As a young teen, the filtering drove me mental as it blocked development tools websites. But it was a lot of fun working out how to corrupt the filtering process so it “appeared” to work when my parents looked at it, but actually did nothing.
I strongly agree with monitoring internet usage, filtering, curfews, limited media consumption, and so on. I must say that it's absolutely fascinating how 80s/90s "normal" is now perceived as extremely strict, but understand the importance of encouraging children to develop an internal moral compass and locus of control by carefully exposing them to the reality of the human condition.
That said, I am deeply concerned by how permissive/inattentive parenting may affect other kids considering the prevalence of so many potentially negative influences.
I'm talking about those one-off interactions where a so-called "bad kid" has the opportunity to expose a dozen children to an HD stream of pornography on their iDroid 15x+. It could be on the school bus, bleachers during a school assembly, field trip, locker room, playground, and so on. This is compounded by the permanent availability of adult-themed uncensored music, marijuana legalization, and more.
If I may ask... do you have a plan/approach to addressing/mitigating these issues with your kids without harming their ability for healthy socialization?
There is literally no reason for anyone under the age of 18 to own a smartphone or have unsupervised use of any internet-connected device. Literally none.
My 16 years old will be pretty independent. He'll have a car and a motorbike. He'll be able to go out by himself, experience real people. He'll be able to work odd jobs, manage his own money, read whatever books and learn whatever things he wants.
But he won't have a smartphone or unsupervised internet access. Neither provide independence, but shackles to kilotons of the worst quality content humanity has ever created.
Not knowing about your 16 year old; but it will be significantly difficult to deal with the peer pressure and peer influences unless you live in a different culture.
The studied reason millenials were less likely to drive is not because cars got harder to afford or high school jobs harder to come by, but because of lack of interest (thanks to smart phones)
Even if you don't give your children a smart phone, they're going to be exposed to this behavior from their friends. And there are already articles of children who buy "burners" to keep their privacy from their parents.
Owned a burner in 2006 when I realized my parents were going through my call logs. Thankfully, back then they weren't clever enough to realize they could download my text logs.
Considering a smart phone can be bought for the equivalent of a month's lunch money today, good luck to anyone trying to keep one out of a kid's hands in ~2030.
Honestly, I’m expecting someone to argue that kids should be allowed to smoke crack because muh independence in a minute... you notice no one has provided a coherent reason they should have smartphones...
I’m not agreeing with this; but the main reason I can see is that not having one when every other kid you know does will cause some issues in your peer groups. I’d expect to be mocked for it, myself. But then I’m biased: I had a smartphone that I researched, purchase, carrier unlocked and then turned into a “global” firmware from 2005, when I was 15! Having a computer in my pocket when no one else did was awesome, heh.
this kind of "tiger parents" attitude would not work in terms of educating kids on how to deal with problems brought by modern technology and internet/social media. 18 as an age should not be a free pass to things.
As someone who is under the age of 18, I would respectfully have to agree with the statement in question. The Smartphone -- or more specifically the internet -- has provided us, adolescents, a powerful platform to learn anything we want and develop into technically literate and ethical adults. Unfortunately, this has and will continue to not be the case.
The internet has evolved from being a source of knowledge into a cancerous entity that craves complete and utter assimilation of any decency humans might have. While adults might be capable of avoiding the raw, seductive power of the evil this medium permits, I think I speak for the majority of teenagers when I say that we cannot.
Constantly and persistently we are using the internet to perform heinous deeds unimaginable to our guardians. We have been raised in a bubble where our role models are Youtubers who have dropped out of high-school and where the names of famous scholars are annoyances of reality. We no longer look at the stars curious of the natures which lay beyond them, for we believe we have already witnessed and possess any great magnitude of beauty in our phones. We are mostly guided by the one and ever consuming belief that the internet is not an extension of our minds, but rather our minds themselves.
It is a terribly sad revelation that something considered so revolutionary and representative of human ingenuity is actually something wholly malignant to the young of our species. We are mentally and emotionally undeveloped and we have been given a powerful tool without guidance on how to use it.
I say these things not to bandwagon or provoke, but because I despise the creature the internet has given birth to -- me. I am a product of this vile creation and I want this cycle to stop. I do not know how many other teenagers have come to this realization or how many are still wasting away on Snapchat speaking of pointlessly obscure thoughts. But what I do know is that the internet has not enriched our lives but has rather regressed it to the point where we do anything for a couple of minutes on our phones. We are young and have been taken advantage of by political powers which want to advertise and indoctrinate; we hold unrestricted power in a domain of our own making; we are independent only in face when enslaved in heart.
As someone who recently grew out of his teens, I would respectfully have to disagree with your comment.
I'm a product of the internet too. The internet helped me keep friends that would otherwise not stay in touch, helped me make new friends, helped me learn and grow and become my own person. I've had jobs and internships, and I owe the vast majority of the knowledge required in those to... the internet.
If you choose to waste your time mindlessly watching empty YouTube videos, if you choose to spend your time at social events finding the optimal selfie position rather than enjoying yourself... then that's on you. But there are many adolescents that choose to use the internet responsibly.
And that's what a responsible parent understands. That their child is not just an extension of them but an entirely new and different person. Good parents don't bubblewrap their kids when they play on the playground. They educate their kids on how to play responsibly, and deal with the fallout when their kids get hurt.
The internet is not an irresistible and all-corrupting force. It is a tool, and becomes only what you make of it.
There are various 'tools' which parents do not allow children to use unsupervised simply because they are cautious of the negative effects. For example, would you allow a child to operate vehicles, kitchen utilities, or weapons alone?
I agree with your point of educating kids to play responsibly, but this does not mean allowing them to do whatever they want in a dangerous territory.
