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Comment by aeraea | Hacker News Reader

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It is troubling just how many intelligent, educated parents I see are perfectly happy to give children and babies a tablet or phone to placate them.

On the other hand, have you thought about the difficulties of handling this as a principled parent?

You can either turn your child into a social pariah during key developmental years, or spend hours of your and their lives trying to regulate a device that is designed to capture and waste your attention (something I personally rejected as an equal waste of my time and effort, when I took my journey to no smartphone), or do what almost every other parent does, and just give your kids a smartphone.

I think the problem likely goes deeper - most of the parents are likely smartphone addicted already, so they see no issue with it. Or they may see the issue with their child's usage of a phone, but they justify their own constant need for using a phone with it being "for work" or what have you and the child is just following in their example as they constantly see them pulling out their phone.

I'm not a parent yet, and I don't have any answers..but as a 90's kid I can't imagine what it is like now growing up with access to all the world's information in your pocket.

> I can't imagine what it is like now growing up with access to all the world's information in your pocket.

"All the world's information" isn't really the problem; it's having all the world's bullshit, vitriol, manipulation, and general madness in your pocket.

I recently saw my niece with her six month old child. Obviously the baby doesn't have a phone yet, but they seemed fascinated by their mum's obvious interest in her phone.

Should we have blame the parents for kids smoking cigarettes and juuls when are corporations targeting them as a means to get rich? Obviously parents need to get involved to correct things, but blaming them for the outcomes of another party's schemes is cruel

Partially. There are things we can clearly blame corporations for, and things we can clearly blame parents for.

Social media addiction is something parents need to fix, but corporations are not helping. However, it's not inherently the fault of corporations, just like kids smoking cigs.

I don't blame parents for being overworked, exhausted, and not having the time to devote to their kids due to the factors I mentioned. When costs of living skyrocket and costs of raising kids becomes completely unaffordable, I don't blame parents for working more and more just to put food on the table. They also need their own time to recharge and be able to breadwinners without completely burning out. They aren't completely aware of everything their kids do, or what the cool kids in school are doing (and why their kids want to copy said cool kids). It is the parent's job to educate their kids, yes, but sometimes parents are too late to the party to actually effect change.

I don't blame corporations for acting in their best interests, and the best interests of their shareholders. Businesses have to make money. Not everything in the business world has to be ethical, good for society, or morally just, no matter how much we'd like it to be.

There is no magic bullet, but imposing restrictions on corporations seems to be a good start.

It also encourages helicopter parenting - which has its own downsides.

They've also not talked to any kids and tried to ascertain which proportion of the kids involved 1) see it as a problem, and/or 2) exhibit behavior that suggests it might be a problem. It's pure speculation until they've actually asked follow-up questions. An article about the results of Dr Rich, quoted towards the end, sounds like it'd have had far more meat on it, but given it's The Guardian they'd lose the hook of it being about "almost half of British teens".

I agree with your sentiment but at a certain point it's just impossible for a few parents to push back on the behemoth that social media has become with children.

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