This is just the latest episode of “Blame the Tech” for why kids supposedly suck now. Telephones, rock music, comic books, TV, video games—every generation has its boogeyman. Now it’s smartphones. Honestly, I’m more curious what’s gonna freak everyone out next, but I’m definitely not losing sleep over “the kids.”
There’s the predictable boogeyman reactions. All phone/tablet use is bad. But that’s not what this article is about.
The other reactions are from those of us looking at measurable changes in kids behaviour, that started with the introduction of the smart phone, and can easily be explained by fairly solid studies linking it to the kind of media kids consume on these devices.
Phones/tablets can be both good and bad, like any technology. But the level to which it can be bad for us humans (not just kids) is on a completely different level.
It’s funny that you mention TV, because there’s a solid argument to be made that TV has also ruined a generation, but it doesn’t really hit until they get older, and start to be glued to day time TV, which rapidly deteriorates them physically and mentally, and has caused some serious political issues from having a huge block of voters voting based on companies trying to scare them all day every day with made-up issues so they stay engaged.
Now it’s not just old folks that have 24/7 access to addictive media. It’s kids, and depending on your job situation, working age adults as well.
The form that TV and (talk show) radio has taken in the last few decades in USA was perhaps the first iteration of the true underlying issue we have with phones/tablets: companies becoming way too good at keeping people from engaged, addicted, anxious and angry, all to make more and more profit above all else.
A new technology has made old modes of thought obsolete. A generation which grew up fetishising those things when they were young is now upset they are no longer valuable or meaningful.
Or to quote Socrates on the invention of writing:
>For this invention will produce forgetfulness in the minds of those who learn to use it, because they will not practice their memory. Their trust in writing, produced by external characters which are no part of themselves, will discourage the use of their own memory within them. You have invented an elixir not of memory, but of reminding; and you offer your pupils the appearance of wisdom, not true wisdom, for they will read many things without instruction and will therefore seem to know many things, when they are for the most part ignorant and hard to get along with, since they are not wise, but only appear wise.
I would say all modes of thought. Again, "Difficulty thinking or concentrating" and "Trouble learning new things".
> A generation which grew up fetishising those things
A generation? One generation? Which generation specifically are you saying fetishized thinking, concentrating, and learning new things?
> Or to quote Socrates on the invention of writing
You have to go back 2500 years to find someone else to dunk on? And do I need to point out that our knowledge of Socrates is based entirely on writing, mostly the writing of Plato, which you quote from and which consists of semi-fictional dialogues, thought experiments, not pure historical transcription?
I find nothing unchill in that exchange. Meta comment: people read emotion into things based on their interpretation, sometimes very incorrectly. I have found that assuming best intent moves most things forward. Of course, caveats exist.
One "trick" I try as a writer of sometimes-misunderstood comms is to avoid making statements about a person I am responding to. Instead of "you," I may sub in "someone" and I try to stick to events if possible.
Instead of "the best you can do is pull up an even from 2k years ago" to "an example from 2k years ago, surely we can find more recent events." (As a trite example). Note I moved away from isolating the other person and who they are to more broad language that let's us focus on the idea at hand, not the person who raised it.
I just want to note that this seems to be bad reasoning. There is no implication that because blaming all these technologies is perceived to have turned out to be mistaken, these new concerns must be mistaken also. Though I want to state that without providing an opinion on whether these concerns are warranted or not.
True to a degree, although I know from myself that if I had something resembling a computer in class, the result of my education would probably be different.
I believe there to be a difference between slide rule/calculator - calculator/smart phone that cannot be generalized.
This is a great point. To me, calculators are very rarely entertaining. A smart phone is mostly a device to deliver ads and entertainment, and allow communication.
This is different. It's nonstop, personalized, and built to keep you hooked. It's not about freaking out, just about setting some boundaries like we do with anything that can go overboard.
Not really, I literally feel the dopamine withdrawal myself when I'm not looking reddit or imgur, the craving its quite strong and I am 36 years old, just going to the bathroom without my phone feels like a chore, does that happen with other of the "boogyemans" you mention? I don't think so, I love rock since a very young age but never had too much of an urge to take my music to the bathroom, same with comic book, they do produce dopamine but in a much more spaced manageable way. I really can't imagine trying to handle that plus any sort of intensive education program.
It does seem like middle america has a new crisis every 10 years or so. That said, other than the "dungeons and dragons is gonna make everyone satanic" phase, I think there's often some truth to the concerns.
New technology changes the context for raising young people. Phones probably won't turn the globe into deliquents, but we do need to consider how to teach children long term focus, educate them to spot misinformation, and give them a whole bunch of skills they wouldn't have needed 15 years ago.
New technology probably won't stop the next generation from thriving, but the current generation of parents, teachers and voters completely ignoring new issues facing kids, and hoping they fix themselves, just might.
>but we do need to consider how to teach children long term focus, educate them to spot misinformation
The kids are already much better at spotting misinformation than the older generations are, as I'm sure anyone with boomer relatives on Facebook will have noticed.
That's a useful strawman for this issue, but you know as well as I do that none of those bogeymans were anywhere near as transformative as the smartphone. They were not networked, they were static, and they had limits (eg. TVs limited programming). They are incomparable to a never-ending firehose of stimulus, algorithmically engineered to be appealing to your personality and optimised for "engagement" (read: more screen time).
