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That sounds like a parental problem
What a great way to dismiss an entire problems based that affects our society. It’s easier to just hand wave it away as someone else’s problem than to actually consider it…
When a problem becomes systematic it’s now a societal and cultural problem and not an individual responsibility problem. Individual responsibility isn’t working so it’s now down to the society this is occurring in to solve the systematic problem in a systematic way.
That’s how almost everything works
You’re both right
Yeah none of those kids should have cell phones. They should be about old enough to drive before they get one even.
Yup. I have kids (three under 10), and the only time my kids use my phone is when I’m literally there with them, letting them pick a video (usually Pat and Mat, Bert and Ernie, or similar). It’s not every day, and never more than 30 min, usually like 15-20 min, and we take turns picking.
I’m not letting my kids have their own phone until I trust them with one, and that doesn’t seem to be happening anytime soon with how many of our other rules they break.
You can type in coherent sentences so it’s no surprise your kids don’t fall into the reported finding, your kids are off to a better start than average, I presume.
That’s a depressingly low bar…
Yup.
It’s probably iPads but still…
Our schools have banned phones. They need to have the right to destroy phones
Yes, but it’s also new territory for us as a species. I’m sure the guidance and monitors will be significantly improved in the next decade, but a decade ago… It was the wild west, baby.
So does a kid snapping and shooting up the school, but it doesn’t mean we ignore guns.
but it doesn’t mean we ignore guns.
Uuuh, you sure about that? It seems like that shit keeps happening and nothing at all is being done about it.
oh please. if guns became sentient someone would stack three of them in a trenchcoat and give them the right to vote.
Children copy their parents.
With some things yes. But not all.
Childless young people downvoting this, perhaps not able to admit they’re just like mom or dad?
For most of us I’m sorry but it’s true! Kids are mirrors; apples don’t fall far from trees. Not all of them. Some carry.
The question here would be… where are their parents?
Out stealing cars for likes.
You wouldn’t download a car.
Can’t, but you can download a video of me stealing a car!
Doing meth, or working? That’s the US these days.
The next generation is so fucked. Wait…they be the ones who take care of me in the old person home. I’m fucked as will.
People have been claiming that new media will destroy society at least since we invented writing, and probably before.
No I get that, but this is different honestly. Look up rates of teenage depression/anxiety/suicide attempts, it’s a stunning correlation with the advent of smartphones and social media. Millenials got out just in time.
I think it has a lot more to do with social media than smart phones. I remember kids being bullied through tombstone messages on Oregon Trail floppies.
Look at Mr Moneybags here, getting cared for in an old person home.
They’re gonna put a camera in your room and post all your old people antics on future tik tok
Nobody wants to see old people.
Who is Will and why is he so fucked?
Eh the kids are alright
That’s fucked
I managed to almost completly keep my children away from it for now (8 and 10). But it is a struggle. And I will soon lose that struggle. So many children at age 8 or 9 have smartphones for fs sake.
I plan to slowly introduce them to stuff like this, so they will be able to deal with it. I did so rather successfully with the other bullshit, like Roblox. They are only allowed to play it when I am in the room, and I check that they follow that rule (they do).
Feels like walking on the edge though. Still unsure when to open the TikTok thing. Too early is bad, but too late and they will somehow already he on tiktok and I just don’t know about it.
my siblings managed to keep their kids away from smartphones until 4th grade. And even that was a struggle.
sadly it just falls into the camp of ‘everyone else is doing it’. and if your kid isn’t they will be socially ostracized.
Some kids also get obsessive about phones once they get one, or obsessed with other people’s phones until then.
Do you have any tips? My kids are still pretty young (3 and 2) and I really want to avoid them having acess to these sorts of things.
the main thing for you is to stay off your phone as well. Kids watch their parents closely and humans have an in built need for “fairness”, if they see you addicted to it they will never stop wanting to do the same.
Yea, that makes sense. Whenever I’m home from work, I make sure the phone goes on the counter. Thankfully, I’m not into social media all that much.
I’d add the “have clear rules” concept to this and enforce the rules. Don’t be wishy washy. But communicate the rules and be prepared to explain the rules.
But also accept that theory and practice are not the same. Imo you should allow them enough, that they don’t isolated from their friends experiences. That is why I allow them to play Roblox under supervision or why I set up a Minecraft Server so that they can play online with their friend in a safe environment (but only on weekends for a fixed time period).
Is there any data for similar age range but for YouTube?
With YouTube kids, and the popularity of channels like cocomelon, I’d be surprised if it’s less than 75%…
This ban can’t come soon enough. Fuck the CCP.
“In my household, the only addictive spyware we use is made in the USA!!!”
