Say goodbye, cell phone!
National Review blogger and theater critic Kevin Williamson raises an issue that especially interests me, as part of the management of a professional theater company. How far can an audience member ethically go to quite a persistently rude and disruptive spectator who insists on using her cell phone during a performance? Here’s how far Williamson went while viewing the musical Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 that a woman was in the process of ruining for him, after he complained to the management without success and received this series of responses from the woman:
“I asked her to turn it off. She answered: “So don’t look.” I asked her whether I had missed something during the very pointed announcements to please turn off your phones, perhaps a special exemption granted for her. She suggested that I should mind my own business.”
Williamson then grabbed the phone from her and hurled it against the wall. She slapped him, and complained. He, not she, was then escorted from the theater.
Let’s stipulate that hurling the phone was over the line. But let’s suppose that he had just confiscated the phone, walked into the lobby, and hidden it in a planter, promising to reveal the hiding place after the performance (having already failed to police the situation as was their duty, Williamson can not be blamed for bypassing management).
Your Ethics Alarms Ethics Quiz Question:
Is it ethical to confiscate the cell phone of a deliberately rude user during a theatrical performance, after appropriate warnings have been given and ignored?
The title of the post notwithstanding, this is not vigilante conduct at all: it’s responsible and necessary conduct. Nobody has the right to flout rules for purely selfish purposes to the detriment of everyone in the vicinity. The disruptive audience member was intentionally interfering with the theater-going experience of everyone around her, all of which had paid dearly for their tickets. Action us called for, and if the theater’s management fails its duty, then it is both appropriate and reasonable for third party to intervene.
Destroying or risking harm to the personal property of the phone addict is not ethical. Taking the phone away, I believe, is a neat, bold solution. I’ve never had to do this, but I have threatened it, with the order of moves I would advise in Williamson’s situation being approximately this:
1. “Please stop using your phone.”
2. “If you don’t cease, I will go to the management.”
3. “The woman next to me is using her cell phone. Stop her, throw her out if she does it again, or I will solve the problem, and you will have a mess on your hands.”
4. “This is your last warning. Turn off your phone.”
5. “Yoink!” [The sound of the phone being snatched, courtesy of “The Simpsons.”]
6. “I have just taken and hidden the cell phone of the audience member I spoke to you about earlier, because you failed to act.”
7. ” I want my money back.”
8. “Dear Sir or Madam: Regarding the management of your theater…”
Astoundingly, some of the commenters to Williamson’s post faulted him because he is male and the awful woman is female. Would he have dared to snatch the phone if the offender was a male? I don’t know; there’s no requirement that reasonable remedies be suicidal. If the cell phone user is Hulk Hogan, Gloria Allred, a Crip, Wayne LaPierre, Son of Sam, President Obama, or Sean Penn, yeah, I might vary my response, and I might not. I once impulsively told a group of six teens to shut up during a movie, and they kept turning around and making throat-cutting gestures to me all through the film…but they shut up, and it was all bluster. This is the duty to confront wrongdoing, and sure, it takes varying amounts of courage and acceptance of risk, but bullies have to know that their tactics won’t work with everyone.
I don’t have any sympathy for the woman at all.
Do you?
____________________________________
Pointer: Arthur in Maine
Facts: The National Review
Ethics Alarms 
No sympathy for the woman from me. Management needs a wake up call too.
I feel positively ensrhined.
Or, perhaps, as I recently experienced during a black box performance, the actors on stage could simply stop what they are doing, turn in the direction of the offending cell phone user and simply wait.
No, I know. Not every venue or performance lends itself to such delicious shaming but as someone who is heavily involved in local theatre (albeit not professional, but hey, we’re pretty darn good!) and savors every moment I can get watching professional theatre (because really, where on else would you rather be?) I have ZERO patience for rude audience members and have no problem call them out, and loudly. Actually take the phone? It’s a daring move. One I might consider in the future.
Jack, your approach is ‘old skool’. Nowadays, you take a picture and twitter it to the management of the theater (and of course the rest of the world).
See for an example: Playhaven developer fired for sexual jokes after SendGrid marketer outs him on Twitter ( http://venturebeat.com/2013/03/20/playhaven-developer-fired-for-making-sexual-jokes-after-sendgrids-developer-evangelist-outs-him-on-twitter/ )
Turning ON your own phone in the theater to stop someone from having their phone on?
The incident is not about this lady having a phone on but about what she did with the phone while being on.
So, yes, turn your phone on, take a picture, type some text, and send it to twitter.
That’s faster, less noise and less disturbance than the lady in the theater talking in her phone or your 8-step approach.
There are things you want to do but shoukdnt. This is one of those. From what ive read the only person the cell phone user cell use was bothering was him. That doesnt excuse it but by grabbing the phone and throwing it he didnt solve the problem he only made it worse by now disturbing everyone else in the theater.
