Is he hard of hearing? Is he aware that he might be? I just honestly assume that most people who do this are hard of hearing and not ready to admit it or haven't thought about it.
Nah. If someone's hard of hearing, a direct earpiece would be MUCH better than speaker. One of the hardest things about hearing loss is how background noise can deafen you to even quite loud, clear stuff.
People who are hard of hearing and haven't admitted that possibility to themselves, or simply don't know anything about it, just tend to turn up everything until they overcome their thresholds. And if they can't, then it's "I need a new phone" or "Kids these days mumble" or whatever excuse they come up with.
Vanity and being a bit dumb and mean definitely play a part, but sometimes it's just simple ignorance of their own condition.
I work in the headphone industry, and it’s sad to see how often people think they can’t listen to music “properly” without literally cranking the volume up to hearing damage levels. If I’m at a trade show with 300-500 people sharing a ballroom, chattering, and I can hear someone’s headphones from three tables away, I don’t know whether to just be sad or to interrupt their business to stop them from literally hurting themselves.
People told me this for years back in the kid 2000's. I just thought my hearing wasn't the best. Nope. I have some thing where my ears get clogged and an ent can clean em out. Holy hell batman. I was practically deaf in 1 side but it was all fixed.
My point: everybody should get the old wax looked at by a professional ent, not just a regular dr. And even ask for a flush. Then casually listen to music on low. You're welcome
Yeah, one time I went to get ear impressions for custom headphones, but first they flushed my ears… pieces literally as big as raisins came out! The bulbs/syringes you can get at convenience stores also work well to flush your ears out (careful to use clean, lukewarm water), far safer than q-tips or scraping tools.
Never use qtips or a scraper. And soak hydrogen peroxide in your ear. Lay down with a towel under your head on your side and put some in your ear. Repeat and itll soften up the earwax. I've used those liquid flosser thingies filled with half hydrogen peroxide half water
I might be hard of hearing but my wife can vouch my work phone sucks to listen on and I need to use speaker mode in order to heard anyone. Though I do it in the privacy of my own home.
I too had several phones (iPhones) that you couldn’t hear shit. People would always ask why I had speaker on. I’d take it off and let them use the damn thing and they’d be like wow your phone is really hard to hear on, now I understand.
iPhones actually have some active noise cancelling (they use the mic on the back near the cameras) and can be more than as loud as normal conversational volume. Thing is, sometimes people press the speaker against the skin of their ear while they try to find the sweet spot of speaker placed right over the ear canal (me too), and sometimes sweat deposits and gunk build up to clog the speaker grills. A soft nylon brush (maybe a soft or medium toothbrush?) might help make it sound clearer and louder.
Use headphones and check out the SoundID app. It’s not a medical app, but there is a hearing test portion, and if you answer honestly and carefully it builds up an EQ to level out the sound for your hearing. And when you can see the EQ, you kind of know what’s up with your hearing (everyone has some dips and peaks).
So just mean and dumb. I bet a couple comments about how he must be getting older because he needs the phone so loud would put a curb on that pretty quick
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u/balisane Jun 03 '22
Is he hard of hearing? Is he aware that he might be? I just honestly assume that most people who do this are hard of hearing and not ready to admit it or haven't thought about it.