Edit: everyone below me is proving my point exactly.
People love to repeat this, but US companies aren’t coming from a place of hostile intent like china’s special brand of tik tok for the states.
I’m not so sure about that, they seem pretty hostile to consumers and employees.
They’re both focused on profit. The only reason you see the other one as scary is because it’s owned by the scary scary Chinese. Red scare all over again.
No tiktok is not focused on profit. It literally has one of the worst/non existent monetization systems.
Why is Chinese tiktok different than that in the states then?
Because the USA strong armed them into giving their platform handling to Oracle Corp, a top tier US govt contractor.
But since pro-palestine cries can’t be silenced on TikTok as easily as Zio media, taking control of the platform is no longer enough
You say “red scare” as if China isn’t a hostile nation state to the US. Go look at western company penetration in China if you want. Are you calling it “western scare” when China blocks yet another western company? I didn’t think so.
Hmm, here’s what Zuckerberg said when he launched Facebook:
According to SAI sources, the following exchange is between a 19-year-old Mark Zuckerberg and a friend shortly after Mark launched The Facebook in his dorm room:
Zuck: Yeah so if you ever need info about anyone at Harvard
Zuck: Just ask.
Zuck: I have over 4,000 emails, pictures, addresses, SNS
[Redacted Friend’s Name]: What? How’d you manage that one?
Zuck: People just submitted it.
Zuck: I don’t know why.
Zuck: They “trust me”
Zuck: Dumb fucks.
Brutal.
Could Mark have been completely joking? Sure. But the exchange does reveal that Facebook’s aggressive attitude toward privacy may have begun early on.
They may not be trying to control elections (they certainly have their fingers in that pie too), but they’re still hostile to users.
Blaming tiktok for bad parental choices?
I’m not saying it’s a good parental choice. But the ban can help the kids.
I doubt it, parents will just move them to YouTube, Instagram, or some other platform. The TikTok ban is intended to limit misinformation by the CCP, and that doesn’t really matter for this age of kids.
I’m a parent. YouTube is watched but you can see what they are watching.
The more important thing to me is building habits. I care less about how much they’re watching vs how they’re spending their time generally.
We have a rule where our kids need to read to be able to watch/play games, and we cap at 2hr/day. If they read 1hr, they can watch/play for 30min. My kids seem to have a pretty good mix of reading, watching/playing, and playing outside w/ friends, so I think it works.
Yea. We do something similar. It’s an electronic allowance. If you use it it’s done for the day. I change it for rainy days and vacations if we are traveling in the car or whatever. But it’s easy to set up with Google family. And then you can see what they are doing. Not to be snoopy. Just to teach them the right way to protect themselves online. I don’t want them to turn 18 and be completely lost.
I give my kids 30 min “free” on Saturdays, which gets doubled if they spend it in a game with a sibling. For trips, I make my kids all do the same thing, so either watch the same show, listen to the same audiobook, etc.
I personally don’t digitally track what my kids do at all, I instead rely on trust and keeping devices in a public space. I tell them what’s acceptable, and occasionally hang out with them while they’re doing whatever. As they follow the rules, I give them more autonomy (e.g. my oldest may get their own PC soon-ish), but if they break the rules, they lose access. The only parental controls I use is for my 4yo, because she keeps getting into my Steam Deck and Switch w/o asking, but my other kids know the passcode on the Switch (not my Steam Deck, that’s mine).
It’s a bit bumpy, but I’m hopeful that having rules but no actual walls teaches them to learn to self-regulate and will help them in the long-run. It worked for me as a kid.
No blaming the CCP on psyops on Americans.
Only Western manipulation please!
It’s not in American businesses best interest overthrow a government. Can’t say the same for the CCP tho. Fuck the CCP.
Lol I hope that’s a poor choice of words, maybe you MIGHT have a point if you specified the US government though even that isn’t true https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot
Wow, that is literally 1 example of an obscure time in the early 19th century.
A mass majority of an American company has zero interest to hurt the community it is based in. The stability of a government and the strength of it’s community determines if people would buy/use a product. It also supplies a competent workforce and a network of security that helps a company prosper.
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I use TikTok routinely. I actually spend time on Chinese parts of TikTok, because I know a little Chinese. I’ve seen content that the CCP would be very much opposed to - including discussions of the Tank Man from Tiananmen Square and homosexuality in Chinese history.
TikTok has censorship certainly, but it’s more targeted towards the Gaza conflict.
I use TikTok routinely.
Your experience is different from other experience. That’s the main issue. They are and can target specific people in specific groups and in specific regions. You seeing this content just means you’re not important enough for them to target.
