To think parenting with screens is becoming completely normalised

[Minimalistmamaoftwo]

my husband and I were travelling with our two children on a ferry over the weekend. It’s an eight hour journey, our children are 4 and 1. We had brought lots of books/coloring/games and a Tonie (with headphones) as backup if they got really tired.
there were a family next to us about our age with slightly older children, maybe 6 and 3. The children were on their iPads for the entire eight hour journey. The mum read a book, the dad was on his phone with headphones in, they also played cards together while the children sat next to them plugged into headphones. We were absolutely astonished. It just felt like they were just relaxing and doing whatever they wanted and had completely absolved themselves of parenting because the iPads were doing it for them.
Just to note before people respond with the usual points, no suggestion they were ND and the argument that parents need a break can surely not be applied for eight hours whilst completely ignoring their children. I just felt really sad for them and worried for society

I was referring to @HettyMeg's post with that comment.

Although personally, I don't care what other people do with their kids on public transport so long as they're not causing a nuisance. It would be an unusual 3yo ime who would actually put up with being plugged into a device for 8 hours. I'd take a toddler on a tablet over one kicking my seat for hours any day.

If ipads have any use whatever, stopping us fantasising about booting other people's (or even our own) annoying kids overboard must be quite high up the list.

I agree.

Apologies @CrispieCake
surely it’s not an either or though, I wouldn’t accept that kind of behaviour from my kids and I wouldn’t give them the iPad for eight hours. I agree it was very unusual which is why it was noticed and I agree with a poster upthread who said it’s likely because they are either never on it and it’s a novelty or always on it and are accustomed to spending hours entertained in that way. Either way my point was that it’s objectively terrible for a three year old to be on an iPad for eight hours while her parents ignore her and enjoy leisure time themselves whether it’s once or daily. We should all care because this is a generation of kids, from a totally selfish perspective my children will have to go to school with children who have shorter attention spans, struggle to follow instructions and who are exposed to inappropriate content earlier so it’s an everyone problem

You sound quite judgmental OP!

That is foreign to me as mine couldn’t sit still for more than 8 minutes never mind 8 hours until she was around 6 years old.

@jumpintheline but this is ridiculous, of course I’m judging, it was horrible. I think it’s crazy that there isn’t more judging. We have a generation of children with the worst mental health, something is going very wrong. People being fearful of judgement is what controls society, if we don’t fear the judgement of others there is no reason for people to conform to societal norms. If it is normalised, as it increasingly is, to have no respect for teachers and education then the education system will fail, as it is doing. If is is normalised for children to spend their waking hours on screens while their parents sit next to them ignoring them then it will be detrimental to a whole generation of kids

@Lesleyann25 my four year old would probably do about 15 minutes before he would get restless, it was very strange to see this tiny child just glued to the screen tapping away

I would find seeing that strange as my DD would be bouncing around non stop. Could not even take her to the cinema until she was around 7 because she would get up and wander off.

Their children sound very unusual. There's clearly some sort of issue there. Even with the offer of unlimited screen time, my kids would get ants in their pants after a while.

I couldn’t agree more but it’s a small minority of people with this opinion.
I grew up in the 80s and to be honest it wasn’t a great home life but Thank god we had a neighbourhood full of kids to play outside with.
I feel that the effects of screens instead of interaction is going to become shockingly apparent in the next 10 years or so and hopefully new laws brought in to put an end to it.

@OoLaOoLa I hope so too, it’s already recommended that children 2-5 only have an hour of screen time a day but I don’t think many people adhere to it. I think it’s really sad that there is currently a thread about a four year old touching a toy in a toy shop and the majority of responses saying how unreasonable the mum and her child are to expect to be able to touch toys in a toy shop and yet there are pages of people here saying it’s completely reasonable to give a three year old an iPad for eight hours whilst completely ignoring them. I feel like a lot of people in the UK just really don’t like children and expect them to just be kept quiet, as a society we’re more tolerant of dogs than kids which is depressing

When we go on holiday, me and my dds watch our ipads for the majority of the flight. Apart from then they barely touch them, they use kindles at night before sleep, might look at their phones a bit through the day in the shade.

