How do people negotiate their privacy in public where everyone can see and hear one another? When you take public transport, be it the bus or MRT, or even the taxi, there is always someone near you. So when you talk on the mobile phone, chances are, the people near you can hear your conversations. How do you communicate effectively and yet, negotiate your privacy at the same time? Possibly via text messaging. At least for me, I realized that is very often the reason why I SMS. Be it in the bus or MRT filled with people, I tend to be more comfortable texting than calling when I need to discuss personal matters. Maybe it's because I'm a very private person by nature. Or it could be the bad experience I had with one over-enthusiastic taxi driver.
I remembered being in a cab, discussing with a friend about the grades I've gotten that semester, lamenting that it was horrible and that I must buck up the next semester. Upon hanging up, the taxi uncle started a conversation by mentioning that youngsters in Singapore tend to take the opportunities to study for granted (which I agree). That was fine, but he went on further to ask me about my academic background. That includes the secondary school and JC I went to, the university I'm in now, my "O" level and "A" level results, whether my parents paid for my education now and the like. Then he asked me why didn't I do well this semester. And that I should try not to disappoint my parents. Not wanting to rude, I answered his questions, albeit in a vague manner. I don't recall being really mad, but what I do recall is being glad when I finally reached my destination. I realized that a taxi may not be the best place for private phone conversations. "One way of understanding privacy is not whether we choose to expose personal information in public - we all do at different times and places - but the ease with which we can return to being private" (Rosen, 2004). I was having difficulties returning "to being private" in the taxi.
I understand that it could be that he was merely just trying to strike a conversation but ended up striking the wrong chord. Or it could be due to an emotional personal experience of his. But something else struck me. It is one of the reasons why text messaging works. Text messaging can give you the privacy telephone conversations cannot. Of course, on the other hand, we see people talking loudly on their mobile phones in public as well. Some complain. Some boast. Some divulge personal incidents. Others, I guess, are probably just loud by nature. Rosen (2004) explains this well. "Today, by contrast, intimacy and trust are increasingly obtained not by shared experiences or fixed social status but by self-revelation: people try to prove their trustworthiness by revealing details of their personal lives to prove that they have nothing to hide before a crowd whose gaze is turned increasingly on all the individuals that compose it"
According to a survey by the Ponemon Institute, only seven percent of Americans said that they will change any behaviors in an effort to preserve their privacy (Sullivan, 2006). I speculate that the percentage will be much higher if a similar survey was conducted in Singapore. I may be wrong, but I'm certain I belong to the seven percent.
References
Rosen, J. (2004, July 19). The Naked Crowd. Retrieved March 9, 2007, from http://www.spiked-online.com/Printable/0000000CA5FF.htm
Schwartz, J. (2001, September 4). Giving the Web a Memory Cost Its Users Privacy. NYTimes.com. Retrieved March 10, 2007, from http://www.law.upenn.edu/fac/pwagner/law619/f2001/week12/nytimes_cookies_series.pdf
Sullivan, B. (2006, October 17). Privacy Lost: Does anybody care?. MSNBC Interactive. Retrieved March 10, 2007, from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15221095/print/1/displaymode/1098/
1 comment:
Online or in the real world, complete privacy is harder to attain nowadays. The point is to figure out a right balance of what and how to disclose, rather to not disclose anything at all.
Interesting issue of privacy in a spartial form (e.g. taxi). Full grades and a creative award! :)
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