To think we should spend less time policing 16/17 year old social media use and more time worrying about young children spending their childhood on iPads?

[Frenchspainiard]

Government has apparently announced a social media curfew on 16 and 17 year olds, I’m unsure how this will be policed but it seems insane to me. They can join the military, they have jobs etc. I personally had a child and moved out at 16.

The real issue from what I see is why do we allow people to buy tablets for young children especially toddlers who then become inactive asocial zombies?

The we in my comment was more what government should do. Because the thread title refers to a couple of things that have come direct from government.

I think children used to “fear”
authority figures so they did behave a lot better. If a child misbehaved, adults would tell them off, and this was accepted in society. Discipline definitely does help!!! Nowadays if you told a child off, you would get abuse from either the child, the parents or both.

People will use the argument that previous generations grew up watching lots of TV.
But there weren't as many channels back then, and children's programmes were only on at set times.
Everyone watched the same shows and talked about them at school or work the next day etc. It was much more restricted.
Totally different to watching TV now.

She was joking. DD called her a legend.

I was at pizza express last month and two parents and a child were eating. The child had an iPad on and was watching Peppa Pig while they all ate.

At Costa recently a mother and child were sitting eating and the child was watching something on her mum’s phone. No conversation or time to just look around at the world.

Very glad my children are in teens/ twenties and we didn’t have any screens (except a televisions) until they were 9/10.

All my Children have handed mobiles in overnight. I still remember seeing all the WhatsApp notifications from messages at 2/3am as classmates had access to their phones through the night. My youngest is 16 and isn’t allowed her phone overnight and screen time is monitored and capped. I agree with the ban but only if it is completely enforced as kids can always get around things. 🙄

Perhaps they should cut everyone's WiFi off from 12mn until 08:00. Up at 07:00 for physical jerks on Zoom then BBC propaganda until the workday starts.

Babies and children up to the age of 18 could be fitted with an electronic collar that interferes with phone/pad functioning so that they can't be used by them.

Only government mandated media content to be viewed by everyone.

I still see plenty of children in parks, walking around town, playing out and interacting where I am. You see the odd child in a cafe/restaurant or in a pushchair with one but it's not like WALL-E for goodness sake.

Completely agree with this.

As a secondary school teacher it's really obvious which kids have parents that issue tablets/phones as a parenting tool and have spent hours staring at a screen.

I'm not saying no screens - mine play things like Minecraft, but they play on creator mode and build stuff with friends. They also understand screen time is a privilege and not a right!

One Y7 child at homework club had nearly 40 hours of TikTok watching in one week when they showed us the phone usage.

My other pet hates:
-toddlers in pushchairs staring at a screen (classic definition of a chav?!?! how about interacting with your child?)
-Kids in restaurants on phones. (if they can't sit nicely at a table then don't eat out with them!)
-Kids watching things with the volume on (if they must have a screen, try headphones!)

Personally I think no child should have a smart phone until they're Y10, and agree with the measures in secondary schools to ban them.

what if eating out with is unavoidable? it could be grandma’s 70s birthday or great grandma is 98 and wanted potentially a last meal out with the whole family. or maybe both parents had errands all day where the kid had to go along so eating out was unavoidable. or they are on holiday? you are getting a very brief snapshot of their interaction with the child

Maybe we should follow in the footsteps of North Korea!!
The general public cannot access the global World Wide Web; instead, they use a heavily censored, state-controlled domestic intranet.

An even bigger issue: SCHOOLS GIVE IPADS TO KIDS!
Im serious. Ok my children both have mobile phones and switches. They are 8 and 12. Everything on them is strictly monitored and mirrors to my husbands phone or my phone. The primary school said when my oldest was in year 3, that all kids in school by 2027 needed to have iPads to learn. So it was either buy a particular iPad, let the school “tech team” (a totally incompetent teacher) loose on it or join in with the school “scheme”. I refused both options, yet my children have still been sent home with the bloody things. Luckily my kids leave them in their bags all afternoon/evening.
However. What made me really furious, last week the school did a play scheme thing (lining the heads pockets with more money) and “invited” parents (read; forced us) to come to school to see our kids play with the new space they have set up (apparently the truth is that new space and new toys are not allowed to be used at lunch or break and can only be touched by the year 6 prefects). They gave a presentation where they said “our research shows children spend an average of 5 hours a day on their iPads” well no shit, Sherlock, it couldn’t be because you are literally forcing them into the kids hands? And the whole school is in extreme handwriting interventions…it’s diabolical. Blame the parents for the shitty job the school are doing!

