This is pretty much Michael Richards with the luck of circumstances to reach for a word that is only offensive to/about disabled people when he lost control of his temper.
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I’m in with the apparent general consensus that Pete Davidson is in the right here.
Standup comedy is perhaps the single most difficult and terrifying art form, and he has every right to be angry at people who disrespect it and him by not being present. And he has every right to tell them off. And tell them off further when someone of them clap as if they weren’t doing what he was just telling them off about.
Is it so difficult to understand how and why this sort of behavior can throw a speaker or performer off and disturb their concentration? These sort of questions are like “well, I may have severe nosebleed in the first row but how does that pick the speaker’s pocket? I’m still paying attention!” (<- something that actually happened to me during an university lecture, I got a nosebleed, the professor was so shaken at the sight of blood he couldn’t continue until I left the room.)
Also: I don’t know you, I don’t know how you absorb information, I’m willing to believe that you have special ways of paying attention and whatnot, but it’s kind of unreasonable to assume that everyone who is playing or chatting or browsing instagram or whatnot are actually doing so because it helps them concentrate on what I’m saying. I mean, seriously now.
Yeah, nope. For one, in my case my audience is usually not the “younger cohort” (people older than me, usually). Two, I’m familiar enough with my phone and swipe keyboards and so on, and I’m willing to bet money that the vast majority of people, even younger people, won’t take notes using their phones, especially not with that tell-tale thumb movement that comes with scrolling through a feed. (Cue people posting that they do, and if someone does that good for them, but they don’t speak for everyone else.)
This is just fishing for excuses. If you’re at a lecture or a performance have some impulse control and put down your damn phone. If you can’t concentrate without flipping through Facebook then perhaps it’s a sign that there’s something you need to work on.
It also sounds like he set a boundary (“don’t record me, don’t inturrupt my show”) which was violated.
While as someone on the autistic spectrum I don’t like his word choice, I also don’t like the idea that if someone repeatedly violates your boundaries you can suffer because your response wasn’t respectful enough.
I’ve seen many a story about a celebrity that boils down to someone harassing them then the media blowing up when they yell or swear.
Being a public figure isn’t a free pass to be treated badly
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And if you can’t handle people using assistance tech (especially in older audiences), maybe you need to work on your skills as a public speaker.
And what @Auld_Lang_Syne is speaking of isn’t as rare as you seem to think. You may think so, because we’ve been forced to abandon our compensations to the detriment of our ability to learn, by teachers and lecturers insulted because we’re not hanging off every word. We’ve been sent out of the room or told not to show up at all. All so people like you can be sheltered from dealing with who don’t fit neatly into your preconceptions of what a person paying attention or learning is supposed to look like.
The arguments you are using are also the exact same ones that people have used historically to ban guide dogs and wheelchairs and sign-language interpreters. Am I saying my issues are exactly the same? No, but your arguments are.
And really, if the problem is that people are consistently bored with your lectures, maybe it’s not the people that are the problem.
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I guess would you mind if I held a flashlight in your eye in a dark room while you were actively trying to have some sort of trancedent communal experience you’d paid good money for? If you can’t pay attention to the performance, why not just do something else?
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You haven’t been listening to a thing I said, have you?
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I’m not sure. I think I am reading something about why you want to use a bright light in a dark room where most people there don’t want you to. Is that not what you’re saying?
Considering that you seem to be assuming the opposite, …
Lectures don’t generally happen in dark rooms. Perhaps darkened, but not dark enough that a phone screen will blind anyone. That would cut down on the note-taking that does happen in most lectures.
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Sorry but these “arguments” are getting ridiculous. A phone is not “assistance tech” the same way a guide dog or a wheelchair or sign-language interpreters are assistance; and most people don’t actually have a condition that requires them to use such assistance to be able to focus on whatever is happening. (Some do; but not every dick who can’t stop looking at Facebook.) And if I need to “work on my skills” then so does every damn speaker and performer who has ever spoken out about people being on their phones during their talks/performances, also damn those backwards and insensitive theaters and cinemas for reminding audiences to switch off their phones, how dare they.
So now they’re bored and not trying to focus using “assistance tech”? Get your arguments right…
Also, I’m just curious - since you seem to think that there’s no such thing as poor self-control and everyone who uses their phones when they’re supposed to be paying attention to something else are just trying to actually focus… what do you think of people who are on their phones while driving/cycling/etc.? Are they also just trying to focus using “assistance tech”?
You’re the one insisting so many people in your lectures are bored. That it can’t be any other reason. Since you are so certain that’s the problem, maybe look at fixing that.
I on the other hand, know that those labels have been slapped on people with attention-deficits and other learning disabilities, as a way of victim blaming and for other people to not have to bother to adapt and accommodate.
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Here’s how to rant against audience distraction:
Let’s not derail this topic by focusing on one member’s take of it.
There are many avenues and environments for public speaking, a small as a classroom or meeting room and as grand as a stadium. I think we can all agree that what counts as a “distraction” has a lot to do with those variables, those talking, and how engaged they are trying to be with their audience. There’s not likely to be a one-size-fits-all approach to be found for general etiquette IMHO, other than perhaps “don’t be a dick to the speaker if you’re voluntarily at their talk”, with all the ambiguity that includes.
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It’s also because conservatives have no sense of humor, and reality tends toward the liberal. They can’t stand that, and have Fox News for the expressed purpose of demonstrating otherwise to a national audience of morons.
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