We continue our 'I'm too old for' series with comedian and Seven Sharp presenter Rhiannon McCall who can no longer tolerate maintaining her social life across a multitude of apps. By Emily Simpson
If Rhiannon McCall could go back to an age it would be the 1980s. She’s a bona fide fan of the decade when hair was high, greed was good, Bill Cosby was decent, and the family phone was firmly attached to the wall.
Although by “go back” McCall doesn’t mean “return”. The comedian, actor, writer and presenter is a ’90s child who just turned 30, a fresh but inarguably adult age when many wake up to exactly what they can and cannot tolerate in life. For McCall the latter is pinball wizard approach to communication. “I hate juggling multiple conversations on different apps,” she says.
You know the lineup: facebook messenger, Instagram DMs, Snapchat, WhatsApp, TikTok and texting. Not to mention ye olde email.
“I sound like a conspiracy theorist but I feel like these apps are always trying to rope you in,” she says. “I think we would be way more time efficient if we just called each other.”
Although a Millennial, the generation that supposedly fears and loathes phone calls, McCall fondly remembers the antique world of the landline. “You’d get home from school, you’d call up your friend, you’d get their mum on the phone, you’d ask to speak to your friend, and then you’d have to get off because your mum wanted to use the computer.”
Growing up in Christchurch, this period was prolonged, she says. “Mum and Dad got their landline reconnected after the earthquake, which happened when I was at high school, because mobile phone networks were affected and you couldn’t call anyone.”
And the meandering phone talking habit stuck. McCall likes to walk to and from work and her phone is a key part of the journey. “I’m either listening to music or I’m talking to my mum or my nana. About nothing. But I do love talking on the phone.”
The rest of the time, her phone is a flashing blinking irritant. “I get overwhelmed because you’re constantly getting little pings, like even a smiley face or a ‘haha’ makes you feel you need to respond. When people see my phone they’re always shocked by the number of unread messages on there. If I look at it now, I have 397 unread messages on there which I might see but not act on. My boyfriend just messaged me ‘have a great day’ which I thought was nice but didn’t think needed a reply.”
McCall admits most apps, individually, have their use (FB messenger is for group social events, texting is for her parents and brother, Whatsapp is for travel) there are some that have zero place in her life. One is X, formerly known as Twitter, “I never quite got on there and I feel happy about that”. She also recently deleted Tiktok. And then there’s Snapchat. “Way back in the mists of time when I was on the dating apps, if you met someone who wanted to use Snapchat it was a red flag, a ‘be aware’ because usually they’d be wanting to send you naughty photos... Since then I’ve never used it.”
One app that still has a big role in her life, though she wishes it didn’t, is Instagram. “I’ve put a limit of an hour a day on it, which I usually go over which is sad... I think Instagram is a little bit about keeping up with the Joneses,” says McCall. “At the moment I have a few friends over in Europe for the summer and some of them are going to the Edinburgh Festival and things which is great, but because they’re posting all the time it’s tricking me into feeling like I’m lacking something in my life, when I know logically that I’m not.
“I think being able to see how much people are up to is no good for your mental health. Like I’ve had conversations with my boyfriend where I haven't heard from him and I’ll say ‘I can see on Instagram that you’re active!’ That kind of thing is, I think, risky and toxic.”
And not possible in that bygone decade that she never knew but misses all the same. “U2, Cyndi Lauper, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Julia Roberts rom coms,” she lists. “Although the last two were technically ’90s... I really love the 80s. I think if I could go back I would.
"I reckon I want my pager and my landline and that’s it.”
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