On Not Responding to Email

The central problem of the modern age (for many of us fortunate enough to live comfortably in the developed West), it has been observed, is one of abundance: too many films to watch; books to read; events to attend; budget flights to catch; tweets to scroll through, text messages to open; and, for our purposes today, emails to respond to. Of course, in centuries and decades past, people were busy too—in many cases, even busier, since they tended to work far more hours. However, today, particularly due to the central role the Internet has come to play in our lives (as well as how interconnected we have become), there is likely a greater breadth of things demanding our attention, ever shortened, constantly pulling us toward ever more instantaneous action or response. Moments of unmolested contemplation seem increasingly scarce. (1)

It is not uncommon to notice friends and family members having thousands (or even tens of thousands) of unread emails. Surely, not all of them are personalized (“Dear Larry”-type) notes, clearly necessitating a response, but some almost certainly are, increasingly crowded out by the endless invitations to events, marketing emails, favors requested, and the like. How often I hear something to the effect of: “I meant to reply, but my inbox got flooded.” In the field, in which I work (i.e., journalism), so many personalized and courteous queries are increasingly left unanswered.

In my own career, here at Merion West in particular, this magazine has always prided itself on providing a response to submissions exclusive to us or personalized interview requests. Of course, the occasional one may slip past us, and for that I apologize, but, at the risk of tooting this magazine horn, I think this is rather unusual. Ask any up-and-coming (say, Wikipedia Page-less) writer, and he will tell you that he often does not receive a response, even when pouring his proverbial heart and soul into a given submitted essay or poem. And this is also true of would-be entrepreneurs. (2)

And, unfortunately perhaps, at times, also for old friends hoping to reconnect or students reaching out to a professor with a thoughtful question.