As can/do Facebook and every other social media platform. But I find it hard to take this idea that TikTok is an arm of the CCP seriously when I routinely discuss Ughyur Muslims and Tiananmen square with folks, and see depictions of Chairman Mao as Pooh Bear.
The more shady shit is the shop and how every third video is an unlabeled ad. TikTok wants to make money first and foremost. I don’t think TikTok is some force for good in the world, but what they are doing is no different from what Meta and Google are doing.
Tiktok has one of the worse/non existent monetization programs. Its clearly not important to them how bad it is.
My extended family in Taiwan would routinely see fake news on Tiktok during the Taiwan elections.
That’s the thing. You don’t know. Nobody knows except the CCP. That’s the problem.
That’s the thing. You don’t know. Nobody knows except the CCP. That’s the problem.
But you do about every other social media platform?
Fake news is not exclusive to a single platform. Teach your family about reputable news sources and stop trying to shoehorn US propaganda down everyone’s throats like it makes you look smart. Tiktok learned everything it does by the likes of facebook, Google and Twitter.
Why do you think US social media is everywhere all over the world with near instant or sometimes even get higher bandwidth preference in some countries? If you don’t think the US government has nothing to do with the level of complexities that entails dealing with local governments/infrastructure and planning, then I guess “ignorance is a bliss”, and I hope the US government will bring you peace and much freedumb. Don’t complain when they come in blasting tho.
It’s one thing to have fake news that is uncontrolled. It’s another thing when a literal adversary uses fake news as a tool to create discourse.
A social media company has one thing in mind. Profits. Even if it means that a byproduct of profits is discourse. But TikTok sole purpose is discourse. They literally don’t care about profits.
You would think that with all those kids watching, Xi would lean into the whole Winnie the Pooh resemblance.
How do you take over the world? Program the children!
I’m not completely convinced. It is possible but sounds a bit high to me. It is based on a survey of less than 3k parents, and although I found the BBC article, it doesn’t seem to link to the actual source. It is therefore difficult to take this too seriously without seeing exactly who was interviewed and how the questions were worded.
It’s probably not that bad, but I wouldn’t be surprised just based on anecdotal experience.
I’m a provider at a children’s hospital and phones have always been an issue during appointments. Before, it was mostly an issue with getting parents to pay attention or answer questions during the evaluation.
However since COVID, we’ve noticed a large increase of parents using tablets and phones as a constant babysitter. These children are so emotionally attached to their screens that they will tantrum until they have access to their screen again.
Yeah, it sounds real high to me. Perhaps the criteria is have ever seen a tt video.
Now yt, easily > 50%. It’s practically a babysitter. Putting cocomellon in front of your 3yo to get 30 minutes of peace is a parental guilty pleasure.
Tweens, sure. IG, TT, whatever.
I turned out perfectly fine without a phone until age 15, and I’m 17 now, I don’t really use social media other than reddit, Lemmy and YouTube on my phone and I barely use it, since I’m more likely to use my iPad at home exclusively.
I feel as though more parents need to do the same mine did, restrict access to smartphones until ages the kid is more likely to explore the world more, specifically for safety, but still teach them to concentrate on stops while on public transport, on where they walk, etc. and not use their phone on the go apart from when time is able to pass and be stationary.
I cringe at the fact kids a third or less my age are allowed phones, I shouldn’t even be allowed since my brain is still developing, i cant imagine the levels of braindead these children will be when they get to my age, since people my age are already horrific enough…
I was given a phone quite young but completely discarded it after I bought myself a thinkpad. No need for it when I can be comfortable on my Arch setup. I think the amount of brain damage could be severely reduced if they only had access to a family PC or something. Most kids probably wouldn’t even touch the PC until way later.
…which starts with P which rhymes with T which stands for trouble.
Mothers of River City is your son starting to buckle his knickerbockers below the knee?
Why would using a phone affect brain development negatively? We aren’t talking about children sniffing Ketamine or drinking a fifth of vodka here.
Socialization is a slow process. Many people who have good families and rich environments still have problems learning how to have face to face conversations. Look how many people on this site talk about not wanting to have a conversation over the phone or talk to a stranger in a shop.
What does this have to do with smartphones and the internet? The internet is a means of gathering information first, and a form of communication second. I don’t get what socialization has to do with the first one. If you want people to be comfortable communicating on the internet (or via phone or whatever) then presumably they need to start earlier.
As for people struggling with phones, that’s because a) lots of people here are autistic, and b) voice phones are not an ideal form of communication anyway. Either way the answer is practice, not shying away from the problem.
the answer is practice,
There are only so many hours in the day. If a child spends eight hours a day glued to the phone, they aren’t going to learn social skills.
