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Comment by jihadjihad | Hacker News Reader

Go to any park/playground sometime and observe the benches.

Go to any sports field/venue and observe the bleachers.

What you find may astound you, even if the percentage isn't literally 50%+.

If I'm in those situations and staring at my phone, it's because I forgot to bring a book. Staring into the middle distance while my kid sits on the bench for fifteen minutes and a bunch of kids I don't know ineptly play soccer, or closely watching my 500th hour of kids playing "tag", is a last resort. Hell sometimes I'll just start trying to find weird bugs or something.

I do also play with them, but I'm not one of the parents who's always playing with them any time they're playing, they also need space to figure their own stuff out. Adults can do other things a lot of the time, it's fine.

Taking your kid to a playground is a parents chance to get a break! Everyone judges parents constantly and blames them for everything, parents in general are doing their best.

It's legit kind-of great, because you can't be doing much productive, so the dozen things you should be doing (most of them due to kids...) if you were at home are out the window. You can just chill for a long stretch of time, without concern. Taking your kids to the park or whatever is awesome, it's one of the best breaks a parent gets during daylight hours.

Or you can knock out some schedule stuff or teacher-emailing or bill-paying or whatever that you'd otherwise have to cram in some other time, that's nice too.

I'm at those things. I don't see even 10% of people on their phones. Yeah people check in but I see involved parents.

Plus, these activities aren't causing missed education. I'm not teaching my kids math while they go on slides.

Parents aren’t supposed to be engaged when kids are engaging in free play at the playground or under the supervision of a coach. That’s the definition of a helicopter parent.

I find restaurants more eye-opening. Amount of toddlers being fed while their mind is zombified with a screen are astonishing. Parents don't want to put effort in engaging the child and screen is an easy legal drug.

Do you take your toddlers out to eat a lot?

Like yeah, waiting in the park while kids plays is the most boring thing in the word. You have to do it, so that kid is not licked inside whole day.

What exactly do you expect people to do there while doing nothing and while being interrupted every 6 minutes over yet another interesting rock?

Gen x’er. My parents didn’t help me with homework. I was expected to be independent. There was a culture shift in 2000s and we are involved daily with our kids and their homework. This is all anecdotal and I can’t find any studies on the subject.

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