I have said before — and it’s partly as confession — that I deeply, viscerally, and inherently distrust people who wear “earpods.” Any time, anywhere, under any circumstance. I have never figured out exact why, but it is something specific to the wirelessness of them. Again, this is partly confessional, so take this with a grain of salt, but something inside me says, “Humans should never do this, and the ones who do should not be trusted.”
I have had a similar, but not identical, reaction to people who wear Apple watches. (Sorry in-laws.🤓) They always felt a little closer to that omnipotently surveilled everything, everywhere, all at once future-that-is-now that we can’t bring ourselves to properly despise.
(I swear to God I’ll pistol whip the next guy who says “collective action problem.”)