Leaving people on read
In philosophy, there is a well-known dilemma known as the Trolley Problem. In it, the responder must chose to let five people die through inaction, or flip a switch and kill one person, which would save the other five lives. The problem has many variations and recently satirical iterations on the internet. Though originally conceived to question the practicality of utilitarianism and other ethical models, it also begs another important question: inaction also an action? Is letting five people die the same as killing them? There are broad applications of this problem, most recently in the field of autonomous driving: What will a self-driving vehicle do when faced with the decision to probably kill one person or improbably kill ten? How about a mother with child or an elderly man? There are also less morbid cases where inaction sometimes is an action, such as leaving people on read.
For those who are less acquainted with the parlance of the younger folk, being “left on read” indicates a situation where the sender expected a response from the recipient about the contents of their message, but received nothing except the messaging platform informing them that the recipient has seen the message, a read receipt. For the technologically savvy and emotionally dependent, being left on read is a mild social slight, but could aggravate a situation that is already tenuous. Someone sending an apology text: apology not accepted. Someone timidly messaging their crush: heartbreak. Someone communicating with their colleague: we are not friends.
Something is to be said about the Millennial and Gen-Z need for validation, that being left on read causes a small amount of real anxiety. Can conversations not end with a statement anymore? Increasingly, conversations end on emojis and GIFs sent to chat, or reactions to messages. That is to say, new netiquette dictates that after someone has sent something substantial: a statement, a question, a picture, or a link, there needs to be a response, appropriate for the content of the original message. If it doesn’t merit a response, an emoji or any variation of “LOL” or “haha” will do. If it doesn’t merit emotion or laughter, then the above would also be inappropriate, so a thumbs up emoji or a reaction to the last message from the sender is needed. Otherwise, the sender might wonder if they did something wrong so elicit a lack of response from the receiver.
Despite this mild unpleasantness, read receipts have a real use, bringing the discussion back to the trolley problem: inaction in the case of read receipts is an action in itself. By reading the message, and choosing not to reply, there is a message sent: “I have read your message and have deemed that it is not worthy of a response at this time”. Whether it is because the message is inherently pointless, the receiver harbours negative feelings about the sender, or the receiver doesn’t know how to respond yet, the message is loud and clear. Of course, because there is a decision that is taken, and the sender knows that the receiver has seen the message, it can be argued that it isn’t the same as pure inaction.
I’ve turned on read receipts expressly to leave people on read. On many messaging applications, read receipts are toggleable, and though the default is on, some people chose to turn them off, so they don’t experience the pressure of immediately needing to respond. I used to do this, until I realized that leading people on read was a tool that I wanted in my arsenal of digital communication. I wanted to be able to communicate a slight sense of malaise, let the sender know that they sent was in bad humour or not something I wanted to entertain, without outright sending an emoji or a message. In the era of read receipts, leaving someone on read is the same as sending them a message.
It’s possible to further extrapolate, and consider those who have read receipts off, or those who cheat by looking at the message preview without opening the actual message and sending a read receipt. This could be understood to be a more honest inaction, because no physical message is sent to the receiver. However, in today’s hyperconnected age, messages are expected to be read and responded to within the hour, give or take depending on social circle. Kids who constantly have their phones with them might expect responses within minutes if they aren’t asleep or in class. Older millennials might have the leeway of half a workday, and then are also exempt during dinnertime. But if anyone hesitates too long to send that response, people will be able to guess, especially if they have reason to be concerned: a preexisting tenuous relationship or a risky message, in essence, a lighter version of the read receipt.
The read receipt not only adds a communication option, but also increases the rate that information is communicated. Furthermore, when the default setting is off, turning it on makes the relationship more intimate. Participants are choosing to express a wider range of emotions via text, and barring their emotions. Similarly, the pair can also chose not to play the game of message previews and becomes even more comfortable leaving links or long stories on read, not because they don’t have a response, but because they simply don’t have the time in that instant. However, they would still rather open the message to ensure that it doesn’t contain anything pressing. By becoming more comfortable with leaving intimates on read, the recipient is rather be signaling that they have enough trust in the strength of their relationship that there is no problem with what others might consider a slight. There is no danger of miscommunication.
Returning again to the trolley problem, the similarity lies mostly at whether inaction sometimes is action in itself. Like the trolley problem, the jury remains divided: is it better to pull the switch or not? Is it better to turn on read receipts or leave them off? What about leaving someone on read, or simply looking at the message preview? Is it a social sin to start typing a response, then put the phone down to respond a few hours later? I suggest that read receipts are an indispensable part of digital communication, and can be used to great effectiveness to better express oneself online. For conversations with closer relations, it shortens the implied distance between the two communicators, and is a paradoxical show of intimacy. So give read receipts a shot, and maybe start leaving your closer friends on read. Perhaps it will lead to more honest communication online altogether.
