Newsflash: if you think mooning refers to the act of mockingly pulling down your pants to reveal your bottom, you are more 1950s than the Cold War. Modern-day mooning is a new term describing how you can use technology to practically ignore someone you don’t feel like dealing with. Kind of like ghosting, but less obvious or permanent.
Where Did The Term Mooning Come From?
Are you wondering where the term stems from? It’s all coming from the little half-moon symbol that signifies “do not disturb” on your iPhone.
Anyone who’s ever used the ‘Do Not Disturb’ mode on their iPhone will know that it functions as a way to silence text conversations by turning off all of your notifications for as long as your heart desires. You can choose to mute individual people or even people in group texts if you’re in no mood to receive messages from them.
How Do You Moon Someone?
Mooning someone is ridiculously easy. All you have to do is press the “i” icon at the top right of the text message thread, move “Do Not Disturb” to the right, and then you’ll stop receiving notifications for their messages until you decide to turn it off. Messages will continue to be there, but your phone will stop lighting up or making a noise every time a new one arrives – which is extremely helpful if you don’t feel like dealing with your phone for some time.
This Is Why People Are Turning To Mooning
Let’s admit to it: in an era of information and constant communication with others, receiving text messages 24/7 can be overwhelming. Not wanting to hear what your mum cooked (and how) or not feeling up for a lengthy conversation with your colleague about his office troubles when you return home from work do not make you a horrible human being.
People often need to unwind, sip on a glass of red wine and just relax on their couch for a while without the constant distraction of their mobile phone lighting up like a UFO every two seconds. They don’t want to turn their phone off, as this might cause offense, and they don’t want to ghost someone because they consider it to be ruder and more drastic.
When they are trying to concentrate on a project at work, people may also feel the need to be left alone and freed from the kind of distraction a constant flow of messages can be. Moreover, they may not be sure how they want to act regarding a certain person in their life, such as a prospective partner, preferring to put that person ‘on hold’ until they are in a position to deal with him/ her.
Is Mooning As Bad As Ghosting?
In a word, no. Mooning is less harmful than ghosting or blocking someone if it’s not done excessively because it’s not a decision to permanently disappear from a person’s life or to stop them having access to yours completely. It’s more like pressing ‘pause’ and taking some space from a certain person or people.
That said, some would argue that real relationships should not be based on muting people and choosing when to have them in our lives and when to shut them out unbeknownst to them. They would advocate a more honest “I will get back to you later” or an “I need to be away for an hour or so” to the sneaky alternative of mooning.
In our view, people shouldn’t do to others what they wouldn’t like done to them. So, if you’re OK with the idea you may be a victim of mooning from time to time yourself, you can go ahead and engage in it with some subtlety and within logical limits.