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My 16 years old will be pretty independent. He'll have a car and a motorbike. He'll be able to go out by himself, experience real people. He'll be able to work
by eeks 9y ago
My 16 years old will be pretty independent. He'll have a car and a motorbike. He'll be able to go out by himself, experience real people. He'll be able to work odd jobs, manage his own money, read whatever books and learn whatever things he wants.
But he won't have a smartphone or unsupervised internet access. Neither provide independence, but shackles to kilotons of the worst quality content humanity has ever created.
- gaius 9y agoAbsolutely. It’s sad the other comment that equates a smartphone with independence. Infact it is the exact opposite.
- toredash 9y agoAh yes, teengers with a car. That's smart.
- kgwgk 9y agoWho will supervise his internet access when he goes out by himself?
- smileysteve 9y agoNot knowing about your 16 year old; but it will be significantly difficult to deal with the peer pressure and peer influences unless you live in a different culture. The studied reason millenials were less likely to drive is not because cars got harder to afford or high school jobs harder to come by, but because of lack of interest (thanks to smart phones) Even if you don't give your children a smart phone, they're going to be exposed to this behavior from their friends. And there are already articles of children who buy "burners" to keep their privacy from their parents.
- Sileni 9y agoOwned a burner in 2006 when I realized my parents were going through my call logs. Thankfully, back then they weren't clever enough to realize they could download my text logs. Considering a smart phone can be bought for the equivalent of a month's lunch money today, good luck to anyone trying to keep one out of a kid's hands in ~2030.