Tags
dating, iphone, Life, LOL, millennial, millennials, relationships
The birth of the Read Receipt was inconspicuous enough. It started out in our work email, with easy opt-out options, and was meant to slightly increase productivity. Today, the Read Receipt is everywhere, oftentimes as a default, poking its devilish head into all parts of our lives, from the mundane, to the professional, to the very personal.
Though most people will tell you otherwise, the Read Receipt is no longer just an alternative to responding with “k”. This is the excuse that most people will give you when you ask why they have Read Receipts turned on for text messages– that it saves time and energy because they do not always have to respond. In some cases, that is absolutely true.
For example, I leave my iMessage Read Receipts on, and my official explanation to people is that it makes it easier for me to enjoy my off-duty time outside of the office. That’s true. Personally, for the way that I do work, Read Receipts come in handy when I get a dozen messages asking if I read a particular email. Depending on the context of the conversations, my Read Receipts let my colleagues know that yes, I have read that email. It keeps me from having to validate their requests with a response, which ultimately opens the door for more work-related banter at 8PM on a Friday night.
Since turning on Read Receipts, I get less chatter and repeat text messages throughout the day, “checking to see if I got this.” There’s a real benefit.
But if I’m being honest with myself (and the rest of you, I guess), there’s more to my Read Receipts than professional convenience and productivity.
I first turned on Read Receipts when I saw that a mentor of mine, someone I truly aspire to be like, had them on. When I asked this person about it, they gave me the same explanation that I gave you above. It seemed like the cool thing to do. The person with Read Receipts on is too busy to respond to all their text messages. That’s not to say that everyone who has their Read Receipts on is trying to come off aloof– some people are legitimately busy and/or cold– but that’s part of the perception.
Long before there were smartphones or text messages, this perception still existed as a fundamental part of the way we play games with each other. This is most true in the beginning stages of dating a Potential Love Interest (PTL), where two people are figuring out where they stand, and what they mean to each other, and how much importance they want to allot to one another. Read Receipts, when used, have now become a fundamental part of that process.
Just like people say that they have Read Receipts on as a convenience, most people that I spoke with for this post said that they don’t like playing games. Everyone says that. But that’s mostly because we’re using the term “playing games,” instead of being more honest about it: we’re protecting ourselves.
You don’t do a cannonball off of the high dive to start a relationship. You wade slowly into the emotional deep end with someone, gradually peeling back layer after layer. This is why most people try to look their best on a first date, and why first dates aren’t spent watching Netflix and eating ice cream. We “play games” as a way of controlling the development of a relationship, so that one person isn’t outpacing the other when it comes to being vulnerable.
We’ve been doing this for centuries, but the Read Receipt is a very powerful new weapon in this game. So powerful, in fact, that companies like Facebook and other chat services have turned on Read Receipts as a default, forcing us to confront the knowledge that sometimes, people just don’t care about what you have to say. Some folks, those who are perhaps less tech-savvy than your average Millennial, don’t even know that they might be subjecting people to this.
And still, there are others, like myself, that choose to use Read Receipts in one of the most personal forms of written communication– text message. That said, I am not always the carefree, confident texter that my Read Receipts might suggest.
Sometimes, if a PTL is taking a while to respond, I will read the message and let my phone sit there for a few minutes. And to take it a step further, I’ll purposefully not open the text message if I really want them to think I’m de-prioritizing them, opting instead to read the message through the preview function on the lock screen, or in the Notifications Center.
A week ago, I would have been ashamed to admit this, but I often read a PTL’s message on the Notification Center of my phone, and intentionally don’t open it for a while so he doesn’t see I’ve read it and not responded. It’s because I’d rather he think I have better things to do than be glued to my phone.
The thing about Read Receipts that puts them on a slightly different level from some of the other games we play is that they are an unusual kind of confirmation. When you screen a call, or don’t respond to a text message (with Read Receipts off), the other person can imagine all kinds of situations in which you might not be able to respond. It hurts, but it’s an indefinite kind of pain with a variety of explanations and excuses that could remedy the situation instantly.
Read Receipts don’t leave much room for a comforting imagination. So if you’re crossing the Read line, using those little bastards for productivity or protection or convenience, be aware of the weight they bear. We’ve never had such an effortless way to make people feel ignored, and with an abundance of screens slowly sucking away the empathy we feel for one another, it’s worth remembering that.