Answer the phone!

 A phone call from a number I don't recognise. Oh God, what is it? When a stranger calls me, I'm always slightly worried: why not drop me an email or text instead? Why this overfamiliarity with someone you don't know?

At least I pick up. According to a new survey, a quarter of young people between the ages of 18 and 34 never answer their phones, even to people they know.They prefer the comfort of texting and voice messages to the stress of of a live conversation.

Beata Beatrix
Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882)
Photo Credit:Tate [CC BY-NC-ND]

I understand where they are coming from. I am part of the generation that would never call someone unless it was an emergency or I was ordering a particular service. I always text first, because I don't want to interrupt the day of someone I don't know well in an abrupt way. With a text or an email I also enjoy the fact I can be precise because I can edit it.

That said, I have never understood the appeal of voice notes - a message with a voice recording of yourself attached to it. Voice notes are the favoured form of communication for much of Gen Z, but give me a phone chat over a voice note any day of the week.

Voice notes are the worst of all worlds. With texts you can edit what you are expressing. With a phone call there is the intimate immediacy of a proper conversation. With voice notes there is neither.

A phone call from a number I don't know is slightly worrying. A voice note from a number I don't recognise is terrifying.

(Tomiwa Owolade, The Sunday Times, 2024)

What is this? Being slightly worried by a stranger's telephone call, the overfamiliarity with someone you don't know, the stress of a live conversation. For God's sake it's a telephone call. Texting first before you phone people? No wonder there's been an increase in mental health problems if such trivial things get blown up into major issues. Get a grip!