[Grombobulous]

When I was a kid my parents wouldn’t give me a cellphone. I wanted to call my girlfriend. Well, really, my girlfriend wanted me to call her. A lot.

They didn’t give me one.

I ended up finding a way to get my own through a more apathetic adult who I could pay cash to cover my bill (only an extra $10/month on a family plan).

I certainly am not telling you to just cave in, but perhaps this story can be a reminder that technology you control is potentially better than technology you don’t.

[bawolff]

What age groups are we talking here, because if we're talking about a 7 year old, giving them unfettered screen time is probably bad parenting. However if we are talking about someone old enough to have gf/bf its probably also bad parenting to not let them develop their own self control around technology. They have to be an adult eventually.

[hamburglar]

I started my kid at 12 with an extremely locked down iPhone. She fights the restrictions at every turn and I have to make sure that she understands that finding loopholes is fun but also if I catch her violating the spirit of the restrictions there will be consequences. So she proudly tells me about clever workarounds she finds but still puts the phone away at the appropriate times. It’s kind of fun that she’s developing an instinct for subversion.

[JoeBOFH]

That’s how we handle it with ours as well. He found a way around a certain control and we opened a bug report with the vendor and it was acknowledged and fixed. He then realized he locked out other kids with that and laughed and tries to find more worth reporting.

[lostlogin]

Is that black hat or white hat?

[vlovich123]

Chaotic hat

[Grombobulous]

I was a teenager, if that wasn’t clear. But I was more of the mindset of lending a story, I can’t say whether or not it’s relevant to the parent commenter’s scenario.

[kelipso]

I don’t think “one can get around rules” is a very insightful thing to say, it’s just a truism.

[bawolff]

Just because someone can get around rules doesn't neccesarily mean they will want to.

[Forgeties79]

They’re talking about the relative ineffectiveness of prohibition when it comes to teenagers. Generally speaking, they’re right. And the implication is therefore “don’t just blanket ban your way through screen time restrictions.”

It’s a bit more nuanced than “one can get around the rules.

[kelipso]

There are kids under 18 who drink and plenty under 21 who drink. Still a very good idea to ban under 18 drinking, and not a terrible idea to ban under 21 drinking. You can do this for lots of rules and laws.

So yeah, they're basically saying "one can get around the rules" and nothing more than that. Therefore, there is no argument here, just a truism.

[Grombobulous]

I wasn’t trying to make an argument, I was trying to offer a story of a personal experience.

[Forgeties79]

>relative ineffectiveness

>generally speaking

I felt like I couched and prefaced enough that somebody wouldn’t read this and go “this guy thinks you literally can’t ban teens from anything ever,” which is a ridiculous stance that no reasonable person would hold. I’ll be more explicit in the future.

Wholesale banning teens from screens is generally highly ineffective, like many but not all things people try to prohibit at that age. It leads to their seeking it elsewhere, perhaps in less safe environments and certainly with less guidance. It also means they won’t communicate about it with their parents, which has a lot of bad secondary effects.

Personally, if my kid experiences or witnesses something disturbing (or illegal/potentially dangerous) when they are young, I want to make sure the lines of communication stay open between us so I can help - or at least help them process it - when they need me.

TL;DR: banning smartphones when they can easily access them elsewhere is almost certainly going to end in a net negative. I am not saying we can’t ban anything. That is a ridiculous interpretation of my comment. I hope this clears that up for you.

[JumpCrisscross]

Yup. I think American culture is broadly too permissive with under-14s and too restrictive with over-14s (but under-21s).

[mc3301]

I told my elementary-age child that they can have a phone when they are old enough to sneakily buy one without me knowing.

[mrandish]

We didn't give our kid her own phone until a few months past her 13th birthday. She was at a private elementary school since kindergarten and her class was small and mostly had the same kids from K-8, so the parents got to know each other early on and there was general agreement on 'no phones until 13'. This greatly reduced the "but so-and-so has one".

[Forgeties79]

Who said it had to be unfettered?

[fma]

My comment got a lot of traction but for context my kids are early in elementary school, far from their teenage years.

The intention of the iPad was to watch some educational videos, check out books, magazines from the library.

They still have occasional access but only with direct active supervision (i.e we are next to them vs we are making dinner).

As they get older, we will revisit.

[expedition32]

Don't apologise. Children end up sending pictures of themselves in their underwear to strangers all the time because 12 year olds panic when someone puts the screws on them. Their brains just work differently.

[sublinear]

What's stopping them from getting a burner device anyway? Imposing too much control can push them away, but a lack of direction can also make them wander.

All you can do is nudge and try not to worry too much. It's certain there are other influences in their life you don't know about.