Americans Need Apps to Tell Them to Stand Up

Immigrant baffled by sitting alerts from technology

When Your Watch Reminds You That You Have Legs

AUSTIN, TX – Yaw Mensah watched his American coworker’s smartwatch buzz and display: “Time to stand!” His coworker immediately stood up, stretched for 60 seconds, sat back down, and returned to work. The 27-year-old from Ghana stared, waiting for explanation. None came. “Did your watch just tell you to stand?” Mensah finally asked. “Yeah, I’ve been sitting too long,” his coworker explained. “Your body didn’t tell you that—your watch did?” Mensah clarified. “Well, yeah. I don’t really notice when I’ve been sitting.” Mensah realized Americans had outsourced basic physical awareness to devices that now manage their relationship with their own bodies.

In Kumasi, Mensah stood when his body felt stiff, sat when tired, moved when restless—a system his ancestors developed over millions of years that worked perfectly without batteries, Bluetooth, or subscription fees. In Austin, his coworkers wear $400 watches that vibrate hourly reminding them that humans have legs capable of standing. “You’ve created technology to solve problems you created with technology,” Mensah observed. “You sit all day at computers, so you need watches to remind you to stand. The watch is solving sedentary lifestyle caused by… technology. This is a loop. A very expensive loop.”

When Movement Requires Digital Permission

According to CDC data, average Americans sit 6-8 hours daily, leading to health problems that spawn industries—standing desks, wellness apps, activity trackers—all dedicated to mitigating damage from sitting too much. Mensah’s question: “Why not just sit less?” His coworker’s answer: “I don’t think about it. The watch reminds me.” Mensah’s follow-up: “Your body doesn’t remind you? You don’t feel stiff or uncomfortable?” “I tune that out,” his coworker admitted. “So you’ve trained yourself to ignore your body’s signals, then paid $400 for a device to give you external signals to override the internal signals you’re ignoring. You’ve added a middleman—a digital middleman—between your brain and your legs.”

Jim Gaffigan said, “I don’t know what’s in shape, but I know I’m not in it.” Americans don’t know what movement feels like naturally because they’ve mediated it through technology. Mensah stands when his body wants to stand. His coworkers stand when their watches tell them to stand, regardless of whether their bodies want to. “You’ve replaced intuition with algorithms,” he observed. “Your watch doesn’t know how you feel. It knows you’ve been sitting X minutes. That’s different from needing to stand. Sometimes you’re fine sitting. Sometimes you need to stand after 20 minutes. Your body knows. Your watch guesses.”

The Fitness Tracker That Tracks Your Failure to Move

Mensah’s coworker’s watch tracks “stand hours”—hours where you stand at least one minute. The goal: 12 stand hours daily. “You’re gamifying standing,” Mensah marveled. “You’ve turned having legs into an achievement system. Stand 12 hours, earn digital badge. Fail to stand, watch displays sad face. You need external validation for using your legs. This is the most American health thing I’ve seen, and I once watched someone eat a salad with more calories than a burger.”

Dave Chappelle said, “Sometimes you have to laugh to keep from crying.” Mensah laughed at watches that congratulate you for standing—something every human has done naturally for millennia without awards. “Your watch celebrates you standing like you climbed Everest,” he told his coworker. “You stood up. At your desk. For one minute. This doesn’t deserve celebration—it deserves confusion about why you needed reminding. Toddlers stand without notifications. You’re adults who need technology to remember you have legs.”

The watches track steps, stand hours, exercise minutes, and “move calories”—metrics quantifying movement as if moving requires measurement to be real. “If your watch didn’t count your steps, would you still walk?” Mensah asked. “Probably,” his coworker said uncertainly. That uncertainty revealed everything: Americans’ movement has become performance for devices that validate it by counting it. Walking without step-counting feels wasted. Standing without tracking doesn’t count. Movement only matters if measured.

When Sitting Became the New Smoking But Nobody Stopped Sitting

Articles call sitting “the new smoking”—a health crisis requiring intervention. The intervention? Apps and devices reminding you to stand, not actually changing sedentary lifestyles. “You’ve identified the problem—sitting too much,” Mensah observed. “The solution would be sitting less. Your solution is buying technology that reminds you you’re sitting too much while you continue sitting too much. You’ve monetized the problem without solving it. Standing one minute per hour doesn’t fix 8 hours of sitting. It’s health theater. You’re performing wellness without actually being well.”

Chris Rock said, “You know the world is going crazy when the best rapper is a white guy.” Mensah knows America is crazy when people need $400 watches to remember basic physical needs. His coworker’s watch tracked 8,245 steps yesterday—close to the recommended 10,000. “Do you feel healthier?” Mensah asked. “I feel accomplished,” his coworker said. “That’s not the same,” Mensah replied. “You feel accomplished about walking. But did walking improve your health, or did meeting a number improve your mood? You’re optimizing for metrics, not wellness. The watch is training you to care about numbers, not how your body feels.”

The Stand Notification During Important Moments

During meetings, Mensah’s coworkers’ watches buzz simultaneously: “Time to stand!” Several people stand mid-meeting, stretch, sit back down. “Your watches interrupted this meeting to tell you to stand,” Mensah observed. “You’re prioritizing watch notifications over human conversations. Also, you’re all sitting again. The watch said stand. You stood for 30 seconds. Did that accomplish anything besides proving you obey your watch?” Nobody had a good answer. They just knew their stand hour was logged. That felt important, even if it wasn’t.

