Pens, paper are dead, handwriting is a relic

I did that thing recently where you have to sign a big card — which is a horror unto itself, especially as the Keeper of the Big Card was leaning over me at the time. Suddenly I was on the spot, a rabbit in the headlights, torn between doing a fun message or some sort of in-joke or a drawing. Instead, overwhelmed by the myriad options available to me, I decided to just write: “Good luck, best, Joel.”

It was then that I realised, to my horror, that I had forgotten how to write. I had to scribble an “e” out twice. I wrote my own name too quickly and messed up the “J”, tried to save it with an underline but miscalculated and drew a line through the whole thing.The thing is: when do I ever write? My entire existence is “tap letters into computer”. My shopping lists are hidden in the notes function of my phone. If I need to remember something I send an email to myself. A pen is something I chew when I’m struggling to think. Paper is something I pile beneath my laptop to make it a more comfortable height for me to type on.

Solidarity, then, with the teenagers who are being gone after by Big Ink this week for their reluctance to write handwritten notes. A poll of 1,000 teens by the stationers Bic found that one in 10 don’t own a pen, a third have never written a letter, and half of 13- to 19-year-olds have never been forced to sit down and write a thank you letter. More than 80% have never written a love letter; 56% don’t have letter paper at home. And a quarter have never known the unique torture of writing a birthday card.

Because, mainly, it’s not Victorian times. Bic, have you heard of mobile phones? Have you heard of email? Are you down with this weird website we use to wish one another a happy birthday, Facebook? These are all ways teens communicate when they are not Snapchatting. This is the future. Pens are dead. Paper is dead. Handwriting is a relic.

Bic UK’s Jonathan Skyrme is still wedded to his Cristal Medium 1.0mm, though. “Perhaps what’s most concerning about our findings is just how little writing appears to be done at home,” he said. “Handwriting is one of the most creative outlets we have and should be given the same importance as other art forms such as sketching, painting or photography.” Listen, I hate teens as much as anyone. They wear luxe sportswear and listen to music I don’t understand. They are wretched. But going after them for not writing thank you letters is bizarre. The most a teen ever has to use a pen is on an exam paper.

If they want to say thank you, they can Skype their grandparents. If they want to profess love, they’ve got 140 characters and access to an expansive archive of appropriate .gifs. They need pens as much as they need typewriters, flint and witch-dunking equipment. They need a stash of letter paper at home as much as they need a cure for the plague.

But spare a thought for ol’ Grampa Bic, up in his lofty paper tower. A lonely Tippex bottle spins on the floor. A stash of headed writing paper flutters out of a window. “How can we make writing cool again?” he’s yelling, and his words echo back to him. “Those girl pens didn’t work. Quick! Let’s demonise the teens!” All the while, down in the biro pits below, the workers pass a big card around for him, dutifully signing it with the same pen, everyone agonising for those same few seconds before giving up and writing “Have a good one, mate” and passing it on. Teens didn’t kill handwriting. It was already dead.