The Microwave Mentality
Speed has become the defining factor of the world we live in today. Speed in communication. Speed in transportation. Speed in the preparation of what we eat. Speed in reaping the rewards of our efforts or lack thereof.
Once upon a time, the Post Office played a central role in many communities. Letter writing was critical in how we communicated with one another. If the message was urgent, we sent the letter by Express Mail. And if it was an emergency, we resorted to sending a telegram. I am still traumatized by the mere mention of the word up till today. “You’ve got a telegram,” usually meant bad news. Like someone in the family had taken seriously ill or had passed away.
Today, the postman may still be dropping off your GEBE bills, your mortgage notes, old magazine subscriptions or your tax forms in your mailbox, but all of that may soon become a thing of the past as we move faster and faster towards a more digital world where the only mailbox you have is your email.
In the field of transportation, the trend is similar. From the donkey and horse to the bicycle and automobile; from the locomotive to the high-speed trains and from the propeller plane to the supersonic jetliners, the progression has always been in the direction of greater speed. Speed is not only how we shorten distances and conquer the world but it is also what landed us on the moon and keeps us in outer space.
And right in our kitchen, the way to our stomach has become a culinary highway. The outdoor firewood and coal pots have become museum items. Even the gas stoves are being replaced by electric cookers, air fryers and microwave ovens. Preparing a meal that used to take our mothers hours is now a matter of shoving it in the microwave and pulling it out minutes later.
Of course, this has not only affected our eating habits, our diets and culinary culture but also the way we think, our outlook on life and how we behave towards one another. Patience has lost its virtue and slowness has become a disease. We have developed a microwave mentality that demands instant gratification just as we have instant coffee or instant meals. What took our grandparents 40 years to accomplish we want to achieve in 4 months or less.
But, is faster necessarily better? Is speed desirable in human relations? How do we navigate this treacherous world with a mindset of instant gratification? Perhaps the following story could best illustrate what I’m trying to say.
Mark and Sue, two young professionals, met online and within a day or two exchanged WhatsApp numbers. They hardly chatted for a week before they began Face Timing. Long story short, within a month they were shacking up together.
Neither of them cooked. So, they bought readymade food which took only a few minutes to warm in the microwave oven. However, more often than not, they patronized fast food restaurants, usually drive thru, or simply ordered pizza that was delivered right to their door.
Then Irma struck. Electricity was down. Internet was out. Life was unbearable. The two of them became very irritable. They snapped at each other at the flimsiest excuse. Luckily, they ate at Sue’s grandmother who cooked their meals on a coal pot in the yard.
Mark, who often argued with his father about “working smarter, not harder,” started to see life a little differently. He called it one of the “lessons of Irma.” Sue, of course, had always loved her grandmother’s cooking but still considered it too time-consuming and old-fashioned. Both of them still felt like fish out of water without GEBE, without internet.
“It’s not even a decade after Irma and look at how AI is taking over our lives,” Mark mused, reflecting on that period. “If we have a microwave mentality, as you say, imagine this new generation with their sense of entitlement, what will they have, an AI mentality?”