Describing an evening in Los Angeles, I said, “We went to that cafe under the cell tower disguised as a tree.” When I got puzzled looks, I elaborated. “The fake trees. They’re everywhere,” I said.
“You think they’re real and then you notice. The foliage is plastic, to hide the wires.” The blank looks had now turned to amused, cautious concern. “And were you wearing your tinfoil hat?” someone asked.
My companions thought I was crazy. I merely thought they were unobservant. All over LA, there are cell towers disguised with enough fake foliage to make you think you’re looking at a tree. Even a huge city notable for the brutality of its urban sprawl regards cell towers as ugly enough to hide. In my home town, it’s a different story.
Arranging a meeting in Auckland, I said, “Let’s go to that cafe under the unbelievably brutal and hideous cell tower.” When asked for clarification, I elaborated. The new cell masts are huge, bristling and dystopian and there’s been no attempt to hide them.
If one went up outside your house, you’d be devastated. It appears we live in a city with no council control over a corporate entity wrecking our visual environment. Here, there’s no shrouding the towers with plastic foliage, nothing so twee as a mast disguised with palm fronds. And if anyone complains, there seems to be no solution.
When I head out on my neighbourhood walk, a menacing cell mast now looms over the nice suburban street, towering over lines of schoolgirls waiting for the bus. The girls sit with their heads bent. They are silent, staring at their phone screens. If one of them were to run around, or try to strike up a conversation, it would count as non-conformist behaviour.
I passed a teacher supervising these weirdly motionless girls. I said, “Jesus Christ. The phones.” She gave me a puzzled look. Perhaps she was looking for my tinfoil hat. But I don’t think we should be resigned about the social bleakness the dystopian image represents.
Recently, a teenage relative said breezily, of Instagram, “The tech companies wrecked my whole generation’s mental health, just for fun.” I said to her, “Not for fun. For money.” So how about resisting, I suggested, by going offline?
We shouldn’t let a telco put up monstrosities where it likes, and we shouldn’t be blasé about the dark side of inter-connectivity. Everywhere you look, ironically, authentic communication is being sabotaged by it.
Toddlers used to make a fuss when you were on the landline. The call would end and rapport would be restored. Now, the toddler sits on the stalled swing, screaming because their parents are on TikTok. If you google the “still face test”, you see how parental unresponsiveness distresses infants. Why wouldn’t a phone-addicted caregiver be as problematic as a depressed one? Children are silenced at the table with screens and even headphones. It’s socially sanctioned neglect.
First Big Tobacco, now Big Tech. Executives from tech companies are being called before the US Congress to answer accusations of failing to protect users from harm. A US law firm that previously specialised in asbestos cases is suing tech platforms, alleging liability for a harmful, deliberately addictive product.
If my teenage relative’s generation has suffered “wrecked” mental health, one immediate solution must be connection and dialogue. Distress can be alleviated with empathetic, face-to-face communication. As well as calling for mental-health support, parents could experiment with the home cure of being present and offline.
Meanwhile, back to the aesthetics. Would our telcos like to stump up for some enormous LA-style palm fronds?
Charlotte Grimshaw is an Auckland author and critic.