Grabbing the phone would probably escalate fast into a bigger disturbance, I doubt you could get it away long enough to hide it. She’d scream attack or maybe rape and you’d look the thug.
I’m beginning to think the places I’ve heard of that have jammers might be better way to block it, but there’s a downside there too. We can’t prevent talkers completely but the phones are not necessary to live.
Jammers are illegal, they (surprisingly) constitute theft – frequencies are “owned” by certain groups. Though there has definitely been talk of making exceptions for theaters and what not.
Nope,no sympathy for the woman and yes, demand my money back from the idiot management. Then check to see if anyone has invented a gizmo that can be used to disrupt cellphones at movie theaters.
Obviously, destroying her cellphone is a no-go. Why not be sneaky:
I would have leaned closer to her and quietly started singing James Blunt’s You’re beautiful” – all the while gazing at her earnestly. Sing low enough as not to disturb the other theatre goers but loud enough to annoy her and disrupt her phone conversation.
If she asks you to seize – say: I will if you will.
Best case scenario: She thinks you’re a creep and leaves…
Ive been dreaming of a solution to this for a long time and I think I have the perfect one. Parametric speakers. They are, essentially, sound “lasers” where only the person being pointed at can hear the sound. Just shoot a constant stream of annoyance into their ears until they hang or shut up. The idea of subjecting them to their own social abuse is delicious. The moment I have some spare cash Im gonna buy one and keep it in the car.
Isn’t taking the phone, even with the intent of giving it back, theft as the owner is deprived usage against their will? I agree the theatre may have some rights concerning how they may deal with their guests, up to some level of confiscation, but I don’t think a private citizen does. Plus, the likely escalation makes everyone potentially more upset.
I like ulrike’s solution. It’s the most reciprocal and seems to be an appropriate level of social nagging to correct someone’s disliked behavior- plus I think it’s much less likely to escalate. I might pick a different song- like, say “sound of silence”, but you definitely don’t veer into unethical behavior yourself.
Most commenters answered the ethical quiz question as given. But reading Williamson’s blog post I am doubting that in this case “appropriate warnings have been given”.
Quoting Williamson, “But my date spoke with the theater management during the intermission, and they apologetically assured us that the situation would be remedied. —— It was not.”
So, theater management did not act as promised. Williamson should have taken this up again with management etc.
The user — having a ‘contract’ with the theater management and was not admonished by theater management regarding her breach of that contract — was at that moment in her full right to say, “Mind your own business!’
btw, see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRQwLwrg7GM for some context (Context is everything.)
Risky. As it was he got a slap and was escorted out of the theater. Had it been a man he could have gotten stomped. I just can’t give the ethics nod to snatching someone else’s property from them, that is, at its most basic, theft. Someone at work tried to snatch my phone away during a conversation I wasn’t particularly interested in having with him, and was promptly met with a very resistant grip on the phone, a sharp “what the hell do you think you’re doing?” and a promise that if he EVER tried something like that again, I would break his wrist. He never tried it again.
Williamson is complaining that instead of getting some praise he was asked to leave. He should be thankful to the “black-suited agent of order”. Let’s imagine that instead of Williamson the lady / ladies were asked to leave and he could enjoy the rest of the show undisturbed for say another hour. Enough time for the ladies to phone their hubbies/friends and … fill in the dots with possible scenarios. My guess is that most of these scenarios could turn out far worse than one unhappy couple that will just leave and blog about it.
As tempting as it might be, taking someone’s property and hiding it is not ethical. I would probably take the step of making a scene about it. If management wouldn’t do anything about it, perhaps loudly singing off-key to made up lyrics (as in a bad SNL skit)
“We all get to be rude now
like the lady next to me with her cell phone.
See how annoying it is.
the management won’t do anything about her
so let’s see if they will do anything about me.
I can do this all day
you won’t get to enjoy your show.
Mine is already ruined,
thanks to the lady right here.
I don’t care if they throw me out.
I’m never coming here again.”
Now, this will stop the production and will probably ruin it for everyone. However, if you want this behavior to stop, this is what will need to be done to stop it. Right now, the cell phone users get to act with impunity. If we ALL start to act this rude and selfish, management and society will have to do something…or this will cause the end of what little is left of polite society.
I think taking it would be ethical. I’ve confiscated cell phones in the theater I am connected Would the patron rather leave, or lose the object for the duration of the performance. Why do you think it’s unethical to take the noise-making object that has already been prohibited? What if it was a trumbone or a vuvuzela? Are you saying it is wrong to confiscate a boombox someone smuggles into the Met?
I considered your solution, by the way. I think it’s more unethical because it harms everyone at the performance. Take the trumbone. Dare her to make the disruption. (And the management is responsible for any disruption, having failed to enforce its own rules.)
