Fence Sitter
A. R. Samson
Mobile communication with its speed and ease of transmission has a down side. With the ubiquity of the smart phone whose penetration rate is over 130% of the population, including babies, fetuses, and prisoners, there is a new social blight that has spread in the texting world.
There is less risk in the more easily retracted slip of the tongue, as in addressing someone as “Love Boat” in a noisy bar. A discreet cough is bound to confuse the listener on what she heard. (Was it pump boat?) On the other hand, a text expressing tender feelings and terms of endearment accompanied by joyous emojis dancing on poles, once sent, can no longer be retrieved.
The “missent message” (MM) can take many forms.
An unidentified caller selling condos or asking for an appointment for a job interview is not in the SIM directory. This unidentified number may be sent a message intended for a previous texter — the jackfruits from Davao are ready for pick-up at the usual place. They have already been washed, rinsed, and peeled as per your instructions. This obviously coded communication (usually employed by spies with clandestine motives) may indeed be about fruits ready to be served as a meal. The female sales person or job applicant who receives this message may dismiss the cryptic note as a missent message. Still, she may take the trouble of texting back: noted on your pair of jackfruits for pick-up. You can keep them in cold storage.
What about a brazenly intimate communication sent by a slip of the thumb to the wrong individual? It is hard to explain away a message requesting particularly skimpy underwear (like dental floss) to be worn by the addressee provided with a specifically numbered hotel room. This missive will be found merely entertaining if sent to an office colleague by mistake, unless she is a dentist: I forwarded the message on dental floss to your wife who may need it for her grocery list.
There are also insulting comments (that pig is asking for too much money considering all the disasters he has caused) intended for a third party being missent to the subject of the attack. This form of front-biting can prove jarring to the embarrassed sender especially when responded with a note — See you at the gym and be careful with your weights when you find ants and fecal matter in your jogging shorts.
Short messages and instructions can be damning. (Just pay off the bastard.) While paper trails are avoided to eliminate evidence of wrongdoing, seemingly untraceable electronic mails and text messages are now capable of being resurrected from their electronic graves where they were supposed to have been buried.
The social damage from a missent message can be long-lasting. Saying that the message is not intended for the one who received it doesn’t repair the harm. While the sentiments expressed might have been intended for a transient object of lustful intent, the receiving party whoever it is will consider the yearning expressed improper if not age-appropriate.
The farewell message is the worst variant of the MM. While a letter (snail mail) can be snatched back from the mailing room in time, an e-mail or text can no longer be recalled once the “send” button is pressed — “We watched so many movies together. Now we don’t even remember any of the plots.” This rather poetic goodbye is sure to wreak havoc when sent to the wrong party, or even the right one.
Are digital communications more prone to being missent? Because of their speed and directness, with no cover of an intermediary who might exercise discretion and keep a letter quarantined until sobriety and second thoughts return, the quickly missent message offers no such protection. It can’t even be anonymous.
The lawyer’s admonition not to put down anything unpleasant in writing has a modern equivalent: do not send a digital message or post that can be read by the wrong eyes or be forwarded to unintended recipients. Terms of endearment anyway are best expressed in person, as well as the actions such words usually accompany. Of course, these can be disguised with a generic moniker like “sir/madam”.
Telegraphing desire and promises of delights, especially if unnatural, cannot readily be classified as poetry, especially when appearing on the phone screen of an unintended party… accompanied by a photo of the Eiffel Tower.
A. R. Samson is chair and CEO of Touch DDB.
ar.samson@yahoo.com
