Why No One Answers Their Phone Anymore

It has literally been 2 months since I even received a call on my phone lmao. And I think I'm scared of phonecalls anyway ever since I had a horrible job in a call centre making hundreds of calls a day, so I only answer calls from family regardless. Weird.

 

If you aren't in my contacts, there is a next to zero percent chance that I will answer.

Otherwise, it strongly depends on "who" and "when."

 

Yeah basically the only time I answer is if they're in my contacts or I'm expecting a call from like my Dr. or auto mechanic etc. Otherwise, no chance in hell i'm answering.

 

If they want you that bad they’ll leave a message.

 

Coincidentally I got a lot better at leaving voicemails because of this trend (yes, I know, but I have to leave them for work...)

 

I still talk to people on the phone. I’d much rather here a voice than read a paragraph of a text if we’ll be talking for a while.

 

I not only don’t mind, but actually enjoy talking on the phone to this day. Keeps long distance friendships much healthier than texting ever could, and opens the door to more information or context being delivered in short conversations. Plus if I answer a number I don’t know and it turns out to be someone I don’t want to talk to, it’s pretty easy to just... hang up. Seems really silly to miss a potential emergency call on purpose. In fact, I get more automated, spammy texts than I do phone calls — by a long shot.

That said, the majority of my day to day communication is done through text

 

True. If that floozy Katie from rewards resort center stopped calling me I might answer!!!

Aside from that I talk to my family on the phone regularly and then one friend who likes to communicate by phone.

 

Most people that call me are sketchy job recruitment folk and political blah blah. Texting is cool, though. Se-se-se-send me a text!

 

entirely treat my phone like a pager

 

You know what’s funny is that I’ve been exclusively texting people for about as long as I’ve had cell phones (half of my life at this point) and just recently have I gotten so sick and tired of it that I’ve gotten into making/ taking calls more. If it’s possible and I’m not working I’d much rather talk since it takes less time and the conversation can actually remain a fluid thing as opposed to someone not answering for like 8 hours. Phone calls are fresh and new again to me since I haven’t done it in a decade basically lmao

 

I have the absolute worst phone anxiety, so it literally sends me into a panic when I get phone calls from unknown numbers that aren't obviously spam. I don't know why. It's a real problem for me at work when I have to call publishers about subscriptions.

I also hate being cold called even by friends and family. I enjoy multi-tasking, and it's much easier to do when you're texting. There are a few very good friends I can talk to on the phone for hours, but I prefer it to be planned. Maybe I'm just the worst, haha.

 

I'm a voice on a phone that you rarely answer anymore

 

Sorta-related, I haven't had my voicemail set up in years. Probably at least six years. The anxiety i got from voicemails was the worst.

 

word. the advent of email and texting has been a life saver because even speaking on phone/skype/etc with folks i'm close with is hard for me

 

Online ordering literally changed my life. I am so glad for it.

 

Phone calls are for where the topic is extremely important, personal, or time-sensitive, because unless the call has been planned in advance, you are essentially asking the other person to drop everything else they’re doing at the moment and prioritize you instead. Honestly pretty rude and presumptuous! We as a society wrote it off when that was the only way to quickly get information out of people at a distance, but with texts and e-mails, you can now also be deferential to the recipient’s schedule and personal bandwidth, and electing *not* to be requires justification.

 

This might be one of the most millennial things I've read in a while. I hope you're being a little sarcastic and honestly don't think someone having the audacity to make a phone call is rude.

I also didn't know phone anxiety was such a big thing. I'm on the phone for hours a day whether it's personally or business so maybe I'm just used to it. I have no problem calling to make appointments/reservations etc to.

 

Ah, for some reason I'm not that good with leaving messages, and my speech becomes a lot more awkward, and impaired than if someone had just picked up the phone.

It's an odd occurrence, I can easily record things with a mic, and it's natural for me. However, leave a message/talk to nobody on the other line, and I just get awkward. I end up not leaving a message, and just try calling them again later because I suck at leaving them.

 

I make internal scripts in my head of what I'm gonna say in the convo or voicemail and I had a professor say in class that he did that too and this one guy in class couldn't believe it because he said it's so "easy" like ok some of us have Issues.mp4

Glad I no longer have to look friends up in the phonebook to invite them over tho that kid anxiety was the woooorst

 

I don’t know when I’m supposed to talk on the phone

 

Never knew talking on the phone gave so many people such severe anxiety. Tbh the responsibility of responding to texts/emails has always given me infinitely more anxiety because it inherently leaves what can become an infinite amount of time to think about and reword what I’m saying, a lot times (in my case) forgetting respond at all because I didn’t have time to reply with a proper answer in the moment. Then I’ve gotta apologize for not responding for like a week+ and I feel like a bag of shit about it every time.

But hey, we’re all wired differently. My comments a few posts above are more in relation to people that act like they’re “above” a phone call. Actual panic/anxiety is a different ballgame, which I totally get.

 

Haha, a little hyperbolic, yes. I’m not actually offended at receiving a call from friends, family, or people who need to convey time-sensitive information that calls for an immediate response. But I’m deeply skeptical whenever I see an unrecognized number on my phone and more often than not don’t pick up — if said number wants me to call back, they need to leave a message or send a text identifying themselves to prove they’re worth my time. (Assuming a cursory Google search doesn’t reveal their identity.)

 

robo calls are obviously the reason. 99% of my calls are robocalls... so i obvioulsy just no longer pickup for anything or anyone