I wasn’t aware private organizations just get to declare certain property ‘banned’ and get to allow anyone to confiscate it on sight. I would think that would constitute theft. With the actual value of certain cell phones, it might even reach felony levels.
I was well-aware of the catch-22, but if the objective was to stop people from disrupting others with cellphones at performances, there are limited options when the management and none of the other surrounding patrons seem to be willing to intervene.
(1) make enough of a distraction that everyone realizes that they need to do something about distractions (while distracting everyone)
(2) seize the cellphone, which would probably result in a big scene and criminal charges
(3) find a way to quietly incapacitate or kill the offending patron
Option 3 is obviously overkill, illegal, and out of all proportion to the offense. I assumed #2 was also illegal, and would result in a massive scene and possibly a physical altercation. Option #1 would only result in the large disruption and me getting thrown out of the establishment.
Then there’s the “Andy of Mayberry” solution: Shout, in Don Knotts’s goofy Brooklyn via Hollywodd version of a North Carolina accent– “Citizen’s Arayest!” Just kidding.
We are now a nation of lawyers and victims. The woman’s purported right to be a jerk and the American Trial Lawyers’ membership’s right to extort “damages” (and fees) from anyone in the country who’s actually trying to accomplish something, outweighs any one else’s interest in peace and quiet or any one else’s expectation of reasonable behaviour by other adults. Serious answer.
Also, I very much like aliciamklein’s approach: Have the players stop the performance and turn up the house lights (maybe hilight her with a spot?) until the offending member of the audience stops the bad behavior. Tremendous shaming. Non-tortious. Plus, it would be be a agreat opportunity to remind the audience of the tremendous illusion live drama creates.
Before every movie, every lecture, every theatre performance, announcements are made to turn off cell phones, no flash photographs, no recording devices, etc. Either this woman has never been to a function or she lives in a bubble. She was rude. It is my opinion, however, the gentleman should not have grabbed her phone. He should have dealt with management encouraging, ordering, demanding them to do something about the disturbing, annoying cell phone user.
On another note, since we are speaking of theatre etiquette, and I only mention this because it happened to me at last night’s performance during my serious solo. Don’t come to the theatre, lecture, movie, etc. so hammered you are unable to walk, talk, or function. During my solo, this woman either a) wanted to come on stage, b) find the restroom thinking the stage was the direction to go or c) hated the show and wanted to leave. In any event, she stood up, tried to walk and did a face plant into one of the chairs causing quite a commotion. Her companion helped her leave the theatre. And yes, she was totally hammered. And, yes, I finished my number. All we actors ask for is a show of common courtesy.
Hear, hear. And why do people with coughs and colds go to recitals and plays anyway? What are they thinking?
And I’d give this guy a pass. He tried to work with the theater management and they failed him. Why do the civil people always have to indulge the morons? It’s a bad bias that’s developing in our culture.
Jack, I prefer a variation of Zanshin’s approach over yours, first, and when it can be done. I absolutely do not agree with seizing the device, or with one-to-one tit-for-tat. “Themz the risks” of watching a performance in a crowd. Eventually, someone in the crowd is going to exhibit “IMITY syndrome” – pronounced “eye mighty,” as in, I’m More Important Than You. Or, maybe make that, IMITEE – I’m More Important Than Everyone Else.
The confrontation of the disrupter must commence immediately, and with more immediate and reliable reason to expect that the disrupter will be unable to ignore the confronter(s). With the devices available to cause disruption today, it is appropriate and ethical to fight technological fire with fire. Sending a text to a “status board” that theater management informs patrons about, then monitors, could go a long way to minimizing disruption. Imagine not one, but many patrons, all sending text within the same minute to report “Lady in [location], [add identifying and corroborating descriptors], [describe misbehavior]” to a competent manager.
Your 8 steps would be fine if they were not so laborious, so demanding of the innocent, that the approach is futile in real time. In the end, the sequential approach is a capitulation of the civil to the morons. As Other Bill pointedly asks: Do we really want to let wrongdoers get away so easily, so cheaply for themselves but so expensively for others, with doing wrong?
I could agree with allicamklein’s approach, if circumstances were such that the performers as well as the person next to the offender were aware of the misbehavior. That would be so much fun for the audience to join in participating! But I don’t know if such was possible in the situation you gave. And of course, given the times, even with that approach, there’s always the danger of provoking a vengeance-bombing or the like…
It is completely appropriate for a fellow citizen to take proper action in regards to louts.
Of course, it also requires measured escalations of force.
Manners are not enforced by an authority. Manners and civil decency can only be secured by the people at large behaving appropriately AND censuring their fellows when necessary.
Mr. Williamson used a proper escalation of force in this scenario until smashing the cell phone against the wall. He discussed with her, sought support of others and finally realized only he could handle the problem.
I think destruction of property was disproportionate however.