"Email I"

"Email I"

Humans have always had to deal with non-response, or to put it bluntly humiliation, which I have dealt with in other places. Here I explore non-response and humiliation vis-a-vis emails. Your first reaction might be to think that I am overreacting. 

 I am confident that instead what is amiss is that we are desensitized to the social violence we wreck on each other all the time. We have to suffer more and more of it not only from non-response but from the attacks of the inundation of all the input we do not want from solicitations and other busybodies.

But we have always had to deal with unanswered letters and telephone calls. What is the difference with email? It is that we now, for one, have multiple ways of communicating and numerous more opportunities. It matters not for one, the quality of the opportunity so much as that they are all opportunities to be disappointed.  Each time we desire a connection with others there is a chance that it will not happen and thus a chance for disappointment, for shame.

But I would like to turn my attention more immediately to what I have found to be a common occurrence, whether it with a friend or a supposed colleague or within a group of common interest, and that is the unanswered plea request or comment. I am limiting the correspondence to that akin to a personal letter.

Whether we “missed the boat” as a society about establishing email etiquette or not I think it is beside the point. I think we are missing the boat period in paying attention to each other in terms of common courtesy. Email seems to have empowered an overall majority with a sense of entitlement to anything that comes their way with not a thought of hitting the “reply” button and even saying “thank you,” It is all the more ironic since it could not be easier to do. It is almost as if we perversely do not do it since we can so easily say “thank you” or “I will get back to you?” And we puff ourselves up saying we are “too busy.” “How important I am!” “Busy beaver I am reading my email!” And or a private indulgence in what we have called “passive-aggressiveness.” If we can read it we can hit the reply button?

Of late I have followed up on several exchanges where I have been left on the short end letting the others know that I felt “hurt.” The responses were interesting. So far there have been responses. At first somewhat conciliatory but in the end a need on the other's part to “win,” shame is always interesting. It is painful; we want the pain to go away and for it to go away we often blame the messenger. 

I am not ignoring the fact that those of us that use email constantly and are thus exposed the most to the danger of being hurt by it need to stop and realize that still after, well only 15, years many people, still use email in very personal ways. Some people only check their mail very infrequently or think nothing of neglecting it for a week or two. Some still only have access at work and for many, it is becoming more expensive to have access instead of less so. 

Brian Lynch