Turn them off

A cell phone rings. Music fills the room, as the ring tone on the phone plays “Take me out to a ballgame.”
The guy directly in front of me, scrambles in his bag to shut off his phone, looking quite embarrassed. Maybe, because of the phone, or maybe, because of his choice of ring tone, I’m still not sure.
It rings again.
Even before my distaste sets in, my mind was flooded with questions for this cellular junkie.
Dude, how important are you really that you need to be reached while in class? Are you a heart surgeon? Did one of your patients just go into arrest? Are you needed in surgery? Will someone die if you don’t answer the phone? What does a heart feel like?
Could someone tell me what phone call is so important that someone must interupt you in the middle of your class, just to say “pick up some milk on your way home.”
By the time the dumbfounded look fell away from my face, the incident was forgotten and the professor had gotten a laugh out of the ordeal. The fact that no one was astonished makes me wonder how often an occurrence this is. And more importantly, why?
The last time I was in a theatre, and a cell went off, the guy was mobbed within three seconds. A movie theatre, a place where Saturday Night Live movies continue to screen, and if this common sense evades, than think of something as simple as respect.
Your professor is there for no other reason than to educate you, can see to it you get something out of the class. Teachers don’t ask for much from you. All they expect is for you to do assigned work, which ultimately benefits us as students far more than it does them.
What they do warrants our respect and not the disturbance of a cell phone.
Teachers deserve our outmost respect and accepting calls in class doesn’t seem like the greatest way to show it. Just turn them off.
I could continue to go on about the inappropriateness of cell phones, how students should know better and how disrespectful it is; or I could take a different approach.
Teachers: the next time you see a student in the hall talking on their cell phone, I urge you to grab it from their ear and begin lecturing on China’s climate.
Turn about is fair play.

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