We’re going to look back and see smartphones as kids smoking cigarettes.
But outside of us uppity coastal elites, America doesn’t even look that badly on cigarettes. People still smoke them — over 10% of adults! You can buy them in nearly every gas station. If we hated them that much they’d be banned.
I don't say this to make a false equivalence, mainly in jest - I recognize TV is fairly mild and internet is a firehose by comparison.
Yet, we keep ignoring parents... and really, personal responsibility and simply the environment/impact that has. He raised himself like many of us do today.
This movie was a bit of a warning, then - decades ago. Except now we have phones, schools are even closer to day care/prison, and so on.
To avoid doing this will just perpetuate the idea that a child is the property of the parent and deserves to be the victim of their failings.
We can't control everything, but we can control how we react to it. He's a product of his environment, parents, and choices.
That's not to discount disadvantage. I get it. None of this is final or complete, it's a fucking movie metaphor