone as my computer mostly to look up plants I find. I still refuse to use it for the convenience of the government or corporate world. Some places where I shop ask me for my cell number and I tell them I do not have one. Sometimes their computer cash register will not advance the sale without a phone number. I will not give the VA my number either, they want me to do remote doctors appointments through a cell phone. I refuse to comply. They did not pay for my phone they do not get to benefit from it.
Smart phones really aren’t that smart for sure for various reasons. As I sit here typing this on one no less. There’s still a way to live life without them assuredly. It sounds crazy to hear restaurants don’t have paper menus anymore at least in some cases. We haven’t been to a restaurant for for over 6 years with one exception of Panera Bread after a hurricane hit our area and we drove over to Alabama to avoid the devastation. Maybe been to a restaurant otherwise another 2 or so times in the last 12 or so years. Definitely haven’t seen one without a paper menu yet and hopefully I won’t anyways. We do the truly organic thing to a almost purist level so no need for restaurants though I used to love eating out at places before we made our changes around 13-14 years ago. If I weren’t running an online business selling plants and such I’d try ditching this damned thing too. Unfortunately in certain ways it has woven itself into my life in ways I’m dependent on it for income. From physical sales to advertising for people to come by local pickup. Also Unfortunately I’ve gotten onto so many plant trading forums and found YouTube personalities I can learn from its definitely hard to walk away without a fight. There are some benefits no doubts but there’s a mountain of detriment too. At least we don’t do cable or even Netflix. Only a DVD player to watch movies or whatever of our choice. No computer at all besides the phones either that’s usable. Have an old laptop but can’t use it without internet installed. Don’t know how to use the wifi hotspot or at least never even tried. I’m glad I got to grow up in the time before phones and computers and have the memory of it although by the time of my young teen years it was taking hold. It is sad they call this way of life progress. It definitely regresses social interaction physically although digitally is alive and well as they want it…
We have lighphones and they have been quirky lately.
Yeah, mine is weird too. But I don’t really care – it’s still better than my old smartphone. The more annoying it is, the less I use it!
Thank you for the encouragement, David! I do remember the days before smartphones. I remember being the odd kid out in high school who didn’t have a cellphone. But my brother and I spent hours playing Legos, telling elaborate stories together. Perhaps that’s why we’re still so close when so many of my peers seem to hate their siblings.
The light phone soon ds great except that I do end listening to videoed sermon. I wouldn’t be able to do that on the light phone, right? I receive them through text. Thanks.
Right – you can’t listen to audio on it, as far as I know. No internet either.
I had a dumb phone for years. I finally got a (used, refurbished, old model) smart phone a couple years ago, mainly due to a lack of other options, but I have never installed a single app, scanned a qr code, or used it to pay for something. Most useful apps can be accessed on a desktop browser; and the rest I can do without. You don’t really NEED a smart phone – it’s just that some people and some companies like to pressure everyone else to use the same gadgets and software that they do, as it seems to validate their choices. Fortunately, my cell signal at home is basically nonexistent, and we don’t use wifi, so when I’m at home (which is most of the time), my smart phone is effectively a dumb phone, except I can type out texts faster and take halfway decent photos.