Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

341–350 of 405 posts

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#341

Post by trinix912 »

OkayPhysicist wrote: post #177
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #56

>However, it's undeniable that at that age it's all about fitting in and it would likely make them feel like a bit of an outcast if I were to limit them from being a part of it, l Should homeschool. The elimination of peer pressure makes alot of these choices dead simple. "But all the other 11 yr olds are going to the 3am tattoo orgy" just isn't a counter-argument I'll ever hear in my household. The real trouble is t…

Homeschooling without a ton of extracurriculars with interaction with children their age makes your kids weird . It completely stunts their ability to socialize. I did fencing as a kid. It was basically a 50/50 split between homeschooled kids and private school kids. It was immediately obvious which were which, and the friend groups that formed were made almost exclusively of the private school kids and the smatterin…

Exactly, and additionally, it's not just about putting them into extracurriculars. You have to let them go outside and make friends without adult organization because that's what it's going to be like once they grow up and don't have your (or some organization's) help on every step. If you don't let them do this, you're hindering their ability to learn to make friends on their own. Which in turn is where the peer pressure eventually kicks in, because, "hey, all those kids outside..."

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#342

Post by flerchin »

Kids are an experiment that you run without a control group. You do the best you can with the information you have, from a place of love. That's it.

Social media is crappy and dangerous, and you keep them away from it until you are able to explain to them why it's crappy and dangerous. It's also everywhere. YouTube comments, HackerNews, Reddit, Roblox. All are various flavors of social media, many of which are hard to justify complete blockage.

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#343

Post by garrickvanburen »

giarc wrote: post #339
garrickvanburen wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So? There was a time when all the phone-based activities were separate objects and devices. But today, conveniently they’re all in a single device. Aggregate screen time is a useless measure and discrete screen time only matters to help diagnose when something has done wrong. If the kid is wildly successful what doors screen time matter?

That's looking at it with rose coloured glasses. And please don't come back with "maybe they are watching educational content on tik tok" because we all know that's not true. >22% of US teenagers spend 2-3 hours a day on TikTok [1] 1. https://explodingtopics.com/blog/time-spent-on-tiktok

How much time is appropriate? Who decides? What _should_ they doing instead? Who decides? Where does the kids agency during their discretionary time end?

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#344

Post by tokioyoyo »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #312
tokioyoyo wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Society is really fine! I live among millions of people every day, and people are genuinely kind and nice on average. It's up to you how you want to perceive the world, but I wouldn't want my neighbours to ever think people around them are lunatics and etc. I understand you're coming from a very American-specific point of view, which is very hard for me to comprehend. Growing up, I absolutely never had to worry (and…

>Society is really fine! Any healthy, long-term viable society has to prioritize one task above all others... making the replacement people that will be society once the current people die. Your society (if you choose to claim it) doesn't do this. Sub-replacement fertility. It's dying because of this. If you think that's fine, go for it. >I live among millions of people every day Sure. And each generation is about ha…

You judge people by the amount of kids they have? So like, if a couple has less than 3 kids, they’re awful people and shouldn’t be around?

Interesting take, if that’s the only way you look at people, and whether you want to be around them or not.

I agree we have fertility problems, but if people don’t have kids, well, that’s so not my business. Every person is different and has their priorities. If a person wants to have 0 or 10 kids, god speed to them.

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#345

Post by skydhash »

tisdadd wrote: post #307
herewulf wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's okay to be "the bad guy". They're your kids, not your friends. Too many parents want to be buddies with their kids these days. That's just setting everyone up for failure. My wife and I have a loving relationship with our kids but they are quite clear on the fact that we are not equals. The distinction will lessen as they reach adulthood and prove their responsibility.

I know that I have a great friendship as an adult with my parents, in part because they were parents while I was growing up. I had a friend ask what I would do in a situation and I wanted to yell be a parent! Said something nicer, but basically gently pointed out that sometimes that means giving up things you may want to do to show a good example. For instance, if you are always on social media then of course they wi…

Pretty much this. My farther was strict on on the kind of behavior he did not tolerate (and made them explicit early). No compromises. We were aware of the lines and the closer we tread to them, the more he took on the role of authority. But after we became adult and there was no need for that authority role, we became quite good friends with each other. My mother rarely had to take up on that role, but there was still clear separation between children and parents.