Okay first who said eight hours? I am not saying there shouldn’t be limits, just that banning the internet completely is a bad idea. Second communicating with technology is an essential social skill in itself, and being able to use technology and apply critical thinking to things you read is absolutely essential. Lots of people work from home using technology. Almost everyone will have to use technology to do research e.g. in college.
Socialization is a slow process. Many people who have good families and rich environments still have problems learning how to have face to face conversations. Look how many people on this site talk about not wanting to have a conversation over the phone or talk to a stranger in a shop.
That’s my original comment. Never said anything about banning the internet.
Yes in a thread about banning kids from having smartphones, which are the main way people access the internetwork nowadays.
well since social media can affect attention spans negatively, as I’ve observed with myself recently, I don’t think the effects of such would translate positively into social or educational circumstances, arguably the most needed situations in a child’s life at that time, even if they are almost an adult.
sure, alcohol and drugs do still affect a child quite intensely, though I’m saying that, is social media and the endless dopamine harvesting NOT a drug? if you think about it, it extracts, makes a person want to come back for more, causing addiction, further extracting more, losing its effectiveness and making it almost impossible to quit from there.
people may say it isn’t addictive, but its just that it isn’t as noticeable since it is a society-wide phenomena which is seen as positive.
sure, alcohol and drugs do still affect a child quite intensely, though I’m saying that, is social media and the endless dopamine harvesting NOT a drug? if you think about it, it extracts, makes a person want to come back for more, causing addiction, further extracting more, losing its effectiveness and making it almost impossible to quit from there.
I don’t think you understand what drugs are or can do. They don’t all just blindly increase dopamine. They have many other effects on the mind and body that social media does not. This whole concept of dopamine detoxes and addiction = dopamine needs to die too. It’s not based on solid scientific understanding as addiction is far more complex than this and comes in multiple, separate forms. Even drugs like amphetamines that primarily interact with the dopamine system don’t always lead to addiction (ask anyone with experience of ADHD meds). Thinking dopamine is only about addiction and vice versa is like thinking electricity is only for heating and that all heating must be done using electricty.
Raising children without access to the internet is both backwards for their education and actively dangerous. The internet has allowed minors in bad situations to escape or get help multiple times. It’s also made people realise their parents or guardians are insane or abusive including those who are members of dangerous religions and cults, are homophobic, or are abusive for other reasons. School in some countries is also packed full of propaganda, and even when it isn’t they can’t always help and are sometimes a source of abuse themselves. Restricting access to information isn’t a good thing.
social media isn’t the phone’s fault.
it seems like you’ve confused hardware and software.
no, I’m not confused at all, I am meaning that the smartphone is the most accessible way to utilise social media, meaning due to its formfactor, it is the most convenient way to access it.
are you more likely to use a desktop PC using android x86 (just an example) or use a smartphone? its almost like using a smartwatch to use Photoshop, its not the same as using a desktop, you know what I mean?
You are not a clever man.
If you were in any way correct, we should be banning cars and trucks from the USA, because they’re the most accessible way drugs are transported. To stop drugs, we should ban cars. Cars are making it far too easy to get that nose candy.
Yeah, no. Hardware has nothing to do with this.
(I’m not even going to start with how insane your mentioning android x86 is; like somehow that esoteric version of an OS has something to do with social media. I’m guessing you think everything uses apps, and social media doesn’t run through web pages?)
You don’t need to run Android x86 to access a social media site on a computer. What are you talking about?
im just giving an example that has the same software, im not saying its better or that you need it.
except they don’t have the same software. Phones use ARM, not x86.
(amusingly, if you had just said “Android”, you would have seemed less insane. still insane, since you could have just said ‘linux’, but less. But even saying that would still make you insane, since the operating system isn’t the social media, and isn’t what you were talking about.)
Hopefully not for much longer
Nah, social media is like a hydra. Another “TikTok” will just be born from the ban.
Nothing is changing drastically until we have better data protection laws.
Ban all Chinese/Russian social media companies. GG EZ.
Edit: sorry my bad, I didn’t realize you were one of the people that thinks all social media is the same.
You realize that tik toks sole purpose is to brainwash western youth right? This is propaganda 101.
Algorithm “okay kids remember, America bad and China number 1”
Chinpokemon all over again…
not anymore
I dunno I’m just gonna drop a 50 minute video link on this one and bounce, 'cause if I chronically post my dogshit opinions every time one of these boomer ass articles gets posted here and gets upvoted a million times by the masturbatory elder millennial ex-redditor linux userbase, then I’m gonna be here for a fuckin eternity
