If there’s one thing boomers love – aside from Antiques Roadshow, voting to restrict the opportunities of the young, and locking an entire generation out of the housing market – it’s policing the behaviour of others. They froth that shit: there’s nothing that appeals to them more than creaking their arthritic knees over the back of that particular high horse, and pontificating endlessly about how technology is mutating the youth, and making them alienated, spoiled, and stunted.

So, perhaps it’s not surprising that the folks leading the charge against the use of phones at gigs are members of the gray brigade – those 40-something-year-old bores who derive pleasure from telling other people how to live their lives. And it’s not just middle-aged audience members who are transforming into culture cops: some particularly crumpled, particularly over-the-hill performers are also trying to outlaw the habit of audiences pulling out their iPhones and snapping a few quick pics of a band, or using them as glorified lighters to be hoisted over their heads during a slow jam.

The main argument against the use of phones at gigs seems to be that it somehow takes you out of the experience – that snapping a photo, or taking a quick video immediately makes you an observer rather than a participant. Which, for my money, is a whole load of bullshit. How long does it take to snap a quick picture? 30 seconds, perhaps, if you wanna take a couple. So even if pulling out one’s phone does have the effect of instantly killing a gig’s vibe – which, like, it almost definitely doesn’t – within less time than it takes to head over to the bar and grab a drink – which definitely does kill a gig’s vibe – you’ll be back and in the thick of it.

Then there’s the secondary claim that pulling out one’s phone distracts others; that the temporary, peripheral flash of light emitted from a phone is enough to send someone’s night flying into tatters. To which I say – how fucking precious do you have to be to have a 90 minute gig ruined by the briefest of distractions? If you’re so easily distracted, that speaks to either your fucked attention span, or the performer’s significant inability to keep you engaged.

Don’t get me wrong – gig etiquette is important, and there are things we need to change about what goes on when the lights go down

Like everyone, I’ve had gigs ruined in my time. But you know what has ruined gigs for me? Once it was a boomer at a Nick Cave concert who wouldn’t shut up. Once it was a boomer at a PJ Harvey concert who, loaded with booze, threw up in the mosh. Once it was a boomer at a Springsteen concert who spent the evening loudly mansplaining the Boss’s back catalogue to his poor, increasingly bored date. Once it was a boomer at a Bill Callahan concert who accidentally tipped an entire glass of wine down the back of my fucking shirt. Never once has a phone ruined a gig for me.

Don’t get me wrong – gig etiquette is important, and there are things we need to change about what goes on when the lights go down: things like unbearably aggressive moshes, and sexual harassment, and intimidatory behaviour.

But people can do whatever the fuck they want with their phones. And hey, if you do want to continue being a miserable old shit and telling people what they can and can’t do with their own property during gigs, at least own your fucked opinions and admit that you’re trying to police behaviour so that it better fits with your own outdated view of the world, rather than embarking on some grand, moral mission. Ya fucking grumps.

For more contrarian opinions, read this rant about the Melbourne Cup.

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