Title: Bad Optics vs Whiny Kids, You Make the Call!
Optics. Have you heard of it?
No not the study of physical light, blah, blah, blah, but optics as it relates to how we see a situation, usually in the media, either news, social or otherwise.
It’s a term that came into vogue within the last decade or so. Mostly people relate it to politics as in a politician being spotted kissing the wrong baby or of course, worse. “Those are bad optics right there, Diane. Now back to you at News 5 Central!”
Interestingly enough I don’t hear that much about it. I think maybe that’s because people were quick to dismiss the term as being part of the media and hence, not worthy of contemplation.
I don’t think that’s fair. I think optics, good or bad, whatever that means is a very important term in our nation’s conscience and we should be more aware of it. Or at least we should be more aware of what we’re observing. Which again, is optics.
For example, people are always getting bent out of shape about other people on their cell phones.
Take the situation where a couple might be sitting in a diner having breakfast, and while waiting on their food they are both caught looking at their phones.
The bad optics response is to say, “Look at those two on their phones! They should be having conversation! They should be getting to know each other.”
Maybe the truth is they are simply reading the news, like we used to do when we took newspapers to the diner with us.
Or maybe they are reading a fashion article, like we used to do when we took a magazine to the diner with us.
Or maybe they are responding to an email from a friend who lives across country, like we used to do when we used the post office!
I recently spotted a Facebook post with a young girl and an old man sitting in a restaurant. The little girl is on her cell phone. The old man, with his back to us, is just sitting there. The caption alludes to the little girl running out of time to communicate with this old fellow.
The optics are suggesting this is a grandfather and his granddaughter and the kid stinks because she is not engrossed in learning all the great lessons he might have to extoll at that moment in time.
Well maybe the little girl is making a funny picture of him and her from some Snapchat app and we’ve only been afforded a snapshot moment in between!
Or maybe she’s reading him something her mother wrote to him and because he doesn’t use email, the little girl will need to relay it.
Or maybe he’s a dope! How do we know he has any great lessons or words of wisdom? Or even funny limericks? We don’t!
Afterall how many people do have words of wisdom or funny limericks? Not many!
It’s not Ben Franklin or Jerry Seinfeld in the picture, it’s just some random septuagenarian!
Forget this kid on her phone, you people are putting a lot of pressure on this old guy! My dad’s like 79. That’s not young.
You know what he wants? To be left alone!
You know what he wanted when I was a kid and we were sitting at a table together? For me to shut up and be quiet!
This is what adults want. This is supposedly what they’ve wanted since the beginning of time. Can you imagine cave man kids?
The men of the cave have headed off to hunt the great wooly mammoth. It’s only the kids, the moms, and the thirty-year-old grandmothers, who look like they are eighty, left in the cave. Well the kids are playing, talking and having great conversation.
Then guess what? A saber tooth tiger hears this conversation, rolls on up in the cave and has a buffet of cave people! And why? Because the kids didn’t have a cell phone!
Children are to be seen and not heard. We’ve finally been given a device that enables this function, but now all of a sudden we want kids to start talking??
You people. Sheesh. Get it together. Get on your phones. And shut up.