Cell Phones and the Demise of Western Civilization

I remember the good old days when you could easily pick out the crazy people when they talked to themselves. You knew how and when to steer clear of them as they approached when they would say things like, "Just kill it. Just KILL IT!," and "The captain said pull back. Captain. I'm the Captain. Hi ho hi ho!"

But it's hard to pick out the crazies when you can't tell whether or not they're talking to themselves or just have a hands-free phone wedged in their ear canal.

One day in the mid 90's I was walking around the East Village, traditionally a place for starving artists and eclectic bohemians, I saw a guy in a button-down Oxford chambray blue shirt talking to himself. Even though he looked like a stuffy wall street guy, I thought, at least he's talking to himself. That would make him quirky and odd, and therefore, fit in perfectly with the colorful fabric of the diverse East Village.

But then I spotted it. There was a phone. A tiny phone. A tiny cordless phone that he was holding with the hand I couldn't see. Damn it! That guy is talking on a cell phone! I then understood that it was the end of the East Village as we knew it.

St. Marks, a street in the Village known for grimy tattoo and body piercing parlors, rubber and mesh fettish-wear at the famed Trash and Vaudeville, and stores selling second-hand music and manic panic hair color, used to be a haven for punkers, artists and wayward kids who debate their sexual preference. But soon after that cell phone incident, I began noticing some unnerving changes. Cropping up alongside the famous Sock Man (yes, he sells socks) who's been there for years and hole-in-the-wall Yaffa Cafe, who makes a darn good soy burger, settled a re-invented GAP (they were the last GAP in the city to update the 70's facade) and now a Chipotle Grill, a chain that sells southwestern-themed food off a behind-the-scenes conveyer belt and is formerly owned by the golden arch gods themselves, McDonalds.

I contest that the cell phone revolution has captured individuality and is holding taste hostage. I thought the East Village would have been the last place to lose all sense of raw creativity and expressive humanity. Hold on - is that my phone ringing?