Most of the phenomenal technological advancements we’ve made over the last five decades are used well in good health care and making life safer and more convenient. Still, too many create discord in families and conflict for young people.
We’ve discussed some of this before. Personal phones are mixed blessings – a distraction from some of the most important things we do each day like playing with our babies, and from the simple but critical things we do each day like crossing streets or driving safely.
Three generations ago, radio became a double-edged sword. Teens crept out of bed to sneak downstairs and listen to “The Shadow.” Still, news and FDR’s “Fireside Chats” were revolutionary. Today, the 24-7-52 instant access to video games, television’s continual offerings, and endless posts on social media, many without the subjects’ permission, range from feeding personal vanity to being potentially dangerous (This also validates keeping cell phones off campus; there is official communication for emergencies), and we need to help teens develop independence, even from constant technology.
Too many of us have actually become oblivious to excessive media time, distracted students, and our own children segueing during family or study time. Unfortunately, many of us also don’t realize we are, ourselves, losing control over our own personal tech-time management. Acquiescing to technological distraction, we will forgo things more beneficial to us, our family, and our relationships. We abandon things that will enhance personal fitness, mental development, or goal accomplishment just to spend extra time gaming, binging a TV series or browsing social media.
I rarely open mass “forwards” on email. They’re usually political, inflammatory and lack research. However, years ago I received one from a family member who rarely sends them, so I read it. It turned out to be interesting. It compared the television to a house guest. In essence it asked, if a visitor in our home distracted family members, mesmerized our children, often pitted them against us, kept them from sports and studies, made them couch potatoes, and could potentially brainwash them, would we let that guest stay? Of course, we wouldn’t – at least, not without serious supervision, because the villain also has perks when controlled with discretion. It must be we, though, who are in charge and teach others to monitor, limit, edit and be in charge, too.
Though there are always wonderful exceptions, today’s tech has created, for too many, a need for constant, instant, superfluous communication, a dependency on “likes,” flattery and acceptance. It breeds vanity and creates an inability: to function alone; make decisions without feedback from a flock of friends; to be reflective, introspective, altruistic, pensive, inclusive, gregarious, to live outside the group; and grasp and enjoy the benefits of solitude and self-confidence.
All the evidence demonstrates growing dependency on constant and compulsive connection to tech and its presentations. We’ve all witnessed the dangers of cyber-bullying, the invasion of privacy, the publishing of personal or demeaning information and photos without victims’ knowledge. Additionally, there is the loss of priceless and critical personal interactions, including those that are developmentally essential to infants and toddlers.
Decades ago, before cell phones, laptops and video games on personal devices, my husband and I performed an involuntary experiment. Our television stopped working (they did that in those days); we didn’t know why and didn’t particularly care. Back then, televisions were small boxes one person could carry. So, we just put it in the basement, supposedly awaiting repair.
We had two children, both under 5, and, with them, we found ourselves baking bread, doing crafts, reading more, playing games, and doing all those projects that usually never get done. It was divine. Recently, history repeated itself when a young teen I know lost access to technology and was doing more art, baking, reading and playing board games to expert levels. People don’t change much. We can all rediscover the fine art of family and expressive living when we limit the distractions that were supposed to fill in gaps, not create chasms, and expand the life we live, not narrow it.
Television does occasionally deliver critical information. Technology is far more diverse than ever, often keeping us safe and in touch while traveling, and helping us with driving directions. Still, we must stay in charge.
After all, distracting us from monitoring tech exposure, usurping parental influence and guidance, or distracting kids from scholastics, or interests that create good physical and mental health isn’t something we’d let any house guest do.
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