4 ms·

I think it is too blunt; the sort-of truth around the matter is that the "stuff you have to stop doing" is often entirely out of reach for most parents. In man

I think it is too blunt; the sort-of truth around the matter is that the "stuff you have to stop doing" is often entirely out of reach for most parents. In many families, the adults are both working full- or overtime jobs, the children are at school or in school-adjacent activities (commuting, extracurriculars, homework, etc.) for 9+ hours per day, and 90% of parent-child interactions are rule-reinforcement (Did you do your homework? Did you put your shoes away? Haven't you already used your screens for an hour?) Actual concrete advice, which is "have one parent leave the workforce so they have more time to parent, reject destructive social norms at the family level, and move away from bad social environments" is not only financially impossible for most, but for those that it is possible for may find that they still can't reach their children, because their children have already adopted a "reject-parent" identity and will continue to prefer online-and-friends over offline-and-family. The most useful advice that I think that any parent can take is to learn about what the world is really like to a kid or teenager, not what it appears to be [1]. It is very difficult to do this, because you have to enter a mindset where a child is not a subsidiary of their parents, but rather a totally foreign and separate entity, capable of the same depths of rage, cruelty, laziness, vindictiveness, passion, joy, etc. [2] No Gen-X parent I know models their kids like this; they reserve the true spectrum of emotion for themselves and their age cohort, and treat their children as less-able to think and feel. [1] = (http://www.paulgraham.com/addiction.html#:~:text=The%20world%20is%20more%20addictive,did%20in%20the%20last%2040 http://www.paulgraham.com/addiction.html#:~:text=The%20world....) [2] = As a example, I often hear parents discuss with amazement the shenanigans that their kids (even up to and around pre-teen) will pull when video games are restricted: full-body tantrums, claims of hatred, physical violence, etc. From the parents' perspective, their child is being completely unreasonable and upset over inconsequential things, but the parent is assigning their own assessment of consequence to the video games, and not accepting their child's version. To the child, these games often represent the only hours in their life when they feel excited, proud, and free; to deprive them of this gives them the short-term chemical emotions that an adult might feel if their house burned down.

A4ET8a8uTh0 5y ago
This. We are above average US earnings for the region and we do not feel comfortable leaving current dual income setup. It is ridiculous, because on paper, we should be able to. The simple reality is that we will need to make some adjustments to make it happen though, because we both see it as a desirable outcome. I have yet to deal with real child issues ( and I know I was a terror to my parents ), but having time is a pre-requisite to not slap a simple 'solution' on the problem.
- quacked 5y ago
  I am sorry to hear that but I am also not surprised. Time, money, and support from other friends/family are essential for avoiding serious internal family strife, and those are the three resources that are stripped from by any go-getter in a wealthy country merely by the act of moving up in the world.
bnralt 5y ago
> From the parents' perspective, their child is being completely unreasonable and upset over inconsequential things, but the parent is assigning their own assessment of consequence to the video games, and not accepting their child's version. To the child, these games often represent the only hours in their life when they feel excited, proud, and free; to deprive them of this gives them the short-term chemical emotions that an adult might feel if their house burned down. True, but I'm sure a heroin addict would say the same thing about being deprived of heroin. At a certain point it's a parent's duty to limit destructive addictions. And these social media networks and games are made to be extremely addictive, companies spend billions of dollars on this goal. Part of the problem is, like you've said, most kids are going to be spending a lot of their time not with their parents, but with other kids. You can tell them what you want at home, but then you're sending them off to a school full of addicts, almost all of whom are exerting an immense social pressure on your kid to partake.
- quacked 5y ago
  > At a certain point it's a parent's duty to limit destructive addictions. And these social media networks and games are made to be extremely addictive, companies spend billions of dollars on this goal. Yes, I agree. I actually typed out a bit about my own experience with playing Gameboy at 10 and comparing it to drinking and partying at 21, but I didn't end up appending it to my comment. It's one of those things that parents don't get--modern stuff (video games, social media) is like heroin for kids. You can't just give them "an hour of heroin time" per week and then expect them to think about anything else for the periods of time you suspend them from it. When I was younger, I could think about playing Donkey Kong Country for literal days at a time. I'd imagine levels in my head, draw pictures, stare at old video game ads, hum the music to myself, and once I made a cardboard Gameboy and pretended to play it to scratch the itch. My life was measured as blocks of time in between playing DKC. My parents didn't get how single-minded I was and thought that by "restricting it" they could redirect my attention to other, more wholesome things. Impossible. I am so thankful I didn't have unlimited internet access or Fortnite when I was younger.
  - nonbirithm 5y ago

A4ET8a8uTh0 5y ago

This. We are above average US earnings for the region and we do not feel comfortable leaving current dual income setup. It is ridiculous, because on paper, we should be able to. The simple reality is that we will need to make some adjustments to make it happen though, because we both see it as a desirable outcome. I have yet to deal with real child issues ( and I know I was a terror to my parents ), but having time is a pre-requisite to not slap a simple 'solution' on the problem.

quacked 5y ago
I am sorry to hear that but I am also not surprised. Time, money, and support from other friends/family are essential for avoiding serious internal family strife, and those are the three resources that are stripped from by any go-getter in a wealthy country merely by the act of moving up in the world.

bnralt 5y ago

> From the parents' perspective, their child is being completely unreasonable and upset over inconsequential things, but the parent is assigning their own assessment of consequence to the video games, and not accepting their child's version. To the child, these games often represent the only hours in their life when they feel excited, proud, and free; to deprive them of this gives them the short-term chemical emotions that an adult might feel if their house burned down. True, but I'm sure a heroin addict would say the same thing about being deprived of heroin. At a certain point it's a parent's duty to limit destructive addictions. And these social media networks and games are made to be extremely addictive, companies spend billions of dollars on this goal. Part of the problem is, like you've said, most kids are going to be spending a lot of their time not with their parents, but with other kids. You can tell them what you want at home, but then you're sending them off to a school full of addicts, almost all of whom are exerting an immense social pressure on your kid to partake.

quacked 5y ago
> At a certain point it's a parent's duty to limit destructive addictions. And these social media networks and games are made to be extremely addictive, companies spend billions of dollars on this goal. Yes, I agree. I actually typed out a bit about my own experience with playing Gameboy at 10 and comparing it to drinking and partying at 21, but I didn't end up appending it to my comment. It's one of those things that parents don't get--modern stuff (video games, social media) is like heroin for kids. You can't just give them "an hour of heroin time" per week and then expect them to think about anything else for the periods of time you suspend them from it. When I was younger, I could think about playing Donkey Kong Country for literal days at a time. I'd imagine levels in my head, draw pictures, stare at old video game ads, hum the music to myself, and once I made a cardboard Gameboy and pretended to play it to scratch the itch. My life was measured as blocks of time in between playing DKC. My parents didn't get how single-minded I was and thought that by "restricting it" they could redirect my attention to other, more wholesome things. Impossible. I am so thankful I didn't have unlimited internet access or Fortnite when I was younger.
- nonbirithm 5y ago