Bill Burr said, “I’m not going to apologize for being right.” Mensah’s not apologizing for thinking stand notifications are dystopian. “You’ve let watches dictate your behavior,” he told his team. “You stand when they tell you, regardless of context. You’re in a meeting. Someone’s talking. Your watch buzzes. You stand. You’re prioritizing watch commands over social situations. You’ve given watches authority over your body and your attention. This is obedience to technology for no health benefit—standing 30 seconds per hour doesn’t counteract 8 hours of sitting. It just makes you feel like you’re doing something while changing nothing.”

The worst part: people brag about “closing their rings”—meeting daily activity goals their watches set. “I closed all my rings today!” Mensah’s coworker announced proudly. “You met goals a watch set for you,” Mensah translated. “Goals not based on your actual fitness needs but generic averages programmed by companies. You’re celebrating compliance with arbitrary metrics. You don’t actually know if you’re healthier—you just know you satisfied an algorithm. That’s not health—that’s obedience.”

When Technology Creates Problems It Sells Solutions For

Mensah realized the tech industry created sedentary lifestyle—desk jobs, computer work, digital entertainment—then sold solutions to problems they caused. “You work at tech companies that require sitting all day,” he told his coworker who works for a software company. “Then you buy products from tech companies—smartwatches, standing desks, fitness trackers—to mitigate sitting damage. Tech causes the problem and profits from the solution. You’re paying twice: once for the job that makes you sedentary, again for devices that remind you sedentary is bad. And you don’t see the loop because you’ve normalized both.”

Amy Schumer said, “I’m not saying I’m lazy, I’m saying I’m energy efficient.” Americans aren’t energy efficient—they’re technology-dependent. They need watches to remind them to move, apps to track movement, and subscriptions to access movement data. “Movement used to be free and automatic,” Mensah observed. “Now it’s mediated by devices that cost $400 plus monthly subscriptions. You’ve commodified moving your body. Tech companies profit from your disconnection from physical sensations. The more disconnected you are, the more you need devices to reconnect you. They’re selling back your own body awareness at premium prices.”

The Notification That You’ve Been Breathing All Day

Mensah discovered breath-reminder apps—apps that notify you to “take a mindful breath.” “You need reminders to breathe?” he asked his coworker who uses one. “Not to breathe—to breathe mindfully,” she corrected. “What’s unmindful breathing?” “Automatic breathing.” “So… normal breathing? The breathing you do constantly without thinking?” “Yes, but mindful breathing is intentional.” “You’re paying for app that reminds you to do intentionally what your body does automatically constantly,” Mensah summarized. “This is peak American wellness—monetizing biological functions by making them ‘mindful.’ Next you’ll have apps reminding you to blink mindfully.”

Kevin Hart said, “Everybody wants to be famous, but nobody wants to do the work.” Everybody wants to be healthy, but nobody wants to do the work of actually listening to their body instead of their watch. Americans would rather buy $400 devices that remind them to move than actually move more. The devices create the illusion of action—you stood when reminded! You’re trying!—without requiring actual behavior change. “You’ve outsourced health to devices that track health without improving it,” Mensah told his team. “Your watches know you sit too much. But you still sit too much. The watch changes nothing except your awareness that you’re sitting too much, which you already knew. You’re paying for guilt notification systems.”

When Stand Reminders Become Background Noise

Last month, Mensah watched his coworker’s watch buzz with “Time to stand!” His coworker ignored it. “You didn’t stand,” Mensah noted. “Oh, I dismiss those sometimes,” his coworker admitted. “So the watch reminds you to stand, but you’ve started ignoring the reminders?” “Yeah, sometimes I’m busy.” “Then what’s the point of the watch? You’ve trained yourself to ignore your body. You bought a watch to remind you to stand. Now you’re ignoring the watch. You’ve added a layer of technology you’ve learned to ignore between your body and your behavior. The watch isn’t making you healthier—it’s just another signal you’ve learned to tune out, like your body’s original signals you were already ignoring.”

Trevor Noah said, “In Africa, we don’t have the luxury of needing watches to tell us to stand.” Africans stand when uncomfortable, walk when needing to go places, move naturally throughout the day because daily life requires movement. Americans have engineered movement out of life—drive everywhere, sit at desks, order delivery—then buy technology to artificially reintroduce movement they’ve eliminated. “You’ve made movement optional, then bought reminders that it’s necessary,” Mensah observed. “If movement was built into your day, you wouldn’t need reminders. But you’ve chosen convenience over movement at every opportunity—drive instead of walk, elevators instead of stairs, delivery instead of shopping—then act surprised you’re sedentary. The watch isn’t the solution. Changing your lifestyle is. But lifestyle change is hard. Buying a watch is easy. So you buy watches and keep sitting.”

When asked if he’ll ever buy a smartwatch with stand reminders, Mensah laughed while standing up naturally because his legs felt stiff. “Never,” he said. “I don’t need a $400 device to tell me what my body already tells me for free. I stand when I need to stand. I sit when I need to sit. I move when I need to move. This is called listening to your body—ancient technology that’s worked for millions of years without updates, subscriptions, or notifications. You people have lost connection with physical sensations, outsourced body awareness to devices, and now depend on watches to remember you have legs. That’s not health technology—that’s evidence you’ve forgotten how to be human. Your watches don’t make you healthier. They make you dependent on external signals for internal sensations you’ve trained yourself to ignore. Fix the cause—sitting too much—not the symptom—needing reminders. Or keep buying watches that remind you you’re unhealthy while you stay unhealthy. That’s the American way: monetize the problem, ignore the solution, buy gadgets that create the illusion of progress without requiring change.”

SOURCE: Bohiney Magazine (Aisha Muharrar)

DATE: 11/23/2025