Techno-terrorism

I admit, I'm really lazy about following the news. Anywhere.

Not having a TV really helps. So does being too cheap to buy newspapers or magazines. I make a pass through the New York Times every day if I can manage, but if I don't, it doesn't keep me awake at night.

So of course I saw a few blurbs about the terrible train wreck on Friday in LA that killed something like 25 people. As an EMT, I can begin to picture way too clearly what a scene like that must've looked like. And sounded like. And smelled like.

But KC sent me this link that really got my attention:

It looks like the train driver was text messaging just before he blew through the red light signals intended to avoid just such a catastrophe.

I'm aware of the irony that I use Web 2.0 technology to rail against, well, things like technology, and teenagers, and the general state of society. But on the other hand, I tried using Twitter after reading about the kid who got out of an Egyptian jail by using the software. I enrolled, and then after about an hour I turned it off, because it was just too irritating. I realized I didn't actually care what any of my friends were doing every second of their day.

This guy who was supposed to be driving the train may have been texting with a 15-year-old just a minute before the train crashed. Leaving 25 people dead.

I rant and rave at my students about leaving the laptops out of my classroom (too many distractions) and making sure I never even see, let alone hear their cell phones. I admit, at rock bottom I'm annoyed by their lack of attention, and the concordant lack of respect for me that this seems to imply. "Just pay attention!" I want to scream. "Pay attention to what you're doing so I don't have to repeat myself 20 times and respond to 40 emails asking me the same stupid question I've already answered!"

(Ahem. Can you tell what I've been doing for the last few days?)

I'm accumulating evidence to support my remarkably-informed, even-keeled, social theory of What's Gone Wrong With Everything. Maybe I should write it out one of these days ... what do you call that again?

Manifestos?

Oh, no, wait, I remember ... they're called blogs.