Dangerous tools like knives or vehicles can cause instantaneous wounding or death when used improperly. Comparing those to the internet is wrong. Especially since your argument started with
> The internet has evolved from being a source of knowledge into a cancerous entity that craves complete and utter assimilation of any decency humans might have.
Is this about decency, or about instant death? You can't move the goalposts like that.
Additionally, I believe we were talking about adolescents, which are entirely capable of operating vehicles or at the very least kitchen utilities. I would indeed allow a teenager to use a kitchen knife unsupervised, with the proper education.
I'm simply not convinced that the so-called "dangers" out there on the internet are so bad you must ignore all the good that the internet can bring. I'm sorry you find the internet indecent, but "the majority of teenagers" you speak for might not really need freeing. Rock and roll and weed and premarital sex still exist, and somehow kids still seem to grow up fine.
I'm not old enough to school the youngs but I'm old enough to take delight in sounding like a curmudgeon, but your comment would be recited nearly verbatim at some poetry slam of decades ago, except replacing "the internet" with such things as
- tv
- mass culture
- the suburbs
- the city
- small town/rural life
- sexual activity when everyone is having it, except you
Sorry for the snarky tone. I don't mean to discount your experience.
It's relevant, but on a certain level so were the complaints of previous generations.
People like me lamented all sorts of contemporary phenomena. Except for passing fads (which seem to get the brunt of overthought lamentations), those changes didn't destroy mankind.
As you get older, this stuff just becomes funny. Young people rediscover the age-old need for self control and adaptation to problematic environments/cultural contexts. Older people discover the joy of misguided, unhelpful arrogance.
As someone who's also under 18, I relate very strongly with this. I'm watching myself, and everyone around me get caught up in the virtual world. I find myself spending hours on a computer/my phone and feeling sick and upset afterwards. Whenever I'm in a group of kids my age, 90% of the time we'll instinctively go for our phones. This behavior is scary to me.
That's not to say that technology is 100% negative. I'd be the last to deny the benefits of it. But, seeing myself and everyone else in my generation getting sucked into devices that just bring discontent is concerning to me.
What generation was that, the Boomers? Because I'm from Gen X, and I (and numerous people I knew) had unsupervised access to internet connected devices under age 18. (PC + dialup + CompuServe account, or something similar, though at the very trailing edge of Gen X it might have been a more "direct" dial-up ISP.)
> and guess what, no one died.
I'm pretty sure that people under 18 did die in your generation, whatever generation that was, that could have been avoided had they had access to a smartphone or other internet-connected device, especially the former.
> In fact that was the generation that invented all this stuff.
"All this stuff" wasn't invented by people from exclusively one generation.
Your generation certainly had other things that your parents and grandparents would rather keep you from using/experiencing. Moreover, no one else had a smartphone, so you weren't the odd one out.
If I had only access to supervised internet there is absolutely no way I'd have the job I have today. (or at least, I'd have it 10 years later) I agree with you up to the age of maybe 10-12, beyond that you're restricting a fully capable mind from connecting with the rest of humanity and learning. If the skill to navigate the internet isn't developed at a younger age, it'll be painfully developed as an adult much more slowly, and any mistakes much longer lasting.
I didn't say fully developed, I said fully capable which in context is to mean that they are capable of going out on the open net without anything they see permanently warping their worldview inaccurately. Its reasonable to shield children from negativity in the world they have no capability of understanding and will end up with warped ideas. At beginning adolescent age that capability is reached, and if they are further shielded from the world they'll form an inaccurate and unhelpful worldview most likely. At best their development will be delayed.
All the sick shit on the internet was there 20 years ago. It might have been a little more pixellated and lower-resolution, and getting it on a 56kbp modem that gurgled and screamed and tied up the phone line was perhaps a bit tricky to do surreptitiously, but it was there. We turned out fine.
If I did ever put some sort of parental blockers on my children's devices, I'd try to find some half-assed thing like the blockers I learned to go around and through, to give them a challenge.
Yes, I read it. It's a lot of hand-wringing and pearl-clutching, and worrying that children might be talking in codes...
There were forums, there was AIM. People were shitty to each other in person. The twelve-year olds that are yelling racial slurs at you and calling you a noob in Battlefield were doing the same to their friends on the couch playing Mortal Kombat.
Every generation needs its existential threat to the wholesomeness of children. Comic books, jazz, rock and roll, hippy counter-culture, rap, and video games are mostly played out. Now it's social media.
The difference being that you're not engulfed in all of that for hours/days at a time like you are with today's technology. It doesn't constantly follow you around to the dinner table, to your school, to the toilet. 15 years ago, most people had a family computer and you'd go on it and if there was something you weren't supposed to see, you'd still do it but with the added fear of looking back over your shoulder hoping your parents wouldn't catch you.
Suicide/cutting forums for 12 year olds weren't a thing, and if they were, it was nothing like the hashtags that exist today and only the more techy kids would end up on /b/ or something of that nature. Regardless, kids being exposed to awful things will always happen, and seeing gore or whatever isn't the worst thing that can happen. I think what's worse is the overabundance of information that exists today, most of which is absolute trash that I wouldn't even recommend a 40 year old to consume let alone a 12 year old.
I don't think the writer of the article is being ludicrous by taking away access to certain apps from the poison of the internet. You literally get dumber consuming that stuff. Being called a noob in battlefield is a poor example with what the author is trying to convey
This is a ridiculous opinion. The amount and vastness of content and the ease at which it is accessible have increased 1000x maybe more. Never in the history of the world never have children been so connected to topics, content, and strangers (that no doubt play a role in their mental development) as they are now.
Their phones and apps will be restricted until mature enough to make their own decisions.