Similar I didn’t eat out until teens, had my first mcds at 16 and first takeaway delivery in my twenties.

I dont see the issue with tablets but like tv it shouldn’t be a constant. We let dc use a tablet from about age 6 but only for an hour a day (split) He uses the iPad at school significantly more though.

We can focus on young kids and teens. It’s not either/or as an pp said. Each age group use screens for different things which can be harmful.

Most teens at 16 are still living at home and aren’t moving out and having babies. They’re still children and we can still try to do what is best for them. Leaving them to have as much screen time as they like like would be silly.

Many parents aren’t setting boundaries or good habits so governments are trying to step in. It’s. Its not a bad thing.

I’m not sure you’re in a great position to be judging what is best for our 16 year olds as you were pregnant at 16 which isn’t great. Also, when your kid gets to 16, come back. You may have concerns about social media when you see the negative impacts on your child.

It’s crazy to argue against things that are trying to improve the lives of children regardless of their age.

It doesn't have to be one or the other. Really the government should do something about both. I do think teenagers is worse though, I work in a related field and the online content they are accessing is disturbing, harmful and dangerous. A toddler watching hey duggee over and over isn't great but it's not the end of the world.

Difficult to move out at 16 these days, not really anywhere to go.

I don't have the slightest problem with making things a bit more difficult for older teens to mindlessly scroll. In fact, on the back of this, I have changed the settings on my social media to no autoplay and set myself a daily limit.

Pretty much any teen will know how to go into settings and change it back, so it's hardly massively controlling. That said, it might give a few pause for thought and coupled with ban on social media for younger age groups, it's a step in the right direction.

Of course people should be worried about the screen time that toddlers have but judging from this thread, that's just not going to change.
Perhaps products aimed at kids should have the tightest settings as default rather than relying on parents to set them up.

Right, so Labour thinks that 16/17 year olds are old enough to join the army, have sex, and vote (for them!) but not old enough to have a scroll on Facebook at midnight?

Look, I don't completely disagree with this, but you can't suggest that they are adult enough to vote on one hand, then infantilise them on the other.

It's so inconsistent.

The aim is the same but, at least with colouring, reading etc your brain is active. Staring at a screen for hours on end mashes your brain.

@SunnyRedSnail this is where I do think being supportive rather than critical can help. My younger child was a nightmare in the pushchair and would screech and arch her back and generally refuse to sit in it.

It was fine; I didn’t need it because I drive. If I was reliant on public transport and faced a battle for just getting a bottle of milk I can see why it would be tempting to hand a phone over. And he deemed a chav, which is just a really, really horrible word.

An almost adult just be able to go into settings and change it if they want to scroll at midnight.

(I'd be inclined to want to tighten up the default settings for everyone but can't imagine that being popular!)

So talk to your children? Interact with them?

Show them the menu. Get them to guess what certain foods are. Ask them questions.

Most restaurants have kids menus to colour in.

Basically anything that is interactive. Be a parent.

I love eating out so have taught my kids how to behave in a restaurant. One has ADHD. Another other ASD. Yes it can be hard work but I chose to have kids so thats what I need to do.

I haven’t experienced any parents who were outraged at pizza or cake being at a party. Don’t think that’s a common scenario tbh.

I don’t think you should have to necessarily stare into your child’s eyes and sing 24/7 either but giving them toys and letting them play is better than staring at an iPad constantly also why do literal one year olds have iPads when they can be entertained by bashing some pots with a wooden spoon? Absolute insanity. And people will say they need to distract their kid but what do you think parents did for the rest of humanity before iPads were invented? Kids do not need iPads. Especially kids under 6

What do you suppose parents did before there were screens??

But why would they need u divided attention? Nothing wrong with leaving them to play with toys or run around the garden while you do something else keeping half an eye on them

I’m going to sound like an arse here but have you met a toddler? Mine haven’t been bad at playing independently but it’s in limited bursts, to say the least!

I have 2 toddler grandchildren. One 16 months one 18 months. Both can wander round front room or garden paying with various toys. They don't concentrate on anything for long obviously but just move onto next thibg