I don't think I'm a bad parent, although mine are older at 11 and 13

Genuine question, Has there been any real study done that proves someone who is ND is better off in front of a screen, What is the actual benefit?
My useless mum has let my brother be home schooled (except there was very little schooling happening) because he is autistic. He is 23 now, has no friends and spends all day playing Xbox. She has literally let him sit in his own little computer world whilst continuously telling him.. You can’t manage. She probably thinks she’s done right by him, I think it’s disgusting.

Eight hours is not "a snapshot" come on 🤣

They're (going) on holiday, on a boat, don't tell me there was nothing 2 parents could think of to occupy their kids for SOME of that time?

OP, we get the ferry a lot with our kids. I find your reaction a little OTT; everyone copes with these long travelling days in ways that suit their family. For us by the time we’ve even got to the ferry we’ve been driving 4 hours playing ten thousand rounds of eye spy. We’ll take tablets with us and they have them whenever they want on the ferry; we do always book a cabin now too just for the space and a lie down, they’ll go to the play area for a bit but I find most of them are crap. So yes, they can be long tablet days but that’s all we use them for. If these kids had a game on their tablet or watched some films to pass that time is that so terrible? We all sit and watch films for hours on planes.
Also, how on earth do you know, as you mention, the parents ignored them for 8 hours - were you sat next to them the entire time?

Yes, it's lazy parenting. We had a similar length ferry crossing recently and DC spent an hour exploring the boat/looking at the view/asking questions etc; 2 hours in the on board cinema; and hour with us eating in the restaurant; an hour reading and an hour on the iPad. I felt that the 3 hours of screen was not ideal but not bad either. 8 hours of sitting looking at a screen and not interacting with other people is unnatural and storing up all sorts of problems for the future if a reflection of how they parent normally (before people jump in with the 'snapshot' argument - 8 hours is not a snapshot).

First post nailed it

Yes , would 8 hours reading have been okay ? My niece is learning Cantonese on Duolingo on her iPad . It’s easy to judge when you don’t know the full circumstances

Matt Groening spent his entire teenage watching tv so thought he should make a career out of it!

Yes, it's lazy parenting. We had a similar length ferry crossing recently and DC spent an hour exploring the boat/looking at the view/asking questions etc; 2 hours in the on board cinema; and hour with us eating in the restaurant; an hour reading and an hour on the iPad. I felt that the 3 hours of screen was not ideal but not bad either. 8 hours of sitting looking at a screen and not interacting with other people is unnatural and storing up all sorts of problems for the future if a reflection of how they parent normally (before people jump in with the 'snapshot' argument - 8 hours is not a snapshot).

OK.. but my kids have been on multiple 4-20 hour ferry trips most years.. Cinema is worse than ipad in some ways (can't move, must keep quiet, forced to watch whatever they have with no choice), I don't think I could spend an hour eating - 15-20 mins max, plus a card game if we really don't want to go back to the cabin yet. We've seen the boat. We've seen the restaurants and the shop and the deck and out the windows at the water 10s of times.

What I find particularly funny, is I also know there was all this panic when books became widely available - that it was ruining the children's eyes, stunting their physical and mental growth etc.

Just because you don't have the skills and imagination to do anything other than watch tv on an ipad, and think that means the kids are un-stimulated (or over-stimulated), and aren't socialising (with each other, or parents), doesn't mean that others of us don't have a different set of abilities that mean 8 hours on an ipad is a world of variety (and socialisation.. with each other, and their friends other places)

@OoLaOoLa I'm not sure about studies but I have read a book by an autism expert which said screen time can be beneficial for ASD kids. My autistic son likes to play a lot of Minecraft after school, which can be very creative and requires problem solving skills. I would not want him on it all day though and we do play physical old-fashioned games together as well

I’m not fearful of judgement. I just think - to each their own. It’s one ferry ride.

This