4 ms·
Why are the moral panics always about the media diets of children? Let’s talk about old people for a minute. 1) They can be socially isolated in ways that few
by sevensor 2y ago
Why are the moral panics always about the media diets of children? Let’s talk about old people for a minute.
1) They can be socially isolated in ways that few children are. An unsupervised septuagenarian can go literal days without speaking to another live human being.
2) They’re more technologically competent than we give them credit for, certainly enough to spend days doomscrolling their politically aligned newsfeeds of choice. The generation who thought their CD-ROM drives were cupholders passed quite some time ago.
3) They have an outsized influence on politics. Not only do they vote more than any other demographic in the US, they are the most likely to turn up and harangue your city council or school board meeting.
Of course, nothing new under the sun, their parents’ generation was mainlining cable news and AM talk radio 20-30 years ago.
- mistermann 2y ago>Why are the moral panics always about the media diets of children? Let’s talk about old people for a minute. This same reasoning is highly applicable to how various "so terrible, they're a threat to X!" are constantly vilified, yet the Normies (who cause most of the problems) get a free pass. Rigged popularity contests are a terrible way to run a world, yet we insist on it.
- agency 2y agobecause children are undergoing a critical phase in their development that has no analogy for older populations? I'm not saying isolation among the elderly is not concerning, nor widespread phone/tech addiction among adults. But I think there’s ample reason to have particular concern for the effects on children.
- dasil003 2y agoLOL at “mainlining cable news and AM talk radio”.
- computerthings 2y agoWhy play kids and the elderly off against the other? How is there even a dichotomy here?