Watched an interesting Ken Burns documentary on Prohibition the other day. At the time of banning alcohol it was blamed for all kinds of complex social issues, from the breakdown of the family to the loss of moral rectitude. Really, though, it was just a very visible scapegoat for things like changing economic structures (industrial revolution) and social structures (immigration).

To whit, my take is that the smartphone is the new opiate of the masses only to the extent to which it (and social media) are the newest things we like to blame for far more complex social problems.

Prediction: banning smartphones won't stop kids from being depressed, nor will regulating Facebook fix extreme nationalism.