TEXT UR M8S AND REJOICE: There Are No Plans To Allow Texting In Cinemas

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Published

April 14, 2016

The internet is currently awash with gripes about the state of modern society after a Variety interview with AMC Entertainment CEO Adam Aron was published.

In the interview, Aron went HAM on millennials, essentially stating that we’re all zombies who couldn’t possibly break away from our smartphones for long enough to get through an full movie.

So, he mentioned that the cinema company would be looking at isolating certain auditoriums to allow texting. And obviously, everyone is freaking the fuck out over it.

Here’s the snippet of the interview:

Would appealing to millennials involve allowing texting or cellphone use?

Yes. When you tell a 22-year-old to turn off the phone, don’t ruin the movie, they hear please cut off your left arm above the elbow. You can’t tell a 22-year-old to turn off their cellphone. That’s not how they live their life.

At the same time, though, we’re going to have to figure out a way to do it that doesn’t disturb today’s audiences. There’s a reason there are ads up there saying turn off your phone, because today’s moviegoer doesn’t want somebody sitting next to them texting or having their phone on.

Would you have a certain section for texting?

That’s one possibility. What may be more likely is we take specific auditoriums and make them more texting friendly.

The backlash of this was so intense and immediate that AMC sent out a series of tweets this morning, saying that there’s absolutely no plans to create ‘texting cinemas’, because they couldn’t verify that it would be a comfortable viewing environment for all of their customers. Plus they know that the majority of patrons seem completely against it.

Press reports we are considering test allowing texts in a very few screens. We know vast majority of audience wants no texting. 1/2

— AMC Theatres (@AMCTheatres) April 14, 2016

If ever, we only would pursue in a way that we can be totally confident ALL our guests will fully enjoy the moviegoing experience at AMC 2/2

— AMC Theatres (@AMCTheatres) April 14, 2016

AMC gave a prepared statement to The A.V. Club too, saying there’s “there is no specific timeframe as to when we might introduce such a test”, and that they “also remain extremely sensitive that the overwhelming majority of our current audience does not want texting to disrupt their experience.”

So, there we are. Now, let’s filter that outrage into the fact that a CEO of a major US theatre company thinks of all of Gen Y as mindless drones who don’t care for the art of cinema, when that couldn’t possibly be any further from the truth.