How can I turn off all texting?
I hate texting, or at least the ways my friends use it, which is simply annoying. I would like to remain available for time-sensitive texts, but 99% of what I receive are neither time-sensitive nor particularly important: at this point I just want to stop the madness. I don't want to get multiple stream of consciousness posts that are neither time-senstive nor require a reply. (Yes, I have tried to express this to the main offenders, multiple times.) For that matter, I also don't want spam from my carrier, certainly not 2 or 3 for every invoice (nearly due, due, processed by auto-pay... which was meant to let me ignore billing entirely!)
I'm just trying to explain why I want to do this: I'm not looking to be dissuaded. I know texting is a boon to others, just not me. When someone texts me they are far less likely to get my attention than with an email or phone call, both of which are higher priorities for me. The main impacts of texting on my life are annoyance and the increased likelihood I will miss something important.
I want my iPhone to be as if the iMessages app did not exist, but it turns out the app cannot be deleted. I want no ability to send or receive any sort of text or text attachments, other than email: NOT iMessage, MMS or SMS. I don't care about messaging capabilities within other apps, so they can stay. I just want to see written communications and associated attachments in my email and nowhere else.
Yes, I know I can turn off cellular data (workaround for SMS and MMS) and turn off iMessage (which only turns off the Apple messaging platform), but there are times I do want my cellular data available. Likewise I have seen the suggestion to use airplane mode. Those are great temporary fixes, but I'm hoping for a permanent one.
I checked with my carrier (AT&T) who have no solution. They have no service packages without texting; they have no way of restricting texting. Parental controls on the actual phone cannot do anything about this, as a different thread suggested.
Ideally the solution would let senders know their texts don't reach me each time they try to send.
Thanks in advance.
iPhone 7, iOS 10.3.1, null