The Press Ombudsman has not upheld a complaint from a 70-year-old man about an article entitled “Emojis, ringtones and loudspeakers – 10 tech signs you’re part of the older generation” which was published by Independent.ie in June 2024. The complainant asserted that the article breached Principle 2 (Distinguishing Fact and Comment) and Principle 8 (Prejudice) of the Press Council’s Code of Practice.
The article begins by stating that “Just because you have the latest technology doesn’t mean you’re ‘down with the kids’”, and goes on to list 10 behaviours the publication attributes to older people using mobile phones. These range from deploying the crying laughing emoji as “basic punctuation”, to using the phone on loudspeaker in public places and “banging every keyboard or keypad like it’s a typewriter”.
The complainant said he “took grave offence to the portrayal and stereotyping of older people in the article as stupid”. He said the piece breached Principle 2.2 of the Code since “comment, conjecture, rumour and unconfirmed reports about the use of technology were reported as if they are facts” with “no evidence referred to”. He said the piece breached Principle 8 of the Code because it was “likely to cause grave offence against a group (older people identified in the article) on the basis of their age”.
Independent.ie placed the article in the satirical tradition of Irish writers including Flann O’Brien, Roddy Doyle, Paul Howard and Waterford Whispers News. It said the article, by its Technology Editor, was “a light-hearted opinion piece” which included “personal, tongue-in-cheek observations” designed to make “a broad sweep of phone users” laugh at their own “supposed tech failings”. It said the only complaint it had received was this one.
Decision
This article was written to amuse. It casts its net wide – with alleged offenders variously referred to as “the 50, 60 and 70-something set”, those “over-55”, the middle aged, pensioners and “old folk”. Only those defined as “under 35” entirely escape censure.
There is no breach of Principle 2 of the Code since the author writes as a witness to all of the behaviours described. Indeed, at one point he refers to the middle-aged person who is “silently irritated” to have husbanded a now redundant adapter. This perhaps hints at personal experience. There is no breach of Principle 8 of the Code. Aspiring to get “down with the kids” is intrinsically ridiculous, but no one in the article is depicted as stupid and it is plain the article sets out to induce the wince of recognition rather than to cause grave offence.
This decision was appealed to the Press Council of Ireland.
