TIGER TV ONLINE REPORTER

Private cell phone conversations that occur in public are increasingly common.

But that doesn’t mean it’s getting any more acceptable.Even public texting can be rude.

“I was at really nice awards dinner and throughout the awards and during the speakers and introductions, the people across from me each had a cell phone and they were texting the whole time,” said Jill Rigby Garner, owner of Manners of the Heart. “It was the height of rudeness.”

Manners of the Heart is a business in Baton Rouge that offers etiquette classes.

A fancy awards ceremony isn’t the only place that cell phone use is discouraged.

Food places like Counter Culture and University resources like the Student Health Center post signs that ask clients to refrain from cell phone use.

“We choose to do that because people hold up the entire line and whisper their order to us when they’re on the phone,” said Jean-Louis Guidroz, the assistant manager of Counter Culture.

Guidroz said Counter Culture implemented the request approximately a year ago because employees had to ask cell phone wielding customers to repeat their orders several times.

“If the people behind the counter have to ask you twice or you get confused and have to think longer, you’re holding up others and making the employee’s job harder,” Garner said.

Julie Hupperich, associate director of the Student Health Center, said discouraging cell phone use has been an unwritten policy for quite some time, but signs were posted a couple years ago.

“It’s primarily so people are respectful of other patients, the staff and clinicians,” she said.

Hupperich said she’s been in a session with students who have answered phone calls or texts.

“When I’m trying to provide information, it’s disruptive and disrespectful,” she said.

Hupperich said quick, discreet phone calls are okay in waiting rooms but the phone should be turned off while in session with a clinician.

“Sometimes students don’t practice good judgment,” she said.

Though cell phones aren’t typically allowed in the class room, professors vary on policies regarding cell phone use.

Richard Condrey, a University oceanography professor, doesn’t allow students to use cell phones in class.

“I would like the students to give me full and undivided attention so we can communicate in a class that has an enrollment of about 160,” he said.

Condrey says he gives students a contract to sign before class that asks students for their full attention.

“Talking or texting on cell phone is not consistent with giving me full and undivided attention,” he said.

Condrey said he can’t expect students to learn what he wants them to if distractions like cell phones disrupt their attention.

However, he said he understands that some phone calls must be taken.

“I don’t want to interfere with family emergencies and I know things happen,” he said. “Students are free to walk out and come back in as long as they do it quietly.”

If cell phones do ring in class, Condrey simply ignores them.

“I’ve learned to adapt to that and just let it ring,” he said.

If a cell phone rings during an exam, Condrey requests the student to turn it off and hand it in to pick up at the end of class.

Garner said cell phones are unacceptable during meals, movies or present conversations.

“If you had a conversation with someone standing in front of you, it’s not a good excuse to say ‘excuse me while I get this’ because that’s not appropriate,” she said. “If you’re in the middle of a conversation let the phone ring and call that person back later.”

Texting mid-conversation can intrude into relationships and prevent people from fully engaging themselves in their current situation, she said.

“Part of what’s wrong with cell phone usage is that it’s so self-centered and we forget that our actions impose on others, which can be a good thing or a bad thing,” Garner said.

The best way to exercise cell phone discretion is to remember the Golden Rule, she said.

“Treat others the way you want to be treated,” Garner said. “I think that’s a really critical part of our own cell phone etiquette when we decide what we do and what not to do based on how we’d feel if someone did it to us.”