Boomers haven't had them for quite a bit longer. Wouldn't say it helped much.

You'll need to use a smartphone for most jobs nowadays, even just random dude in a supermarket.

Boomers haven't had them for quite a bit longer. Wouldn't say it helped much.

I don't disagree, but wouldn't it be better if society rejected that demand from capitalism and forced them to change because people aren't interested in using an app to shop in a fucking grocery store?

I still fall for it from time to time. I used to show them the headlines that caught me; they showed me the ones that caught them.

I think showing them how to use PiHole or some other content filtering would be useful. Empower them to shape their own world.

I like and understand where you're going, but I can offer some actual experience. I learned my legal first name at 8.

It didn't go down well (I cried because the teacher didn't call my name and sent me to the school office to get it sorted) and I had a weird complex about the real name into high school. There's no rhyme or reason to the two names, so it is actually sort of surprising to pair the two. To this day I still go by the nickname I thought was my real name. My nieces and nephews still enjoy discovering my real name and calling me by it thinking it's a big secret they've discovered. I still have to explain it a hundred times a year to new coworkers and acquaintances.

My kid is 3 but this has been a big issue on my mind lately. I’ve read The Anxious Generation, The Screentime Solution, and The Art of Screentime over the past 9 months (with some other tech-adjacent books). My husband has also recently had a turn-around on tech for kids. I think our big thing is no personal devices for the little one for a long time. Family computer in a common area. Family cellphone that can be used when she’s not with us. Family tv in the living room. Family iPad that is used for specific tasks.

Do you realize how hostile the outside is to non-adults? Like genuinely I've seen people call the cops because there was a kid riding a bike unsuprivized in a suburban neighborhood. Malls are dying and there's nothing to replace them as a meeting spot.

This isn't even getting into the seeming requirement to spend what feels like 100$ to see a movie now or any of the other stereotypical hang outs. Or how many people have parents that simply do not have time to drive them places.

I'm genuinely interested in your response because I genuinely think the world has become actively hostile to kids being kids.

You still have local second-run theaters where those still exist, plus parks and playgrounds where those haven't been ruined yet, and depending on where you live, there may even be various art/craft places to hang out at, splatter-painting places included in that, and some of the nicer parts of the country even have interactive museums that are kid-friendly (as in actually interactive, like the patrons can actually interact and play with the exhibits there).

Aside from those, yeah, there isn't much for kids to do. sarcasm, but also not really if you're in a *really* low-income part of the country where there really *isn't* anything to do, think of places like Appalachia for a good example of that extreme

What about onlinebanks? Also a hard no?

If I wanted to raise superhumans, I'd simply not give them smartphones until they turned 18.

I understand that it is harder to bond to someone who isn't immediately digitally available. I understand that "kids these days! " do their social stuff online, but at the same time, they seem to have largely lost all skill at interacting with real humans of slight or no aquaintence.

It is easy to make sarcastic comments on your phone about how stupid this or that is. The sterotypical basement dweller can snark all day. What takes social skill is actively engaging with people you don't care about and finding common ground.

Yes, digital people track some of this on facebook and such, but in real life: in which community groups do they participate? Do they know what their neighbors do and what they like beyond snapshots of events? That is: yeah, they saw that pic of that cookout, but did they know that he volunteer teaches English as a second language Tuesday and Thursday at the library? When was the last time they went into a neighbor's home (or had one visit theirs) to share a cup of coffee and complain about that road that needs fixing and who to push about it?

Edited to replace 'you' with 'they' so there'd be no confusion that I mean multiple 'you' readers rather than a single person.

You'll need to use a smartphone for most jobs nowadays, even just random dude in a supermarket.

My kid is 3 but this has been a big issue on my mind lately. I’ve read The Anxious Generation, The Screentime Solution, and The Art of Screentime over the past 9 months (with some other tech-adjacent books). My husband has also recently had a turn-around on tech for kids. I think our big thing is no personal devices for the little one for a long time. Family computer in a common area. Family cellphone that can be used when she’s not with us. Family tv in the living room. Family iPad that is used for specific tasks.

Maybe not a smartphone, I mean you can still use calls and texts to call out sick answer calls about job interviews.

But yeah you're not wrong in that smartphone do make life a lot smoother. For example if you want to check your payroll and w2 info, that is gonna require an app on a smartphone, and some of them even requires an app for 2fa because of (supposedly) the increase in fraud, and banking and job applications, while you don't need a smartphone for those, you're still gonna need access to a computer, so for someone without a computer, might as well get a smartphone instead of a dumbphone + a computer.

No, many jobs even trivial ones give you company phones so you can look stuff up, do inventory management etc

I recommend reading this article if you’re worried about this https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2025/08/kids-smartphones-play-freedom/683742/

I don't think you understand. Would it be nice if society was less dependant on phones for everything social? Sure. It is your kid's responsibility to evangelize to their peers that they have to? Absolutely not.

This isn't a societal question. This is about affording a kid a social life at all. If a kid doesn't have a phone when all their peers have one, there's no "oh well simply only go to events that are shared on something else than phones", because there are no such events. There's no "oh well only socialize with people who will make the effort to only have conversations in person", because there will be at best one kid in the entire school that also doesn't have a phone (hint: they'll be the "weird" kid).

This is equivalent to your parents saying "you may only talk to people at school, you aren't allowed to talk to anyone once you leave school." Surely you understand that this is a surefire way to completely ostracize and socially stunt your kid, and for what benefit? The only thing you gain is that you get to not parent your kid about safe internet use, a thing you really should be doing anyway because they're going to get internet access at some point.

Are you in EU? Because in America, that's not the norm.

To clarify, they do provide devices for things you do on the job, like scanning inventory for example, but not for the stuff you do outside of the job, stuff like checking your pay statements, schedule, and to call in sick, that's expected to be done on your own devices, because that's technically not needed for the job itself, even though its practically needed as a prerequisite for getting that job in the first place (Because how are you gonna fill out your job application? They don't even take paper applications anymore, its all done online. You'll need a phone number and some companies require an email address as well).

If your phone breaks after you got the job, that's fine, you probably won't have any problems if you work at a warehouse or fastfood place, but just hope you don't get sick and need that phone to call them (because "no call, no show" get you fired).