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#347

Post by mwigdahl »

stephenhuey wrote: post #127
ryandrake wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 2. The gorilla in the room is that most adults can barely handle online media. I think this is the huge one. Kids can spot hypocrisy easily. You can't convince a kid to not get addicted to social media if you yourself are addicted. Just like children of smokers know their smoking parents telling them not to smoke are full of shit. I do it by 1. not using social media and 2. when I do use my phone, set a good exampl…

My wife reminds me of this. And as you both pointed out, it's not just social media, but the algorithmically fueled addiction to endless content. A relative told me their teenagers have to use Chromebooks in middle school, and all quizzes and tests and homework are done on the computer. Not only that, but if they finish a quiz or test in the classroom, they're allowed to sit there and watch YouTube right there in the…

When my oldest was going into middle school the district started providing devices for the kids to use in class. There was breathless hype about how this would usher in a new age of technological competence and improved pedagogy. I asked the district IT folks in attendance what types of controls they had in place to prevent misuse -- watching YouTube, open browsing of the web, etc. They had literally nothing in place.

You can guess how that went.

I love Vernor Vinge's works, but the worst prediction of his ever, just 180 degrees totally in the wrong direction, was _Rainbow's End_'s treatment of technology in education. His take (and this was as late as 2006!) was that unfettered access to technology would turn elementary students into a cohort of genius autodidacts. Fast forward to 2025 (coincidently the date the book is set in) and unfettered access to technology has turned children into feed-consuming zombies.

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#348

Post by jacobgkau »

tokioyoyo wrote: post #344
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Society is really fine! Any healthy, long-term viable society has to prioritize one task above all others... making the replacement people that will be society once the current people die. Your society (if you choose to claim it) doesn't do this. Sub-replacement fertility. It's dying because of this. If you think that's fine, go for it. >I live among millions of people every day Sure. And each generation is about ha…

You judge people by the amount of kids they have? So like, if a couple has less than 3 kids, they’re awful people and shouldn’t be around? Interesting take, if that’s the only way you look at people, and whether you want to be around them or not. I agree we have fertility problems, but if people don’t have kids, well, that’s so not my business. Every person is different and has their priorities. If a person wants to…

> So like, if a couple has less than 3 kids, they’re awful people and shouldn’t be around?

Wow, what a strawman. No, that's not what he said.

What I will say, though, is if a "couple" has no kids (and does not plan to), they aren't contributing to continuing society and should not receive tax or other marriage benefits.

That's not a punishment, it's treating them the same as everyone else because they have the same burdens as anyone else (and can already take advantage of pooling resources for their earthly pleasure without society bankrolling it). Tax and other financial structure benefits for married couples were meant to encourage and support the raising of families (continuing society), and between several different (and individually well-meaning) social movements, we've lost the plot over the last half-century. Marriage has turned into "best friends with benefits +," which, again, is fine for people to choose if they want to see it that way, but does not deserve any subsidies.

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#349

Post by jacobgkau »

tokioyoyo wrote: post #305
jacobgkau wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yet we find ways to sit down, have a drink, go for a drive, or have sex from time to time. US born & raised, here. No we don't. I'm 26, have never had a drink, and have never had sex in this country. (ETA: By societal standards, I'm considered "doing well.") You do not understand the severity of the problem.

I'm sorry to hear that. Nobody is really stopping you to have a drink at the bar by yourself though. The above commenters might not like to be associated with those type of "lunatics", but I still think that an average person is good. It is nice to be just around other average people, even if one considers themselves higher than others.

Gotcha, so to borrow a page from your blowing other peoples' arguments out of proportion elsewhere in the thread... your solution to society crumbling is to be an alcoholic by going to the bar and drinking alone. You're right, it's "really fine" after all!

Re: Ask HN: How do you prevent the impact of social media on your children?

#350

Post by jacobgkau »

hsbauauvhabzb wrote: post #320
jacobgkau wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These days, it also serves to encourage people to build worldviews around fictional scenarios much the same as social media encourages building worldviews around fictional information.

Implying it wasn’t always that way?

As you said, the psychology of marketing and retention is far more widespread today than it was when TV was invented. Would you agree news stations today report differently than they did 50 years ago? That's a very obvious transition. The transition of how fictional programming has changed is less obvious, but still there-- and the amount people watch (and allow it to shape their personalities) has changed, too.
Post reply on HN